Michelle Pozzi & Torrie Browne

PERSUASION Australia Curriculum Writing overview Classroom practice NAPLAN focus and beyond ICT

CHALLENGES Planning Generic Time limit Spelling and grammar Ideas Can’t elaborate detail Waffle & repetition Generic Time limit Spelling and grammar

Child’s Persuasive Brain 3 B’s = Begging, Buttering up, Immmersed in the genre Systematically taught skills for expressing persuasive Practise skills enter working memory Extend their creative voice 4

REMEDIES Explicit direct instruction (I do) Collaboration with peers (We do) Individual practise (You do) Immersion in genre. Timely feedback and conferencing Environmental print scaffolds Narrow focus on text type Remedy a lot of these challenges is with the direct instruction model Repeating cycle of I do, we do, you do

NAPLAN The goal of persuasive writing is to persuade! Mastery of “big-picture” writing techniques = High Marks First phase of attack – hurdle that is naplan

NAPLAN Marks Engage reader (audience 6 marks) Strong Ideas (5 marks) Plan Powerfully (Structure 4 marks – cohesion 4 marks) Persuade Reader (Devices 4 marks) Spelling and Grammar (11/48)

EXPLICIT TEACHING Tennis analogy – more effective? - ‘’Go play” vs. Skill chunking. Gradual Release Model Modelling (I do) Interaction with others (We do) Solo practise (you do)

PLANNING & IDEAS Strong piece of writing is always based on great ideas. Teaching Only Planning = 2 weeks Planning to time limit (5 mins) Great ideas lay at the foundation of any piece of writing Challenging – nimble, time constraint Ideas that are relevant, let alone persuasive

Walk in and this hits them

BRAINSTORMING Creativity can be practised. Students will struggle at first Skill comes with practise Ignore test instructions, analyse the pictures. TEST TIP - Don’t walk around the room People standing behind you raises blood pressure and intrudes on concentration. Police interrogation tactic

BRAINSTORMING Class, group, solo practise Thinking on their feet games Drama improv. Games Patterns emerge – common themes Relate to school values 5 min persuasion quickies Improv games

GROUP BRAINSTORMING 4-6 students Each student writes a paragraph Brainstorm For and Against Select + Group main ideas Each person chooses one main idea and elaborates 1 min of help from group to improve ideas

VALUES Care Cooperation Pursuit of Excellence Responsibility

COLLABORATION (WE DO) Interaction – Laughter and learning. Emphasis on oral to literate H.O.T.S Judge/Jury 4 Corners Verbal boxing Group Brainstorming Role Plays

GRAPHIC ORGANISER K.I.S – 4 Square planner Easiest = no pre drawn boxes or templates Strong plan = excellent marks for Ideas (5) Cohesion (4) Structure (4) Paragraphing (3) Experimented with a lot of graphic organisers and planners, but the 4 square = best and easiest.

4 SQUARE PLANNER

PLANNING TIPS - Thinking = most important - Separate brainstorming and planning from writing. - 2 different timeslots

IMMERSION Variety good + bad Embed persuasive texts into all aspects of Literacy program (shared + guided reading) BBC Persuaders Teen Ink Shared Student examples. BTN Kids Picture Books

BBC PERSUADERS

MODELING I do – “think alouds” as I’m writing Involve student input What have I done here? What’s a more persuasive word I could use? Students copy and rewrite neatly as homework

PERSUASION GRAPH Purpose of persuasive writing is to persuade however Writing to entertain = writing to persuade

INTRODUCTIONS vs. SIZZLING STARTS Boring but safe Scaffolded write by numbers approach Good as a fall back for writers block Formula Rhetorical question + Opinion + Preview 3 Ideas + Engage Reader (we….) Security blanket Boys like write by numbers approach

RISK-TAKING & EXCITING Why write something ordinary when you can write something amazing? Facts don’t necessarily change minds, the 3 E’s do! Engagement + Emotion + Energy Compelling stories = Entertain to Persuade

SIZZLING STARTS Before After – I think books are better than TV because 1)…2)….3). Let me explain. After I’m in a fantasy land far away, magical and mysterious. I am a sorcerer, a power, a leader of thousands. Ok, I admit it. I’m in bed reading a book. T.V. just doesn’t compete.

