Week 5 · Skill Lab

Point of View & Purpose

Identify who is telling a text and why, separate fact from opinion, and see how a writer's position shapes what you are shown.

By the end of this lab you will be able to

  • Identify first-, second-, and third-person point of view
  • Determine an author's primary purpose from the text itself
  • Separate statements of fact from statements of opinion
  • Explain how two accounts of the same event differ because of who is telling them

Course outcomes covered

  • Describe how a narrator's or author's point of view influences how events or ideas are presented
  • Distinguish between fact and opinion and determine an author's primary purpose

From the ENG0300 course syllabus.

Learn

How this skill works

Read this first. Everything after it assumes these ideas.

Point of view: who is speaking

Point of viewSignalsWhat the reader gets
First personI, me, my, weOne person's direct experience, including what they cannot see or do not know.
Second personyou, yourInstructions or direct address. Common in manuals, guides, and advice.
Third person limitedhe, she, they — with one person's thoughtsAn outside narrator who reports one character's inner view.
Third person omniscienthe, she, they — with several people's thoughtsAn outside narrator with access to more than one mind.

Why it matters

Point of view controls what information you are allowed to have. A first-person account cannot tell you what anyone else was thinking — so when a question asks what someone else believed, the answer must be an inference from behavior, not a statement.

Author's purpose: why the text exists

Every text is written to do something. The four purposes you will see most often are to inform, to persuade, to entertain, and to explain how something works. A single text can have more than one, but TABE items usually ask for the primary purpose.

  • To inform — presents facts with little evaluation. Neutral vocabulary.
  • To persuade — argues for a position. Look for claims, evidence, and words carrying judgment.
  • To explain / instruct — walks through a process or a mechanism, often in sequence.
  • To entertain — tells a story for its own sake, with narrative detail and voice.

Test tip

Ask what the author wants you to do after reading. Know something? Do something? Agree with something? Feel something? The answer to that question is the purpose.

Fact and opinion

A fact can be checked against a record, a measurement, or a source — whether or not it turns out to be true. An opinion expresses a judgment and cannot be verified, even when most people share it.

Be careful: an opinion is not the same as a lie, and a fact is not the same as a correct statement. "The office received 4,000 requests in June" is a factual statement, verifiable and possibly wrong. "The office is doing an excellent job" is an opinion no record can settle.

  • Opinion markers: best, worst, should, ought, unfair, remarkable, too much.
  • Fact markers: dates, counts, measurements, named sources, quoted records.
  • Watch for opinions written to sound like facts: "Everyone knows that…" is a judgment wearing a fact's clothing.
See It

A worked example

Watch the reasoning before you try it. Notice the order of the moves — that order is the skill.

One event, two points of view

The Bus Route Hearing

Informational161 words

ACCOUNT ONE — from a transit agency newsletter: At Tuesday's public hearing, the agency presented its plan to consolidate the B14 and B16 routes. Consolidation would reduce duplicated service along a fourteen-block overlap and allow the agency to increase frequency on the combined route from every twenty minutes to every twelve. Thirty-one residents attended. Agency staff answered questions for ninety minutes and will accept written comment for thirty days.

ACCOUNT TWO — from a letter to a neighborhood paper: I sat through Tuesday's hearing on the B14 and B16. The agency called it consolidation. What it means for my block is that the stop two doors from my building disappears, and the nearest one becomes an eight-block walk. I am 71. Eight blocks in February is not a shorter wait; it is no bus at all. Thirty-one of us came out on a weeknight. They took our questions politely and told us the comment period would be open for thirty days.

Original passage — BEOC Academic Bridge

The question

How does point of view shape the way each account presents the same hearing?

Thinking it through

  1. Identify the point of view of each account.

    Account One is third person and institutional — no I, no personal stake. Account Two is first person: I sat, my block, I am 71.

  2. Find the facts both accounts agree on.

    Both report the same hearing, the same two routes, thirty-one attendees, and a thirty-day comment period. The verifiable facts do not conflict.

  3. Notice what each one chooses to measure.

    Account One measures service in frequency — every twenty minutes becomes every twelve. Account Two measures it in walking distance — two doors becomes eight blocks. Both are real; each writer's position determines which one counts.

  4. Examine the loaded language.

    Account One uses consolidate and duplicated service — neutral, administrative words that make removal sound like tidying. Account Two answers directly: "The agency called it consolidation." The writer is contesting the word itself.

  5. Separate fact from opinion in each.

    "Frequency increases to every twelve minutes" is a fact. "Eight blocks in February is not a shorter wait; it is no bus at all" is an opinion built on the fact of the eight-block walk.

