Choose the model that fits your text and thesis. A paragraph count cannot organize the argument for you. Each model needs a precise argument, close analysis, and a clear connection to the topic.
Use this when a protagonist’s transformation supports your thesis: who they were → pressure → result → lesson. CART does not require this model; use it when the text fits.
| Stage | Job |
| Introduction | Identify the text, establish your interpretation of the topic, and give the reader a clear direction. A general observation is one possible opening. |
| 1 · Status Quo | Establish who the character was at the start, using traits and conditions relevant to the topic. |
| 2 · Pressure Point | Explain what disrupts the character’s life and why that pressure affects them. |
| 3 · Result | Explain what changed and why the character reached this outcome. Retelling the ending is not enough. |
| 4 · Universal Lesson | Bring the analysis together: what does this transformation reveal about the topic? |
| Conclusion | Restate your thesis in fresh words. Explain how the character’s transformation supports it and why it matters. |
Start with an argument about how two or three of the writer’s craft choices work together to develop an idea about the topic. Organize each section around a technique and explain what it contributes to that argument.
| Section role | Job |
| Introduction | State your thesis and why it matters. Explain how the craft choices you selected work together to develop that meaning. |
| First craft choice | Make your first claim by closely analyzing a central craft choice, such as narrative perspective. |
| Second craft choice | Analyze another choice, such as imagery or symbolism. Explain whether it supports the first claim, limits it, or reveals a tension within it. |
| Third craft choice | If the argument needs another section, examine a further choice, such as juxtaposition or structure. Use it to complete or refine your claim. |
| Conclusion | Explain how the evidence, taken together, supports your thesis and establishes why it matters. |
Connect claims about the topic by examining conditions, motives, tensions, and consequences in the text. Organize each section around a claim about meaning, then analyze the textual choices that support it.
| Section role | Job |
| Introduction | State your interpretation and the tension it addresses. Explain how the claims you will prove connect to one another. |
| 1 · Governing condition | Explain the need, belief, or pressure that makes the response possible or gives someone a reason to respond that way. |
| 2 · Mechanism or tension | Explain the competing motives, contradiction, or hidden assumption that produces the outcome. |
| 3 · Consequence or limit | Trace the consequences. Use evidence to test where your interpretation holds and where it needs to be more precise. |
| Conclusion | Bring the claims together to explain how they support your opening interpretation and why it matters. |
In every model, establish the text and your interpretation of the topic, then arrange your reasoning so the reader can follow it. A general observation, topic definition, or separate directional statement can help, but none is a required opening formula. The models and thesis frames are optional scaffolds; adapt them to the argument your evidence supports. Each body section should develop that thesis through precise evidence and analysis. Retelling events in order, listing devices, or naming a broad theme leaves the argument unproved.