Common Core ELA6th GradeReading: Informational

RI.6.1: Cite Evidence for What a Text States and Implies

Also written as CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.6.1 · Cluster: Key Ideas and Details.

The Official Wording

Cite textual evidence to support analysis of what the text says explicitly as well as inferences drawn from the text.

Common Core State Standards, Grade 6, Reading: Informational Text · Read it at the source · Checked October 14, 2026

What RI.6.1 Means in Plain English

Sixth graders prove what they say about a nonfiction text with the lines behind it, for what the text states outright and for what it leaves readers to work out. A passage may never say why Egyptian officials measured the Nile’s flood, yet the clues are on the page.

Fifth graders (RI.5.1) quoted accurately to explain a text. Sixth grade puts the weight on analysis: each quotation has to prove a specific point, and students say whether that point is stated or inferred. Seventh grade (RI.7.1) asks for several pieces of evidence behind each point.

RI.6.1 I Can Statements

I can tell what a text states from what it implies.
I can make an inference and name the lines that led me there.
I can quote evidence that proves my exact point, not just the topic.

RI.6.1 Worked Example

The passage never says why the river was measured, and only one of the two answers proves its inference with lines from the text.

Read the Story

Rain almost never falls in southern Egypt. Yet for thousands of years, farmers there grew wheat and barley in some of the richest soil on Earth.Each summer, heavy rains far to the south swelled the Nile until it spilled over its banks. When the water went down in the fall, it left a layer of black mud full of nutrients. Egyptians called their country Kemet, “the black land.”On an island near Egypt’s southern border, a stone staircase called a nilometer led down into the river, with marks cut into its walls. Every summer, officials checked how high the flood climbed against the marks and wrote it down.A low flood meant hungry months ahead. A very high one could wash away whole villages. The tax each farmer owed depended on the size of the harvest officials expected.

A short passage written for this page.

Question: Why did officials record how high the flood climbed each summer? Support your answer with what the text states and what you can infer from it.

Not Yet“They wanted to know how high the water was, because the Nile was very important to Egypt.”It restates the question and adds a general truth anyone could guess. There is no quoted line, and nothing connects the flood’s height to the harvest or the tax.

Meets the Standard“The text never says why, so this is an inference. It states that ‘a low flood meant hungry months ahead’ and that each farmer’s tax ‘depended on the size of the harvest officials expected.’ The readings were taken in summer, before the water went down and the crops went in, so they let officials predict the harvest early and know how much tax to expect.”It labels what is stated and what is inferred, quotes the two lines the inference rests on and explains the step between them, so a reader can check the reasoning.

Question Stems to Use

What does the text say directly about…? Quote it.What does the author suggest without saying it?Which two lines, read together, lead to that inference?Is your point stated in the text or inferred from it?Does your quotation prove this point, or only the topic?

Common Mistakes with RI.6.1

Quoting without explaining

A quotation dropped into the answer with no sentence saying what it proves

Try this: Require one sentence after every quotation that begins “This shows…” and names the exact point the line supports.

Calling an inference a fact

“The text says the nilometer was used to set taxes.”

Try this: Have students find the exact words before writing “the text says.” If the words are not there, the sentence starts “I can infer.”

Evidence for the topic, not the point

“Egyptians called their country Kemet, ‘the black land’” offered as proof that the readings set taxes

Try this: Ask students to read their point and their quotation aloud together, then decide whether the quotation would convince someone who disagreed.

Where RI.6.1 Fits

Comes BeforeRI.5.1Quote a text accurately to explain both what it says and what it implies.

AlongsideRL.6.1Cite evidence for what a story or poem says and implies, the same move with literature.W.6.9Draw evidence from texts into written analysis, where the citing becomes the writer’s job.RH.6-8.1Cite specific evidence when analyzing primary and secondary sources in history class.

Comes NextRI.7.1Cite several pieces of evidence behind each point instead of one.

Practice RI.6.1

Quick Check

What does the passage state directly about why Egypt’s soil was so rich?
When the flood went down each fall, it left a layer of black mud full of nutrients.
What can you infer about why officials recorded the flood’s height? Which lines support it?
They used it to predict the harvest and the taxes. Support: “A low flood meant hungry months ahead” and the tax “depended on the size of the harvest officials expected.”
Is this stated or inferred: “Egyptian farmers depended on the flood to grow their crops”?
Inferred. The passage never says it in those words, but rain “almost never falls” there, and the flood leaves the rich mud the crops grow in.

RI.6.1: Other Names

RI.6.1CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.6.1