SHOW DON’T TELL Kids “tell” because it is quick and simple Word pictures = empathise and connect Creates a solid image TELL Before – Yes we should help other countries because children in places like Ethiopia are dying without water. The goal is to persuade. Energy, emotion , Advertising Collage Create a full page spread advertising your school. SHOW the best things about the school to others

SHOW After – Thirsty? Walk into a shop and pick up a bottle of water. Pay a few dollars, unscrew the cap and drink. That’s if you’re lucky and live in Australia. Now take a close look at that small bottle in your hands. If you lived in Ethiopia, that is all the water you have to live on for three days.

SHOW DON’T TELL

Sizzling Starts Imagine if…. Picture this… Teach using sensory input What can you see, hear, taste, touch, smell? Scaffold Prompts Imagine if…. Picture this…

AUDIENCE Imagine writing to a friendly adult or teacher Makes the tone less stilted and generic.

ACTIVITY Student ad agencies are in charge of marketing flavoured milk to a particular audience. Use appropriate persuasive devices and language for their audience. Kids - Older people Teens - Athletes/Sporty People Busy mums and dads - Weight Conscious

ELABORATION Challenge – students can find ideas, but can’t elaborate Thesis = hypothesis - walls Elaboration = proof – wall paper Referring to their planner, students can easily plan 3-4 thesis statements which serve as the main theme for their

PERSUASIVE DEVICES A- Alliteration F- Facts O- Opinions R- Rhetorical Questions/R- Repetition E- Examples/Experts/Emotive Language S- Statistics T- Rule of Three

PERSUASIVE DEVICES Teach explicitly Identify examples Readings Written work Ads/ Movie Clips Activity – Sell a product by creating a poster using A FOREST devices. Ads teach art of persuasion Collect variety ads Identify Devices used Emotions evoked

SPOT THE DEVICES

ETHOS , LOGOS, PATHOS The most enlightening passage of Aristotle’s rhetoric is his identification of three core facets of a good arguer.  These were: Pathos: appeal to the emotion of the audience Ethos: a sense of credibility and “more competence” Logos: good logical structure

QUOTATIONS Students research a good quote on the topic of a persuasive theme. E.g. Cats are smarter than dogs. You can’t get eight cats to pull a sled through snow (Jeff Valdez) Dogs come when they are called. Cats take a message and get back to you. (Mary Bly) Another way to add elaboration

FINAL ARGUMENT Formula End with impact– use questions, rule of 3, short words and sentences. 3 Techniques Link to opening Show don’t tell Call to action – tell the reader what to do.

FINAL PARAGRAPH Before – Finally, plastic bags should be banned because they are not as easily disposed of as some people think. They pollute the land and the sea.

FINAL PARAGRAPH After – You think plastic bags are harmless? Tell that to the dolphin with the plastic bag wound around its snout, slowly starving to death. You think they’re light and easily thrown out? Over one million bags a week are buried, ditched and dumped in our country. One little bag blowing in the wind couldn’t hurt, could it? One maybe wouldn’t. A million does.

VOCABULARY Vocab marked separate to spelling, so have students take risks. ‘’I think toys are good’’……isn’t very persuasive Word walls of emotional + persuasive vocab Reinforce words in spelling program Explicitly teach high modality words Use modality strengthening exercises and word cloze

4 SQUARE CONNECTIVES

CONVENTIONS Takes a long time to bring a weak speller up to scratch Work on higher order thinking (planning etc) More empowering that trying to patch weak spots Practise, practise, practise words and phrases related to persuasive texts Words that crop up in written work Words like ‘’extremely’’ ‘’dangerous’’

CONVENTIONS Higher marks for complex punctuation Brackets, exclamation marks, speech marks, ellipsis… () !! “”…. Stronger students use small bits of dialogue to show mastery Weaker students read work aloud to help with commas and full stops. Last 5 mins to check work Hard for kids to focus on detail and big picture thinking at the same time.

