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ELA
How to Build a Claim-Evidence-Reasoning Answer
Claim, evidence, and the link in between
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A Claim-Evidence-Reasoning answer helps you turn a question into a clear, supported written response. It matters because strong writing is more than giving an opinion or copying a quote. In grades 6 to 12, CER gives you a simple structure for explaining what you think, proving it with text or facts, and showing how your proof connects to your idea. This structure works for literature, nonfiction, history, science, and test responses.
Key Facts
- CER = Claim + Evidence + Reasoning.
- Claim = your main answer to the question in one clear sentence.
- Evidence = specific proof from the text, data, or source, such as a quote, fact, example, or detail.
- Reasoning = your explanation of how the evidence proves or supports the claim.
- A strong CER paragraph often follows this order: claim, evidence, reasoning, closing sentence.
- Use sentence starters carefully, such as The text states, This shows, and This supports my claim because.
Vocabulary
- Claim
- A claim is the main answer or position you are trying to prove.
- Evidence
- Evidence is the specific proof you use to support your claim, such as a quote, fact, detail, or example.
- Reasoning
- Reasoning is the explanation that connects your evidence back to your claim.
- Citation
- A citation tells where a quote, fact, or detail came from so the reader can find it.
- Analysis
- Analysis is close explanation of what evidence means and why it matters.
Common Mistakes to Avoid
- Writing a claim that is too vague, such as The character is interesting, is weak because it does not directly answer the question or give a clear position.
- Dropping in a quote without context is confusing because the reader may not know who is speaking, what is happening, or why the quote matters.
- Repeating the evidence as reasoning is wrong because reasoning must explain the connection, not simply restate the quote or fact.
- Using evidence that does not match the claim weakens the answer because proof must directly support the point you are making.
Practice Questions
- 1 A student writes 1 claim sentence, 2 evidence sentences, and 3 reasoning sentences. How many total sentences are in the CER response, and which part takes up the most space?
- 2 You need to write a 12-sentence CER response with 1 claim sentence and 1 closing sentence. If you include 3 pieces of evidence and give each one the same number of reasoning sentences, how many reasoning sentences can follow each piece of evidence?
- 3 Read this claim: The narrator is unreliable. Explain what kind of evidence would best support this claim and why reasoning is still needed after the evidence.