Reference

Glossary of classroom academic language.

Claim
A statement you want a reader to accept, which must be supported with evidence.
Evidence
Facts, data, or quotations from a text, table, or experiment.
Reasoning
The sentence that explains how the evidence supports the claim.
Hypothesis
A testable prediction, not a wild guess.
Variable
A quantity that can change in an experiment or an expression.
Slope
The rate of change of a line; rise over run in a graph story.
Thesis
The central answer to an essay prompt.
Primary source
A document or object from the time under study.
Mean
A fair-share average of a data set.
Theme
A message about life that a story supports, not a one-word topic.