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.
8 Comments
Mandy Yokim
Great post! I also study a lot of nonfiction picture books for various things but I haven’t been nearly as organized as you with this awesome spreadsheet. I will give that a try.
Marcie Flinchum Atkins
Yay! I hope it’s helpful!
nicolesalterbraun
What a great idea! Thank you!
Marcie Flinchum Atkins
You’re welcome. I hope it was helpful!
Jilanne Hoffmann
Wow! You’re so organized. I wonder if I could make myself follow through on this kind of detailed spreadsheet over the long term. I often start out with a huge head of steam and then dribble off to nothing. But this has the potential of saving so much time down the road. All my analyses are spread out in so many places right now. But here, anytime you want to study something in particular, you have all info at your fingertips. Maybe from here on out? Thanks!
Marcie Flinchum Atkins
Jilanne, Thanks! I don’t do this for every picture book I read. I read hundreds of books a year, but I only analyze maybe 15-20 like this. I definitely couldn’t keep up with that level with all of the books I read. 🙂
Sylvia Liu
what a cool idea! thanks for sharing and congrats on your book deal!
Marcie Flinchum Atkins
Thanks so much!