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Reading and Writing 6-8 / Week 02 / Press Day
6/6
Week 02 · Theme and Central Idea

Press Day

Press Day: What It Is Really About
// What a text is really about
⏱ about 20 min

Press Day: What It Is Really About

The second issue of The Signal is stacked on the porch rail, folded and ready.

Raven's garden feature runs on the front page under the headline The Sign Works Backward.

Rocket hands the first copy to the gardener with the gray braid, who reads the headline and laughs out loud.

"You found what it was about," she says. "I only found the sign."

Theo takes a copy to the bench and reads it slowly, moving his finger along the lines.

Nova hovers above the stack, her light warm and gold. "Topic, theme, central idea," she says. "All three, in print."

Raven tucks a fresh index card into the garden feature. On it she has written: What is your story really about?

"Next week," Rocket says, "we find out what happens next. Plot. Characters. One story, all week."

  1. A topic is the subject in a word or two. A theme is an idea about life, written as a sentence.
  2. Details carry the theme: repeated actions, lines of dialogue, a change at the end.
  3. A central idea is the main point of nonfiction. A long piece can have two, developed in turn.
  4. A theme develops across the story: beginning, middle, end.
  5. An objective summary retells in order, in your words, with no opinions.
◇ READ IT ALOUD
Read your Writing Lab summary aloud to someone at home.
Ask them for one compliment and one question. Then ask them to listen for any opinion word.
Swap roles: they tell you about something they read this week, and you ask, "What is it really about?"
Try it
Fold a sheet of paper in half twice to make a four-page booklet.
Write your summary inside. On the front, write the theme or central idea as the headline.
PRESS DAY CHECK
  • Read the question.
  • Tap your answer.
A reader says, "This story is about a boat race." What has the reader named?
Which sentence belongs in an objective summary?
Where should you look to see how a theme develops?
StatementTrue or false?
The gardener found the theme of the feature herself.?
Raven's feature ran on the front page.?
Next week the crew reads one story across the whole week.?
WHY THIS EXERCISEThe gardener says she only found the sign. Raven found what it was about. Next week is plot and character.

Write it: finish your piece

Issue two is out. Next week: plot and character, one story told across five days.

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