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Rise Up
Theme and Inferences
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What is theme?
▪ A theme is a broad idea,
message, or universal
truth.
Where can I find the theme?
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To find the theme of a text, look for it. You can find it in the characters, actions, and
narrator’s voice.

Ask these questions!

▪ What important idea does this text convey?

▪ What do characters do to help illustrate this idea?

▪ What do characters say to help illustrate this idea?

▪ Are there any sparks? (Advice, symbols, or signs.)

▪ What does the narrator say that helps to illustrate this idea?
How can understanding theme
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make you a better reader?

When reading fiction, identifying themes

can enhance the experience by allowing
you to better understand characters and
conflicts and possibly even anticipate
what will happen next.
How can understanding theme
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make you a better writer?

While you might start with an issue or theme in mind, they also develop, emerge,
or expand as you write. It may not be until the editing stage that you even begin to
recognize your themes. Once you see it, you more easily can decide what to cut
from your story or novel and what to highlight.

Here's a scenario: You are writing a story through which you hope to communicate
themes of love and loss. You might even have formulated a message you wish to
get across through your characters, something like "true love is eternal and can
survive even death."
Themes in Out of the Dust
Themes in Out of the
Dust include family, loss,
forgiveness, and the
environment. The author
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explores the power of the
human spirit to push through
and rise above the pain that
comes with adversity and
tragedy.
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Theme- Grief and Loss
(What does the narrator say that helps to illustrate this
idea?)

Billie Jo is grieving, and when people grieve, it is natural

for them to feel anger. Billie Jo is very angry. She says,

“I am so filled with bitterness,

it comes from the dust, it comes
from the silence of my father, it comes
from the absence of Ma.”
Question 1z

What do you notice about the shift in the

narrator’s tone from the beginning to the
end of the first stanza? (In other words,
how does her tone (attitude that shows
through word choice) change by the end
of stanza 1?

Hint- Look at the change in the

pronouns used at the beginning and the
end of the stanza.
Question 2
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What does the phrase “in spite of”

mean as it is used in stanza 2?

Use context to determine the

meaning of the phrase.
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Question 3

A simile is a comparison of to unlike things using the

words like or as. Find a simile in the stanza 2 and
explain the comparison. What two things are being
compared? What is the significance of the simile?
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Question 4
Perseverance is being
determined to do
something despite
difficulty or delay.

Select one phrase from

each stanza that
supports the theme of
perseverance.
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Exit Slip

▪ What is theme?

▪ Why is theme important to readers

and writers?