Analyze the informational text provided on the first page of this activity: "Prevent Pedestrian Crashes" from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Do so by reading the text and answering the questions in this practice guide. Be prepared to write about the text's purpose, perspective, and central idea; its use of prose, text features, and text structure; and its development of smaller ideas that fall under the central idea.

If you see any words listed below, write definitions for them in the space provided. Also, if you come across a word you don't know, write it in one of the empty spaces. Try to figure out what the word means by looking at its context. Then use your dictionary or the internet to look up the correct definition for the word.
Key Term
Definition
inference



objective



subjective




If you noticed other unfamiliar terms in this activity, use the blank rows to list them and their definitions.




















1. Use this space to objectively summarize the content of "Prevent Pedestrian Crashes." Describe what the text is about, how the text is arranged on the page, how much information it includes about each topic, and how many topics it covers. You'll describe how the topics are organized in the next question.









2. Use this space to objectively summarize the structure of "Prevent Pedestrian Crashes." Which of the three text structures (topical, spatial, sequential) does it use? Or does it use a combination of text structures? What else do you notice about how the text is organized?













3. Use this space to subjectively summarize the perspective, purpose, and central idea of "Prevent Pedestrian Crashes." For each, explain the evidence that helped you make your inferences.
Perspective:








Purpose:








Central idea:








4. Identify and describe at least two smaller ideas that "Prevent Pedestrian Crashes" communicates — besides the overall central idea. These are subtopics that fall underneath the main topic.









5. Describe how the author of "Prevent Pedestrian Crashes" develops each of the ideas you identified in the previous question. How does the author use prose, text features, and text structure to clearly and effectively communicate each point?

















6. Compare the way the author develops the first idea you identified in question 4 with the way the author develops the second idea. What are some key differences and similarities in the approaches?