Mentor Text Tips,  Mentor Texts for Writers

Studying Mentor Texts with Spreadsheets

I’m over at ReFoReMo (Read for Research Month) today with a guest post about first and last line in nonfiction picture books. I talk about 10 books specifically. Hop on over to read my post there.

I thought it might be helpful to dive deeper into how I read and study picture books.

First of all, I read hundreds of books a year both in my job as a librarian and as a writer. When I am trying to figure out something in a book I am currently writing or want to write, I often study picture books with an eye on specific things. I gather loads of mentor texts. Then I create a spreadsheet with specific things I want to study.

As I read each book, I plug in quotes from the book or my reflections.

Some of the categories I use include:

  • Title
  • Author
  • Publisher and Publication Year
  • Word Count
  • First Line
  • Last Line
  • Structure
  • Historical Context
  • Back Matter
  • Takeaways or Theme
  • Things I Loved

The great thing is that you can choose to focus on things that are particular to the project you are working on. For example, one time I went through a bunch of picture book biographies and just looked at how the author handled the subject’s childhood.

Try it out. Make a spreadsheet with categories of what you’re studying. It’s a great way to see a lot of mentor texts at a glance.

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