Answer, Cite, and Elaborate Method
What is an ACE response?
From the ACE book: Lesson 1, introducing ACE, p. 13
ACE stands for Answer, Cite, Elaborate.
- Answer: After thinking about the question, what would you answer?
- Cite: Now that you have your answer, what evidence can you bring up to support your choice?
- Elaborate: Explain more about why your evidence supports your choice, and why your overall answer is significant.
ACE is a way to make higher-quality short responses to questions. Rather than just answering with a one-word barely-adequate response, you think a bit more deeply about it and provide some reasons and some explanation about why you chose your answer. Responding like this makes you think more deeply about things, which is good all by itself, and it also opens the door for conversation and maybe even changing of minds. One-word answers are conversation killers, but explanations and evidence give people something to work with.
Template for ACE answer building:
- I think
insert answer here - One reason is:
add evidence to support your answer - This is significant because:
why does your evidence matter?
How to Elaborate
- Ask a rhetorical question
- Explain things that your reader might not already know
- Explain source and author: Where did your evidence come from, who said it, and why are they authoritative?
- If you use a quote, explain what it means and why it's relevant. DON'T JUST RESTATE WHAT THE QUOTE SAID!
Now, revise and edit
- Any keywords or concepts your reader might not understand? Explain them.
- Did you explain after your rhetorical questions?
- Did you explain the credibility of the author, source, and quote?
- Did you answer all of the reader's questions?
- Are you redundant?
- Do you fully prove your point?
- Only now do you check spelling and grammar.
Media resources
- Mister Messinger: How to elaborate your ideas
- Youtube search for "ACE Method for short response answers"
- Youtube search for "answer the question, cite evidence, elaborate your thinking"