Pupils can make a point and find a quotation - but what do they say next?

Make Your Thinking Count! is a flexible, illustrated PEE/PEA literary analysis resource for Years 6-8, designed to tackle one of the most common difficulties in reading comprehension: helping pupils develop thoughtful explanations rather than simply repeating their point or paraphrasing the evidence.

Instead of offering another rigid paragraph-writing formula, this resource introduces five routes into analysis:

Word Choice - What might particular words suggest?

Inference - What can we work out that isn’t directly stated?

Reader Response - What might the reader think, feel or question?

Mood & Pace - How does the writer shape atmosphere or pace?

Significance - Why does this particular detail matter?

Using an atmospheric quotation from Susan Hill’s Farthing House, pupils explore how a single piece of evidence can open up different possibilities for interpretation.

The emphasis is on discussion, discovery and choice. Through modelling and dialogic talk, pupils learn to explore interpretations before developing their own written responses.

What’s included?

12-slide illustrated PowerPoint with models, discussion opportunities and independent application

Five Routes into Analysis pupil activity sheet

Choose Your Route independent application resources

Support and Power-Up prompts, including sentence starters and mood-and-tone vocabulary

Learning goal and success criteria slips in colour and black and white

Editable sample lesson plan, including Oracy, AfL and adaptive teaching

Teacher’s Guide with five suggested teaching pathways

Designed for flexible teaching

This isn’t a PowerPoint to rush through in one lesson and then forget.

Teachers can introduce PEE or PEA, explore individual analytical routes, revisit particular slides when pupils need support or apply the approach to entirely different literary texts.

The Teacher’s Guide includes suggested pathways for complete lessons, shorter interventions and independent application.

Support and Power-Up are available to all pupils, encouraging them to choose what helps their thinking.

Ideal for upper KS2, KS3, Common Entrance preparation and developing more confident literary analysis.

Whether your school uses PEE or PEA, the aim is the same: help pupils move beyond identifying evidence towards having something genuinely worthwhile to say about it.

Stackers Education - teaching choices, not checklists.