1. Informational Text SPI 0701.6.3
Use text features to locate information and make meaning from the text.
Based on Tennessee State Curriculum Standards from the school year. Prepared by Andy Lombardo, Sevierville Middle School

2. Text Features
There are 4 main kinds of text features that help you find information in your textbooks:
Headings
Keywords
Captions
Footnotes

3. Heading What is a heading?
The title of a section of writing (like a chapter, a section inside of a chapter, a newspaper or magazine article, etc.)

4. Find the Heading:

5. Keywords
Keywords are important words from a text, usually vocabulary words or names of important people, events, or ideas.
Keywords are usually in bold and/or underlined in textbooks.
Find the keywords in the following example:

6. Find the Keywords

7. Captions
Captions are located under pictures, tables, graphs, forms, and other images.
Captions tell you what’s going on in the pictures.
What is the caption in the following example?

8. Find the Caption

9. Footnotes
Footnotes happen when the author wants to give you more info about something in the text.
They’re usually used to explain things like vocabulary words or to give background information.
Footnotes are usually marked with a small superscript number like this1
Find the Footnote in the following example:

11. Why?
Why is it important to know about text features like headings, keywords, captions, and footnotes?
They help you find information quickly
They help show you important information
They’re like road signs pointing you to what you need to know.

12. Text Features Quiz #1

13. Text Features Quiz #2