Connect Across the Curriculum

Literary Analysis: Use Text Features
Academic Vocabulary

  • • feature (fē-chur) noun

    A feature is a part of something that stands out or is noticeable.

Learn About Text Features Authors use text features to help you understand their ideas. Some common text features are maps, diagrams, illustrations, and photographs. These features show information visually.

Practice Together

Learn More From Text Features Look at the passage and text features below. With your class, make a two-column chart that tells what information the map, diagram, labels, and caption provide.

What was this eye-popping place? Its name was Tenochtitlán and almost 200,000 Aztec lived there. Tenochtitlán, the largest city in the Americas (North, Central, and South America), was the capital of the powerful Aztec Empire. The gleaming city was designed to impress visitors, and it did.

Aztec Empire, 1500

Aztec Empire, 1500

Tenochtitlán was the central and most powerful city of the Aztec. Today, it is buried under Mexico City.

map

diagram

caption

label

Lake Texcoco

temple

pyramid canal

Try It!

Identify Text Features Add to the chart by writing down other text features you find in the rest of the selection. Then explain how each text feature helps you better understand the text.