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Common Core ELAGrades 11–12Reading: Literature

RL.11-12.3: Analyze an Author’s Choices in a Story

Also written as CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.11-12.3 · Cluster: Key Ideas and Details.

All 41 Grades 11–12 ELA Standards

The Official Wording

Analyze the impact of the author's choices regarding how to develop and relate elements of a story or drama (e.g., where a story is set, how the action is ordered, how the characters are introduced and developed).

Common Core State Standards, Grades 11-12, Reading: Literature · Read it at the source · Checked October 14, 2026

What RL.11-12.3 Means in Plain English

Juniors and seniors explain how an author’s choices about setting, the order of events and the way characters arrive shape the whole story. When a mother meets her estranged son’s laundry before she sees his face, readers judge him by evidence before history.

In grades 9 and 10 (RL.9-10.3) students followed complex characters with conflicting motives through a plot. Grades 11 and 12 turn the lens on the author. This is the last band of the line, with no later code: it is where the standards place college and career readiness.

RL.11-12.3 I Can Statements

  • I can explain why an author introduces a character a certain way.
  • I can analyze how a story’s setting shapes what can happen in it.
  • I can explain how the order of events changes what readers understand.

RL.11-12.3 Worked Example

A mother and the son who stopped calling meet by accident, and the author lets her meet his laundry first.

Read the Story
At three in the morning the laundromat on Fenwick Street had one other customer, and Bernadette met his laundry before she met him.Green hospital scrubs, four sets, stiff at the knees. A plaid shirt she had ironed for a school picture twenty years ago, worn through at the elbows. One small sock with a dinosaur on it.Then he turned from the dryer, and it was Hollis, who had not called since the funeral.“Ma,” he said, as if they had planned to meet there, and held up the sock. “She’s three now.”
A short passage written for this page.
Question: Why does the author introduce Hollis through his laundry before his face, and why set the meeting in a laundromat at three in the morning?
Not Yet“The author describes his clothes to add details to the setting. The laundromat is just where the story happens.”It notices the choice but not its impact. Every item of laundry tells Bernadette, and the reader, something about Hollis, and the answer never asks what.
Meets the Standard“Because Bernadette ‘met his laundry before she met him,’ we learn who Hollis has become before we know it is him. The ‘Green hospital scrubs’ mean night shifts, the plaid shirt ‘she had ironed for a school picture twenty years ago’ means he kept something of hers, and the dinosaur sock means a child. By the time he turns, the silence ‘since the funeral’ is already outweighed by evidence of what she has missed. The setting matters too: a laundromat at three in the morning belongs to neither of them, so the reunion can happen without anyone inviting or apologizing. ‘As if they had planned to meet there’ only works on neutral ground.”It explains what each choice does. The order of introduction makes readers judge Hollis by evidence before history, and the neutral, late-night setting makes an unplanned reconciliation believable.
Question Stems to Use
What do we learn about this character before we learn the name?Why might the author reveal this detail before that one?What would change if the scene were set somewhere else?How does the hour shape what the characters are able to say?Which of the author’s choices would you least want to change, and why?

Common Mistakes with RL.11-12.3

Retelling the choice

“The author describes his laundry, and then he turns around.”

Try this: Require a “which makes the reader…” clause after every choice students name, so a description always turns into an effect.

Setting as backdrop

“The story takes place in a laundromat at night.”

Try this: Have students move the scene somewhere else, a kitchen or a church, and list what could no longer happen there.

Explaining the character, not the author

“Hollis wears scrubs because he is a nurse.”

Try this: Ask why the author shows the detail at that moment, not only why the character has it, since authors choose every detail.

Where RL.11-12.3 Fits

Comes BeforeRL.9-10.3Analyze how complex characters with conflicting motives develop and drive the plot or theme.
AlongsideRL.11-12.5Analyze how structuring a specific part, like the ending, adds to meaning and impact.W.11-12.3Introduce characters and order events deliberately in their own narratives.
Comes NextW.11-12.9Write an analysis of an author’s choices with evidence from the story.

Practice RL.11-12.3

Quick Check

  1. What does Bernadette notice before she sees who the customer is?
  2. What does the dinosaur sock reveal?
  3. Why might a laundromat at three in the morning suit this reunion?

RL.11-12.3: Other Names

RL.11-12.3CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.11-12.3

Common Core State Standards © Copyright 2010. National Governors Association Center for Best Practices and Council of Chief State School Officers. All rights reserved. Official wording from the Common Core State Standards PDFs at corestandards.org, last checked October 14, 2026. The explanation, I can statements, example, mistakes and practice on this page are EMStudio’s own, written beside the official wording. They are not part of the standard.