Persuasive Writing PBA

The Main Purpose of Your PBA You are going to produce a well researched essay, formatted correctly, that persuades your audience to take action about a topic. This essay should be your work – it should tell me your perspective, using evidence you found, and what you think is right. The evidence you use should be sourced from RELIABLE websites/newspapers/magazines, etc. I will be checking your sources much more carefully this time.

Key Dates Thursday: The first half of the 3rd sheet, the Topic Proposal Check, is due. Friday: The second half of that sheet, the Thesis Statement Check, is due. Tuesday next week (30th April) – Outline of the whole essay is due. Tuesday the week after (7th May) – Rough draft due. Tuesday the week after that (14th May) – Final draft and Infographic due.

Key features Your PBA should be structured like an essay – it should have an introduction, some body paragraphs, and a conclusion. Your essay needs to try and persuade the audience to take action of some kind. What this looks like will depend on your topic and what you want people to do. Your essay should contain 1-2 figures, like last time. You must ALSO submit a separate infographic that outlines all your key points visually. We’ll talk about that later.

Counter Argument A key difference between this essay and the last is that you MUST include a counter-argument in this one. This should be one of your body paragraphs, and you should explore a potential disagreement someone might have and why they’re wrong (using evidence). Make sure you explain why you DON’T find the counter-argument good. If you just make 2 arguments in your essay, you’ll sound like you have no idea what you’re talking about.

Point Breakdown 10% based on the Thesis and Topic checks 10% based on the Outline 50% based on the Essay itself 10% based on the Infographic 10% Self Assessment (at the end) 10% Homework assignments

Persuasive Writing The point of persuasive writing is to persuade. Shockingly. There are various ways of doing this, and for this essay, you should try and use several of them. Ultimately though, make sure that what you are saying advances YOUR agenda, and is based on reliable information. If I can poke holes in your argument through bad data alone, you won’t be scoring highly.

Aristotelian Rhetoric Logos The use of evidence and logic to show how good your argument is. This is the main form of rhetoric you want to be using in this essay. Ethos An appeal to the character. You might not be an expert in your subject, but you should convince me that the people whose evidence you’re using are. Pathos An appeal to emotion. This can be very effective, but you need to be careful using it. If it’s not done right, this can backfire.

Appeals Can you think of an examples of appeals you’ve already learnt you could use? Appeals to loyalty, fear, guilt, challenge, reason would all be useful here. Endorsements from celebrities and scientists might also be useful to your arguments. Don’t forget cold hard data driven arguments.

Difference between Persuasive and Informational The main difference is in what you’re trying to achieve. For the previous essay, you were trying to show that there was a particular cause and effect relationship. In this essay, you’re trying to convince someone to take action. The form of the essay will be quite similar, but the information you use may well be quite different.

Example On July 17th, 2014, Eric Garner, a 395-pound 43-year-old man with asthma, and loving husband and father of six, died in Staten Island after being put in a chokehold by a police officer after resisting arrest for selling untaxed cigarettes, and was denied medical attention after losing consciousness. This is a very brutally clear example of police brutality. Hello, I am Jackson Smart and I am here to inform you of the horrors of police brutality. I have read and researched many different reference books and websites that have informed me about police brutality and its history. Due to the cases, factors, and prevention tactics for police brutality have greatly impacted it. One of the things I learned about police brutality is that it now can happen to anyone, with or without their consideration of race, gender, religion, sexual preference, etc. The cases of, factors of, and lack of penalties for police brutality are what mainly stir up more occurrences of it.

Homework Choose your topic Tomorrow, we will have class time lab 202 for you to work on your proposals. You can bring your own electronic devices or use the lab computers. Do the Topic Proposal check for Thursday Do the Thesis Statement check for Friday