Author's Craft Graphic Organizer – Notice, Quote, Explain

How it works

This author's craft graphic organizer is for a second read, when the question changes from what happened to how it was written. It is blank, so it fits a story, a poem, an article or a speech.

Read the full guide

One kind at a time

Stay with one kind of craft move for a whole text before mixing them. A class hunting only for word choice has one question to ask of every sentence: why this word?

Craft and Structure in the standards

The Common Core reading standards group three standards under the heading Craft and Structure: the meaning and choice of words, the structure of a text, and point of view. By 6th grade students analyze the impact of a specific word choice on meaning and tone.

For the why column, swap the author's words for plain ones and ask what is lost.
Quote only the words that carry the move. A few are often enough.

Questions and answers

What is author's craft?

On these sheets, author's craft means the choices an author makes about how a text is written: which words to use, what to compare, how to order the parts and who tells it.

What are examples of author's craft?

A strong verb where a plain one would do, a simile or a metaphor, alliteration or a repeated line, a flashback, a first-person narrator, a chapter that ends on a question. Each is a choice with an effect on the reader.

What is the difference between tone and mood?

Tone is the writer's attitude toward the subject and the audience. Mood is the feeling that the wording stirs in the reader. A story can be told in a calm tone and still leave the reader uneasy.

All 11 organizers

Notice, quote, explain 4

Author's craft graphic organizer: move, words, why A Title line over a chart of three columns and five rows: the craft move you noticed, the exact words from the text, and why the author did it. A line under the chart names four kinds of move to look for.
Craft move exit slips, two to a page Half sheets with a cut line between, each with three short boxes: what I noticed, the words, the effect.
Four kinds of craft, one example of each A box each for word choice, figurative language, structure and point of view, with a question under each heading.
One craft move, looked at closely Four boxes joined by arrows for a single choice the author made: name it, quote it with its page, say what it does to the reader, then say why the author chose it.

Show all 11 organizers (7 more)

One kind of craft 5

Craft in a poem: sound, lines, images A box each for the sound of the poem, its lines and stanzas, and its images, over a box for what those choices do for the poem.
Figurative language chart One row for each figure of speech: the words from the text, what kind of figure they are, and what they mean. A line under the chart names five kinds.
Structure: how one part fits the whole Three boxes joined by arrows for one sentence, chapter, scene or stanza: what it is, where it comes, and what it adds to the theme, the setting or the plot.
Tone and mood Tone beside mood, each over a box for the words in the text that create it.
Word choice: the author's word beside a plainer one One row a word or phrase: what the author wrote, a plainer word that could stand in its place, and what the author's word adds.

Use it in your own writing 1

Borrow a craft move for your own writing Three boxes joined by arrows: a move an author made, how it works, and a sentence of your own that uses it.

Filled-in sample 1

Sample author's craft organizer, filled in Four rows of the opening chart done for a made-up story, one row for each kind of move.

How this list was compiled: Our own layouts and wording; no publisher's organizer is copied. All sheets but the sample are blank forms. The grade wordings on word choice, structure and point of view were checked against the Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts, reading standards 4 to 6, and what tone and mood mean against the Wikipedia articles Tone (literature) and Mood (narrative), read October 13, 2026. The sample is about a made-up story. Licence: own work