EDITING Explicitly taught and modelled SWAP & CUPS Peer Editing Start with a Star? (What do you like) What do you wonder? (3 questions) Advice (How to make it better) Plans for revising (Written by the writer)

Capitalisation Usage and Grammar Punctuation Spelling SELF EDITING CUPS Capitalisation Usage and Grammar Punctuation Spelling

CUPS Read own work aloud 4 times Slows down reading Ear catches things the eye doesn’t. Read one time for each aspect of CUPS Ask yourself, “Does this make sense?” Different pen for each stage Dictionaries Environmental print Work with a different student

GOALS Integral part of the curriculum Effective communication skills Challenge other people’s thinking

ICT AMAP – collaborative online maps

ICT Wordle – vocabulary word art

ICT Tagexedo – Students type in words or phrases and computer makes a word cloud or image.

Animoto – Creating ads

ICT Xtranormal -Animated Persuasion

TEXTS

ACTIVITY Draw a portrait of the person you write to. Display these pictures near the persuasive environmental print as a ‘’faces of inspiration gallery’’

ACTIVITY Three Word Challenge Pair students. Each person writes 3 words on a piece of paper e.g. soup, racing, invisible Swap papers – 2 mins to write a persuasive Sizzling Start using 3 words. Randomness gets kids thinking outside square, i.e. creatively Imagine this, picture this…..

WE DO – GROUP WRITING Groups 4-6 Each person will write a paragraph Timed Brainstorm For & Against Select + Group 3-5 Main Ideas Each student chooses 1 Main Idea to work on + elaborate Students present ideas + 1 minute brainstorm help for more ideas.

Teaching Persuasive Writing – The Bones K-10 Syllabus English Scope and Sequence for persuasive texts First Steps Resource Book – Writing to Persuade (p103-116) Sentence and Paragraph work – First Steps Writing Resource Book (p190-196) DET NAPLAN site

Art of Persuasion

Connect to Students Lives Children are natural persuaders?? Variety of genre - TV Commercials Letters to the Editor Junk mail Magazine ads Connect with Literacy – non fiction and fiction books.

BBC The Persuaders

Child’s Persuasive Brain

Monty Python defines an argument

Oral to Literate Hands Game – Three B’s Verbal articulation of H.O.T.S – 4 Corners, Judge Jury Drama – improvised skits, role-play debates. Argument Game

Gradual Release Stephen King – “On Writing” Teacher directed – graphic organisers completed with think aloud statements. Read Write Think – Writing is Fun Timely and specific feedback is CRITICAL

ICT and Persuasion Opportunities are infinite.

Test Triage What are your kids’ problems? - Wyatt Earp Syndrome –brave, courageous and bold - Filibustering -

Writing Scaffolds O - Opinions R - Reasons E - Explanation O – Opinion restated

A FORREST

Spot the techniques

Your Turn Task – Creative a persuasive poster advocating for either as to why a dog or a cat would make the best pet. Use some of the techniques we’ve covered in the presentation.

Recommended Resources

The End Thanks for listening!

What is Persuasive Writing? Definition: persuasive writing… seeks to convince its readers to embrace the point-of-view presented by appealing to the audience’s reason and understanding through argument and/or entreaty. First, let’s establish what we mean by persuasive writing.

Persuasive Genres You encounter persuasion every day. TV Commercials Letters to the Editor Junk mail Magazine ads College brochures Can you think of other persuasive contexts? You encounter persuasion every day in many forms. Have you recently been persuaded by something? Have you been on a web site and been tempted to click on an advertisement or article? What drew you in?

