Full Analytical Paragraph Writing Instruction Unit with BJ Novak Short Stories

Engage your middle and high school students with satirical, funny, and accessible short stories from BJ Novak’s One More Thing—while building rock-solid paragraph writing foundations.

This complete unit guides students step by step through reading, analysis, and writing instruction with short stories that keep them hooked, while scaffolding the structure of the analytical paragraph (claims, evidence, reasoning, analysis, and quotation integration).

What’s Inside:

1. 4 lesson sets that cover 6 different stories:

• The Rematch → Characterization, diction + paragraph structure
• The Girl Who Gave Great Advice → Irony, sarcasm, and tone
• All You Have to Do & The Most Beautiful Girl in the Bookstore → Symbolism, irony, and voice/style
• The Impatient Billionaire and the Mirror for Earth & Missed Connection:... -> mood, allegory, theme, characterization, satire (bring it all together)

2. Optional Activator Lesson Plan for an episode of The Office
3. 2 Different Paragraph Pre-Assessment Assignments that map to the formative and summative assessments
4. 1 additional short story lesson set (I Never Want to Walk on the Moon) for practice and assessment prep
5. Differentiated reading questions (required/optional, close reading, scaffolding for analysis)
6. Mentor texts & fill-in-the-blank notes for claims, evidence, reasoning, and analysis
7. Sentence starters, frames, and graphic organizers to support struggling writers
8. Final analytical paragraph assessment with choice and scaffolds

Why Teachers Love It:

• ✅ High engagement — stories are short, funny, and accessible
• ✅ Explicit writing instruction built in (so it’s not just “read & discuss”)
• ✅ Differentiated options so every student can succeed
• ✅ Plug-and-play lessons ready to teach tomorrow

Length of Unit: 2–3 weeks (depending on pacing)

What's Not Included?

Please note that this unit includes scaffolded reading questions AND instructional writing materials and mentor texts for selected short stories from the collection, One More Thing by BJ Novak, but I do not own the rights to distribute the stories themselves. You will need the stories to make this unit worthwhile. I recommend purchasing a copy of the text to use for yourself, previewing the text here, or borrowing from the library.

Think your students will LOVE BJ Novak short stories?

Get the full unit bundle to access additional short story lessons and even more analytical writing practice!