The answer

The two accounts report the same verifiable facts but measure the outcome differently. The agency's institutional point of view frames the change as improved frequency across a system; the resident's first-person point of view frames it as lost access at one address. Neither is inaccurate — each point of view determines which facts are treated as the important ones.

Take this with you

When two texts disagree, check first whether they disagree about facts or about which facts matter. On paired-passage items, it is usually the second.

Try It

Your turn, with support

One question, with a hint available. Nothing here is graded.

From an Employee Handbook

Workplace70 words

You must submit your time sheet by 5:00 p.m. on the Friday that ends the pay period. If you are scheduled off that Friday, submit it on your last worked day of the week. Late time sheets are processed in the following cycle, which means your hours will appear on the next paycheck rather than the current one. Keep a copy of your submission confirmation until the corresponding paycheck arrives.

Original passage — BEOC Academic Bridge

Question 1Multiple choiceFoundation
What is the point of view and the author's primary purpose in this passage?
Practice

Practice on a full passage

A longer passage with several questions. Check each answer as you go.

What the Library Became

Argument171 words

The branch library on my corner circulated 41,000 items last year. It also hosted 312 public programs, provided 9,400 sessions on its public computers, and served as a designated cooling center on eleven days.

City budget discussions still describe library funding as spending on books. That description is decades out of date, and it quietly makes the case for cuts. If a library is a book warehouse, then a city with declining print circulation has an obvious place to save money.

But the computer sessions are not incidental. For a resident applying for a job, renewing a benefit, or filing a form that no longer exists on paper, the branch is often the only free place to sit down with a keyboard and get help using it.

I do not think the library should be exempt from budget scrutiny. Every department should have to justify what it costs. I think the justification should be measured against what the library actually does, and the current accounting does not measure that at all.

Original passage — BEOC Academic Bridge

Question 1Multiple choiceTABE Ready
What is the author's primary purpose?
Question 2Select all that applyDeveloping
Select the TWO statements from the passage that are statements of FACT.
Question 3Multiple choiceChallenge
How does the author's use of first person in paragraph 4 affect the argument?
Challenge

A harder, TABE-style set

Denser text and less obvious answers — closer to what the test will ask of you.

This biography is built on facts you could look up, but its author is not neutral about the person. Read all five paragraphs before you decide what the author is trying to do, and test each sentence by asking whether a record could settle it.

What Frances Perkins Saw

Biography348 words

On a Saturday afternoon in March 1911, a young advocate for working people named Frances Perkins was near Washington Square in New York City when fire broke out at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory, on the upper floors of a nearby building. She reached the street in time to see workers trapped at the windows. More than one hundred people died, most of them young immigrant women. Perkins spent the rest of her career acting on what she saw that day.

In the following years, she investigated factory conditions for New York State and pushed for laws on fire safety and working hours. When Franklin Roosevelt became governor of New York, he made her the state's industrial commissioner, in charge of its labor department. It is hard to imagine a better preparation for what came next.

When Roosevelt became president in 1933, he chose her as Secretary of Labor. She was the first woman to serve in a presidential cabinet. Her appointment is usually remembered as a milestone for women, and it was. But that framing is too small for what she did with the job. Calling her a first makes her sound like a symbol, when she was one of the most effective officials of her century.

In 1934 she led the committee that drafted the Social Security Act, which became law in 1935 and created old-age and unemployment insurance. She also pushed for the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938, which set a national minimum wage and restricted child labor. The first version of Social Security left out farmworkers and household workers, a gap that later Congresses narrowed. But no law arrives complete, and it would be unfair to hold that gap against her.

Perkins served as Secretary of Labor from 1933 to 1945. Those twelve years did more for people who work for wages than any twelve years before or since. A minimum wage, a retirement check, an unemployment benefit — each carries a trace of what she saw from the street in 1911. Her name should be as familiar as the protections she fought for.

Original passage — BEOC Academic Bridge

Question 1Multiple choiceTABE Ready
What is the author's primary purpose in writing this passage?
Question 2Select all that applyChallenge
Which statements from the passage are opinions? Select all that apply.
Question 3Multiple choiceChallenge
In paragraph 4, the author notes that the first version of Social Security "left out farmworkers and household workers." How does the author's point of view shape the way this fact is presented?
Question 4Short responseChallenge
Answer Review

Why each answer is right or wrong

The reasoning behind every choice, including the ones designed to catch you.

Work through the practice first, then open a question below to see the full reasoning. Reading why a wrong answer is wrong is what stops you from choosing it again on the test.

