Mississippi Standards
Mississippi 6th Grade ELA Standards
All 41 Mississippi English language arts standards for 6th grade, each explained in plain English. The official wording is in Mississippi Department of Education's document, linked at the end of this page.
41 standards
Reading Literature
9 standardsRL.6.1
Back up every claim about a story or poem with a quoted line or a specific detail, including claims about what the author only hints at.
RL.6.2
Find a story's theme or central idea, show which details reveal it, and write a summary based on that idea.
RL.6.3
Describe how a story's plot unfolds event by event and how the characters react or change as it moves toward the resolution.
RL.6.4
Work out what words and phrases mean in a story or poem, including figurative uses and the feelings a word carries, and explain how one word choice affects the tone.
RL.6.5
Explain how one sentence, chapter, scene or stanza fits into the whole work and helps build its theme, setting or plot.
RL.6.6
Explain how an author builds the narrator's or speaker's point of view through what they notice, say and leave out.
RL.6.7
Compare reading a story, play or poem with hearing or watching a performance of it, noting what you imagine on the page versus what you see and hear.
RL.6.9
Compare how texts in different forms or genres, like a poem and a story or a historical novel and a fantasy, handle a similar theme.
RL.6.10
By year's end, read and understand stories, plays and poems written for grades 6 to 8, with support on the hardest ones.
Reading Informational Text
10 standardsRI.6.1
Back up every claim about a story or poem with a quoted line or a specific detail, including claims about what the author only hints at.
RI.6.2
Find the central idea of a nonfiction text and the details that convey it, and summarize the text without adding personal opinions.
RI.6.3
Explain how a nonfiction text introduces a key person, event or idea and then builds it out with examples or anecdotes.
RI.6.4
Work out the meaning of words in a nonfiction text, including figurative uses, the associations a word carries and technical terms like circuit.
RI.6.5
Explain what job a given sentence, paragraph or section does in a nonfiction text and how it moves the ideas forward.
RI.6.6
Figure out an author's purpose or stance in a nonfiction text and point to the places where it shows.
RI.6.7
Combine what charts, images, numbers and written words say to build a clear, complete picture of a topic or issue.
RI.6.8
Follow an author's argument claim by claim and sort the claims backed by reasons and evidence from the ones that are not.
RI.6.9
Compare how two authors present the same events, like a memoir and a biography about the same person.
RI.6.10
Read and understand literary nonfiction such as memoirs, essays and speeches written for grades 6 to 8 by the end of the year, with help on the hardest ones.
Writing
10 standardsW.6.1
Write an argument with a clear claim, reasons and evidence from credible sources, linking words, a formal style and a conclusion that follows from it.
W.6.2
Write an informative piece that introduces a topic, organizes facts, definitions and examples under headings or charts where they help, and ends with a conclusion.
W.6.3
Write a true or made-up story that sets the scene, uses dialogue, pacing and sensory detail, moves clearly through time and ends with a fitting conclusion.
W.6.4
Match how a piece of writing is developed, organized and styled to its task, its purpose and the people who will read it.
W.6.5
With help from peers and adults, make writing stronger through planning, revision, editing, rewriting or a fresh approach, using sixth grade grammar.
W.6.6
Use technology and the internet to write and publish work and to collaborate with others online, with solid keyboarding skills.
W.6.7
Run a short research project that answers a question from several sources and narrows the question when the findings call for it.
W.6.8
Gather information from print and online sources, judge whether each source is trustworthy, quote or paraphrase without plagiarizing and list where it came from.
W.6.9
Use evidence from stories and informational texts in writing, like details that show a character in depth or the reasons an author gives for a point.
W.6.10
Write regularly, from a report built over several days to a journal entry finished in one class, for different subjects, purposes and readers.
Speaking and Listening
6 standardsSL.6.1
Take part in discussions on sixth grade topics prepared with evidence, set goals and roles, ask and answer detailed questions, and paraphrase other viewpoints.
SL.6.2
Interpret information from images, numbers or spoken sources and explain how it adds to the topic, text or issue being studied.
SL.6.3
Lay out a speaker's argument claim by claim and tell which claims are backed by reasons and evidence and which are not.
SL.6.4
Present claims and findings in a logical order with facts and details that spotlight the main ideas, making eye contact and speaking clearly and loudly enough.
SL.6.5
Add graphics, images, music or sound and visual displays to a presentation where they make the information clearer.
SL.6.6
Switch between casual and formal English to fit the setting, using formal English when a task calls for it.
Language
6 standardsL.6.1
Use sixth grade grammar, like the right pronoun case such as she or her, intensive pronouns, and fixing vague or shifting pronouns and nonstandard English.
L.6.2
Capitalize the first word of a sentence and the word I, name the period and question mark, and spell simple words the way they sound, like kat for cat.
L.6.3
Notice the difference between formal and casual English, like Good morning, Mrs. Lee versus Hey, and choose which fits the moment.
L.6.4
Work out an unfamiliar word from context clues, Greek and Latin roots like aud in audience and audible, or a dictionary, then check the guess.
L.6.5
Explain a nonliteral phrase like take steps, name someone who is friendly to link a word to real life, and rank knew, believed and suspected by how sure they are.
L.6.6
Learn and use grade-level academic and subject words, and look up any word that matters to understanding or expressing an idea.
The official Mississippi documents
- 2025 Mississippi College- and Career-Readiness Standards for English Language Arts · adopted 2025 · required since 2025-26
The plain-English lines on this page are EMStudio's own explanations of Mississippi's standards, not the official wording, which Mississippi Department of Education publishes in the documents above. Codes and strand names identify each standard.