Text Features

Texts that give us true information about a topic are called nonfiction texts. They are different from fiction texts. An example of a fiction text is a novel, which is about imagined people, places, and events. Poems and plays are also fiction text. Examples of nonfiction include encyclopedias, textbooks, biographies, and newspaper articles.

Which of the following is most likely a nonfiction text?

• The Ocean at the End of the Lane: A novel by Neil Gaiman

• The Life of Pi: A Novel by Yann Martel

• Near the Ocean (poems) by Robert Lowell

• Makers and Takers: Studying Food Webs in the Ocean by Gwendolyn Hooks

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You might want to use a nonfiction book to answer a specific question. That's one reason why nonfiction books have text features. A text feature is a special part of the page that gets your attention. Some text features will help you locate information and some will help you understand information. And some text features make reading more fun and interesting!

According to this passage, some books have text features to

• help a reader locate information

• help a reader prove information

• help a reader rewrite information

• help a reader ignore information

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Tables of contents can be found in both fiction and nonfiction, usually at the start of the book. The table of contents lists all the big topics or chapters that are in the book in the order that they appear. It also lists the page numbers they start on. You can use the table of contents to find information.

According to the passage, a reader can use the table of contents to

• learn more about the author's point of view.

• see how the book is organized and the topics it contains.

• find out more about the author's life and goals.

• Identify the book's main character and setting.

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Headings are titles. They are big, bold words that appear at the top of a page, and they tell you what that section of text will be about. A heading might be a few words but will usually not be a complete sentence. Subheadings are used to tell you what smaller sections of text within the main section will include.

Imagine that you are reading a text with the heading "Languages." Which of the following would most likely be the subheading?

• Spanish

• Guitars

• Pasta Dishes

• Sloths

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A caption is the writing near photographs, illustrations, or drawings. It explains what is happening in the image or gives more information about it. Captions help you understand how the image is connected to the text.

Which of the following would most likely be the caption near a photograph of a sleeping sloth?

• The Queen of England arrives in Fiji.

• Some sloths sleep for 15-18 hours per day.

• Gorillas can catch colds from humans.

• 5.5 million people live in Singapore.

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The index is an alphabetical list of key ideas, terms, events, and names that come up in the text. It tells you all the page numbers where these items can be found in the book. The index usually appears near the back of the book.

According to this passage, a reader might check the index of a book when

• she wants to know if a book has the information she needs.

• she wants to understand the meaning of an unknown word in the book.

• she wants to learn more about the book's author.

• she wants to learn when the book was published.

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Because nonfiction books contain information about a specific topic, they often use vocabulary words that you might not know. That's where the glossary comes in. The glossary is like a dictionary. It lists and defines important words related to the topic that are used in the book in alphabetical order. But don't confuse the glossary and the index. The index tells you which pages they keywords appear on while the glossary provides definitions of words you might not know.

According to this passage, which of the following would you find in the glossary of a biology textbook?

• a definition of the word "enzyme"

• a list of pages the term "chemical reactions" appears on

• a history of the discovery of cells

• a biography of the biologist Rachel Carson

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A diagram is a special picture with lots of labels. It shows the different parts of something or explains how it works. A diagram can give you cleaner, detailed view of a complicated thing or idea. A diagram that shows the steps of a process is called a flowchart. Some nonfiction texts contain a lot of facts and numbers. That's a lot of information to keep in your head. Thankfully, you won't have to if the text has a chart, table, or graph. These features organize information visually so that it's easier to understand and compare numbers.

Which of the following would most likely be shown in a diagram in a nonfiction text?

• the hero of a fairy tale

• a definition of the word "debris"

• the location of the planets in the solar system

• a painting of a famous physicist

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Which text feature would you use to find the names of all the chapters in a book and the pages where they started?

• a heading

• the table of contents

• captions

• the glossary

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Which text feature would tell you the major topic or main idea in one chapter of the text?

• the heading

• the glossary

• the caption

• the table of contents

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