Practice set

Q1What is the author's primary purpose?

Correct answer: B. To persuade readers that library funding should be evaluated by the full range of services the library provides

Why: The statistics in paragraph 1 are evidence, not the point. Paragraphs 2 through 4 argue that the way library funding is described is wrong and should change.

Every choice, explained

  • A.To inform readers of the branch library's annual circulation figures — Circulation is one figure among several, and it is used to support an argument rather than to stand alone.
  • B.To persuade readers that library funding should be evaluated by the full range of services the library provides — Correct. The author makes a claim about how funding should be judged and supports it.
  • C.To explain how to reserve a public computer at a branch library — No process is explained anywhere in the passage.
  • D.To entertain readers with a personal story about a neighborhood library — The author writes in first person, but the passage argues rather than tells a story.
Q2Select the TWO statements from the passage that are statements of FACT.

Correct answer: A. The branch circulated 41,000 items last year. • C. The branch served as a designated cooling center on eleven days.

Why: A fact can be checked against a record. Circulation counts and cooling-center days both appear in library records. The other two express the author's judgment.

Every choice, explained

  • A.The branch circulated 41,000 items last year. — Correct. A countable figure that could be verified against library records.
  • B.That description is decades out of date. — A judgment about how a description should be regarded. No record settles it.
  • C.The branch served as a designated cooling center on eleven days. — Correct. The number of days is documented and verifiable.
  • D.Every department should have to justify what it costs. — Contains should, which signals a value judgment rather than a verifiable claim.
Q3How does the author's use of first person in paragraph 4 affect the argument?

Correct answer: B. It signals that the author is conceding a point and separating their actual claim from a position they do not hold.

Why: Paragraph 4 uses "I do not think… I think…" to give ground first (libraries should face scrutiny) and then state the narrower claim (scrutiny should measure what libraries do). That structure makes the argument harder to dismiss.

Every choice, explained

  • A.It weakens the argument, because personal statements cannot be evidence. — The factual evidence sits in paragraph 1. First person here marks the claim, not the evidence.
  • B.It signals that the author is conceding a point and separating their actual claim from a position they do not hold. — Correct. The paired I-statements distinguish the concession from the actual position.
  • C.It shows the author works at the library. — Nothing in the passage indicates the author is an employee — only that the branch is on their corner.
  • D.It changes the passage from an argument into a personal narrative. — The paragraph is the clearest statement of the claim in the whole passage, which is argument, not narrative.

Challenge

Q1What is the author's primary purpose in writing this passage?

Correct answer: C. To persuade readers that Perkins should be remembered for the protections working people still rely on, not only as the first woman in a cabinet

Why: The facts are real, but they are arranged to make a case. Paragraph 3 argues that remembering Perkins only as a first is "too small for what she did with the job," and paragraph 5 ends with "Her name should be as familiar as the protections she fought for." The author wants you to agree with a judgment about Perkins, not just learn the dates of her career.

Every choice, explained

  • A.To inform readers about the causes of the 1911 Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire — The fire opens the passage, but its causes are never explained. It appears as the event that set Perkins's work in motion — a purpose the passage serves only incidentally.
  • B.To entertain readers with a dramatic story about a factory fire — The opening is vivid, but the fire fills one paragraph. The other four argue about how Perkins should be remembered, which is not storytelling for its own sake.
  • C.To persuade readers that Perkins should be remembered for the protections working people still rely on, not only as the first woman in a cabinet — Correct. Paragraph 3 rejects the narrower way of remembering her, and paragraph 5 states the author's aim outright.
  • D.To explain how the Social Security Act and the Fair Labor Standards Act work — The two laws are named and summarized in a clause each, but nothing about how they operate is explained. They serve as evidence for the author's claim about Perkins.
Q2Which statements from the passage are opinions? Select all that apply.

Correct answer: A. "It is hard to imagine a better preparation for what came next." (paragraph 2) • D. "Those twelve years did more for people who work for wages than any twelve years before or since." (paragraph 5) • E. "Her name should be as familiar as the protections she fought for." (paragraph 5)

Why: Apply one test to each statement: could a record settle it? A cabinet appointment and the coverage of a law are matters of record. How good a preparation was, whether twelve years "did more" than any others, and whose name should be familiar are judgments. The trap is the opinion that carries a number — the dates behind "twelve years" are factual, but the comparison built on them is not.

