Students must express their ideas through writing in every content area, so teachers employ different methods to help students organize their thoughts. While there are nuances across content areas, all informative and persuasive writing requires students to present and support an idea. 

How can we align our explanatory writing instruction across content areas while maintaining the nuances of each content area? 

Consider the examples below to see the types of writing tasks students are asked to do in different content areas.

Prompt: Why do we use soap to clean greasy dishes and not just water?

Student responses could:

• State that water alone cannot effectively remove grease, but when combined with soap, grease is eliminated.
• Describe observations from investigations, readings, and other relevant sources.
• Explain the scientific principles that prove soap is beneficial for cleaning grease.

Prompt: Who is to blame for the titular characters’ deaths in Romeo and Juliet?

Student responses could:

• Identify the character or group the student believes is responsible.
• Refer to key events or actions from the play, such as decisions made by specific characters or notable quotes.
• Explain the connection between the choices made and the tragic outcome.

Prompt: A bakery sells two different types of flour. Brand X comes in a 10-pound bag for $12, while Brand Y is sold in a five-pound bag for $7. Which flour offers the lower cost per pound?

Student responses could:

• Identify which brand of flour has the lower cost per pound. 
• Share how they calculated the cost per pound for each brand by dividing the total price by the weight. 
• Compare the results and explain which brand provides the better value based on the calculated costs.

A complete student response requires three key elements in every subject.

Responses must:

• Address the question
• Provide supporting information
• Explain how this support connects to the answer. 

In English Language Arts, we often call these elements “thesis, supporting details, and analysis.” In math, we may call them “answer, work, and explanation.” In science, we call them “claim, evidence, and reasoning” (CER).

• Claim: “a statement or conclusion that answers the original question or problem” (Zembal-Saul et al., 2013, p. 22).
• Evidence: “data that support the claim” (Zembal-Saul et al., 2013, p. 23). Data are observations, measurements, calculations, information from a text, etc.
• Reasoning: “justification that connects the evidence to the claim. The reasoning shows why the data count as evidence…” (Zembal-Saul et al., 2013, p. 24).

Since the CER framework is flexible enough to accommodate subject-specific nuances, we can use it as the writing method across subject areas. Using the same framework creates a consistent cognitive routine for students, which allows them to focus more on the grade-level content instead of digesting a new writing method. As we simplify the writing process for students, we can achieve more student engagement. 

Our UnboundEd Science team created a tool that scaffolds students as they prepare a written response in any content area. To maximize the benefits of the CER framework:

• Spend instructional time teaching the basics of the CER framework.
• Use the same language across subject areas so students become familiar with it.
• Allow students to use the CER tool to organize their ideas before writing. 

As you do these things, student writing capacity increases, and their reliance on this tool decreases.

Access the Tool

---

Reference

Zembal-Saul, C., McNeill, K. L., & Hershberger, K. (2013). What’s your evidence? Engaging K-5 students in constructing explanations in science. Pearson.