Reading and writing
Grade 6 reading is analysis: what a text implies, how it is built, and what it is trying to make you believe. Writing is revision — and in June, both are tested.
What Alberta asks for by the end of Grade 6
The subject: English language arts and literature
- Offer relevant information and logical reasoning in group discussion.
- Analyze texts and interpret their contexts to build comprehension.
- Refine and adjust writing through creative and critical thinking, so it reflects the writer.
- Apply grammar, spelling and punctuation accurately and skillfully.
- Analyze how texts are organized, and how they can shape what we understand about ourselves, other people and the world.
The achievement test has two parts, each half the mark. Part A is two pieces of writing — one non-fiction, one fiction — in two hours, and the first ten minutes may be spent talking the prompts over with classmates. Part B is 50 reading questions in an hour, on fiction, non-fiction, poetry and visual media. Both are written on a computer, with spell-check and grammar tools switched on for the writing.
The words, first
These are the terms a teacher will use at a parent interview, defined before anything below uses them.
| Word | What it means |
|---|---|
| Relevant | Connected to the question being decided. A true fact can still be irrelevant. |
| Logical reasoning | Getting from a reason to a conclusion in steps someone else can follow and check. |
| Inference | What a text means without saying it — worked out from clues and what you already know. |
| Context | The situation around a text: who wrote it, when, for whom, and why. |
| Voice | What makes writing sound like its writer: word choice, sentence rhythm, what they notice. |
| Revise | Change what the writing says and how — not just fix the spelling. That part is editing. |
| Proofread | Read slowly for errors in spelling, grammar and punctuation, usually aloud. |
| Persuasive technique | A way of making an audience agree: bandwagon, testimonial, loaded words, numbers, fear of missing out. |
| Audience | Who a text is for. A persuasive text is shaped around what its audience wants or fears. |
| Non-fiction and fiction | Writing about what is real, and writing that is invented. The achievement test asks for one of each. |
Claim
What I think should happen, or what I think is true.
Reason
Why — the part that has to make sense to someone who disagrees.
Evidence
What shows the reason is true: a fact, an example, a number, a quote.
What to do at home
- Argue at dinner, properly — Pick something small — the weekend plan. Everyone gives a reason and one piece of evidence. A reason that isn't relevant gets called out, kindly.
- Ask what a text didn't say — After a show or a chapter: what did the character want that they never said out loud? How do you know?
- Read a first draft aloud — Their own writing, to you. Hearing it is how a writer finds the flat parts and the missing words.
- Pull apart an ad — Who is it for, what does it want, and which trick is it using? Grade 6 names the techniques.
- Read something short every day — The reading test is 50 questions in an hour, across poems, stories, articles and pictures. Variety matters more than length.
- Write a story in 45 minutes — Once, for practice, with a plan first. The test gives two hours for two pieces, so timing is a skill worth trying before June.
Sheets you can print for this
- Make your case — reasons that hold up
- Reading between the lines — inference
- Revise for voice — make it sound like you
- Proofread it — accurate spelling, grammar and punctuation
- How texts persuade — techniques and audience
- Plan before you write — the two achievement-test assignments
The expectations above are paraphrased from Alberta Education's Grade 6 programs of study, published on new LearnAlberta.