Every choice, explained

  • A."It is hard to imagine a better preparation for what came next." (paragraph 2) — Correct. The phrase "hard to imagine a better" is a judgment about how well her earlier work prepared her. No record could settle it.
  • B."She was the first woman to serve in a presidential cabinet." (paragraph 3) — A fact. Cabinet appointments are public record. A statement can make someone look good and still be a fact.
  • C."The first version of Social Security left out farmworkers and household workers, a gap that later Congresses narrowed." (paragraph 4) — A fact, even though it points out a flaw in the law. Who the law covered can be checked against the law itself. A critical-sounding statement is not automatically an opinion.
  • D."Those twelve years did more for people who work for wages than any twelve years before or since." (paragraph 5) — Correct. The twelve years can be checked — 1933 to 1945 — but the claim built on them cannot. Whether those years "did more" than any others is a judgment no record could settle.
  • E."Her name should be as familiar as the protections she fought for." (paragraph 5) — Correct. The word "should" signals a judgment about what ought to be, not a claim a record could check.
Q3In paragraph 4, the author notes that the first version of Social Security "left out farmworkers and household workers." How does the author's point of view shape the way this fact is presented?

Correct answer: A. The author mentions the gap once and immediately excuses it, so a real limitation reads as a small exception to Perkins's achievement.

Why: A writer with a strong point of view can include an unwelcome fact and still control its effect. Here the fact is true and checkable, but it is mentioned only once and is answered immediately by an opinion — "no law arrives complete" — that asks the reader not to count it against Perkins. Point of view shapes not only which facts appear, but how much each one is allowed to weigh.

Every choice, explained

  • A.The author mentions the gap once and immediately excuses it, so a real limitation reads as a small exception to Perkins's achievement. — Correct. The limitation gets one sentence, and the next sentence — "But no law arrives complete" — tells the reader how to judge it. The author's admiration controls how much the fact is allowed to count.
  • B.The author leaves the gap out of the passage so that Perkins appears more successful than she was. — The gap is in the passage, in paragraph 4. The author did not hide it; the question is what the author does with it once it is there.
  • C.The author uses the gap to argue that Social Security failed the workers who needed it most. — The author argues the opposite: "it would be unfair to hold that gap against her." The gap is raised in order to be set aside.
  • D.The author presents the gap neutrally, giving it the same weight as the laws Perkins helped pass. — The laws return in paragraph 5 as the reason Perkins should be remembered, while the gap is mentioned once and answered at once by the author's judgment that it should not count against her. That is neither equal weight nor a neutral presentation.
Q4The author of this biography admires Perkins. In three or four sentences, name the author's point of view toward her, quote one statement of fact and one statement of opinion from the passage, and explain one thing the author emphasizes or plays down because of that point of view.

Model response: The author writes from an admiring point of view, and that attitude decides which facts get the most room. The passage rests on checkable facts such as "Perkins served as Secretary of Labor from 1933 to 1945," but it surrounds them with judgments like "It is hard to imagine a better preparation for what came next." Because of that point of view, the new laws are praised again in the final paragraph, while the fact that Social Security first "left out farmworkers and household workers" is mentioned once and excused in the very next sentence. A neutral biography would report the same facts without telling the reader how much each one should count.

Why: A complete answer does three jobs: it names the author's point of view, quotes a fact and an opinion accurately, and connects that point of view to a specific choice about emphasis. The third job is the one most answers leave out — and it is the one that shows you understand how point of view shapes what a reader is shown.

Mastery Check

Check yourself

A short formative check. It is not recorded — use it to decide whether to move on or review.

Two short passages about the same event, four items. If you miss one, the review below each answer will tell you which part of the lesson to revisit.

Passage 1: A Resident's Letter

Argument103 words

The elevator in my building was out of service for nine days this month. I live on the sixth floor, and I managed the stairs. My neighbor across the hall uses a cane, and for those nine days she did not leave her apartment. We were given one notice, taped inside the lobby door, and it gave no date for the repair. I understand that parts take time. What I do not understand is why no one from the office knocked on a single door to ask who needed help getting groceries upstairs. A building this size should have a plan for this.

Original passage — BEOC Academic Bridge

Passage 2: Notice from the Management Office

Informational93 words

The building's elevator was taken out of service on March 4 after a routine inspection found a worn part in the motor. Because the elevator is more than thirty years old, the replacement part had to be made to order. The elevator returned to service on March 13 and passed a city safety inspection the same day. A notice was posted in the lobby on the first day of the outage. The repair was completed at no cost to residents. Management handled the repair as quickly and carefully as residents could reasonably expect.

Original passage — BEOC Academic Bridge

Question 1Multiple choiceFoundation
From which point of view is Passage 1 written?
Question 2Multiple choiceDeveloping
Which statement from Passage 2 is an opinion rather than a fact?
Question 3Multiple choiceTABE Ready
What is the primary purpose of Passage 1?
Question 4Paired textTABE Ready
How does the author of Passage 1 differ from the author of Passage 2?
Write It

Now write it yourself

The same skill, going the other direction. Nothing here is submitted from this page — you will copy your paragraph into Brightspace when it is ready.

Same facts, two purposesBased on “What the Library Became”

The library passage used real figures — 41,000 items circulated, 312 programs, 9,400 computer sessions, eleven days as a cooling center — and shaped them into an argument. The same numbers could have been written up as a neutral report. Purpose, not facts, decided how they read.

Write the same information twice, using these facts: a community center's after-school program served 180 students last year, kept 92 percent of them enrolled through June, and currently has one staff member for every 30 students.

First, write three to four sentences TO A CLASSMATE, to inform. Neutral, no argument, just what the program is and what the numbers say. Then write three to four sentences TO A SUPERVISOR who controls the budget, to persuade them to fund a second staff member. Same facts, different purpose. Label each version.

Before you submit, check each one

Ticking these is for your own tracking. Nothing here is scored or recorded.

Sentence frames

Starters, not a template. Fill one in, change the wording to sound like you, or write past it entirely.

  • TO INFORM: The after-school program at ______ served ______ last year.
  • TO PERSUADE: The program keeps ______ percent of its students enrolled, which is why ______.
  • For that reason, I am asking that ______.

0 words · 0 sentences(a rough count from end punctuation — a guide, not a rule)

What you type stays in this browser. It is not sent anywhere, not scored by software, and not seen by anyone until you paste it into Brightspace yourself.

Score your own draft

This is the same 10-point rubric attached to the Brightspace dropbox. Scoring yourself first is the fastest way to find what to fix. Your score here is yours alone — it is not recorded and it is not your grade.

Focus — 3 points

One clear controlling idea, stated early and held to. Every sentence belongs to that idea — nothing wanders off the question that was asked.

Evidence & Development — 3 points

Specific support from the passage — details, examples, or quoted words — and an explanation of what that support shows. Not just a detail dropped in and left alone.

Organization — 2 points

A sensible order a reader can follow, with transitions that signal how one sentence relates to the next. A beginning, a middle, and an ending that lands.

Conventions — 2 points

Complete sentences, subject-verb agreement, capitalization, and end punctuation. Errors do not stop a reader from understanding you.

Score all four strands to see your total.

▸ Show a strong example

The two versions below use identical facts. Read the verbs and the adjectives — that is where purpose lives, not in the data.

TO INFORM: The after-school program served 180 students last year. Of those, 92 percent stayed enrolled through June. The program currently runs with one staff member for every 30 students. TO PERSUADE: Our after-school program held on to 92 percent of its 180 students all the way through June, which is a retention rate most programs do not reach. It does that with one staff member for every 30 students, a ratio that leaves no margin when someone is out sick. Funding one additional staff member would bring the ratio to roughly one to 15 and protect the result we already have. I am asking for that position in this budget cycle.

Which sentence earns which strand

  1. TO INFORM: The after-school program served 180 students last year. Of those, 92 percent stayed enrolled through June. The program currently runs with one staff member for every 30 students.

    Focus — Informative purpose held all the way through. Nothing here tells the reader what to conclude — served, stayed, runs are flat reporting verbs.

  2. TO PERSUADE: Our after-school program held on to 92 percent of its 180 students all the way through June, which is a retention rate most programs do not reach.

    Evidence & Development — Same two numbers, now doing argumentative work. Held on to and which is a rate most programs do not reach add the evaluation the informative version refused.

  3. It does that with one staff member for every 30 students, a ratio that leaves no margin when someone is out sick.

    Evidence & Development — The third fact reframed as a vulnerability. The number did not change; its role in the paragraph did.

  4. Funding one additional staff member would bring the ratio to roughly one to 15 and protect the result we already have.

    Organization — The ask, placed last where a persuasive paragraph puts it, and connected to the evidence rather than dropped in.

  5. I am asking for that position in this budget cycle.

    Conventions — Short, complete, correctly punctuated, and unambiguous about what is wanted. A persuasive paragraph that never names its request has not finished.

Turn it in

Copy your paragraph, then paste it into WRITE IT! Week 5 — Point of View & Purpose in Brightspace (Week 5).

Write your paragraph first — then these buttons turn on.

Finished Point of View & Purpose?

Marking a lab complete saves a note in this browser so you can track your own review. It is not a grade and it is not submitted anywhere.

Keep going