Steps for Effective Persuasion Understand your audience Support your opinion Know the various sides of your issue Respectfully address other points of view Find common ground with your audience Establish your credibility In order to create an effective persuasive document, you should consider these important steps. We’ll go over how to accomplish each of these. Let’s start with audience.

When to Persuade an Audience Your organization needs funding for a project Your boss wants you to make recommendations for a course of action You need to shift someone’s current point of view to build common ground so action can be taken Here are some circumstances you might encounter in which you would need to persuade someone. Have you ever needed to persuade someone? What did you persuade your audience to do? Were you successful?

Understanding Your Audience Who is your audience? What beliefs do they hold about the topic? What disagreements might arise between you and your audience? How can you refute counterarguments with respect? Here are some questions you should ask yourself at the start of any persuasive writing project. It’s important to know something about what your audience believes. For example, you might use different tactics to persuade an audience who knows little about a topic versus an audience who already has strong beliefs on a topic. If you understand where your audience is coming from, you can predict how they might react and what kinds of arguments they might find convincing.

Understanding Your Audience What concerns does your audience face? For example: Do they have limited funds to distribute? Do they feel the topic directly affects them? How much time do they have to consider your document? Here are some more questions you might ask yourself about your audience. You might also think of other questions, depending on the specific nature of your project.

Understanding Your Audience Help your audience relate to your topic Appeal to their hearts as well as their minds. Use anecdotes when appropriate Paint your topic in with plenty of detail Involve the reader’s senses in these sections It’s important to back up your argument with plenty of reputable sources and information. But people make decisions with their hearts as well as their minds. While you don’t want to become sentimental about your topic, you do want your audience to be able to relate to your topic and to feel connected to your concern. If they don’t care about the topic, why should they bother to change their minds? Here are some ways you can get your audience more involved. People tend to feel more involved in issues that are local or that directly affect them. For example, if you’re trying to persuade your town to give more funding to local programs for the homeless, paint an accurate but detailed picture of what someone who’s homeless might go through in one day, or discuss in detail the current lack of resources that are available in your area.

Researching an Issue Become familiar with all sides of an issue. -find common ground -understand the history of the topic -predict the counterarguments your audience might make -find strong support for your own perspective We’ve already discussed why it’s important to find some common ground, and you need to research both sides of a topic to be able to do so. Often, it’s tempting to only research the side of the topic for which we’re arguing. However, if you’re going to be persuasive and sound educated about the topic, you’ll need to be able to address the opposing viewpoint. Also, when writing a persuasive essay, you’ll often need to include a counterargument; this is the section in which you can acknowledge and then refute major arguments made by the opposing viewpoint. Being able to predict what arguments a reader might make against you will give the opportunity to disarm these readers ahead of time. This is why it’s so important to think about your audience before you start writing.

Researching an Issue Find common ground with your audience For example: Point of Opposition: You might support a war, whereas your audience might not. Common ground: Both sides want to see their troops come home. The most effective persuaders know how to find common ground and let their audience know that they understand where they’re coming from. This is especially true if the topic is controversial and/or your audience has strong opinions about it already. Here’s one example of common ground that you might find for such a topic. The best way to find that common ground is to research both sides of the issue at hand.

Researching an Issue Predict counterarguments Example: Your Argument: Organic produce from local Farmers’ Markets is better than store-bought produce. The Opposition: Organic produce is too expensive. If you know how the opposition might react to your argument, you’ll be better equipped to disarm their arguments by creating a strong counterargument. Here’s one example of how the opposition might react. Can you think of a good counterargument off the tops of your heads?

Researching an Issue One Possible Counterargument: Organic produce is higher in nutritional value than store-bought produce and is also free of pesticides, making it a better value. Also, store-bought produce travels thousands of miles, and the cost of gasoline affects the prices of food on supermarket shelves. Here’s one possible counterargument. If you’ve done your research on this topic, you would also have statistics to back this up.

Support Your Perspective Appeal to the audience’s reason Use statistics and reputable studies Cite experts on the topic Do they back up what you say? Do they refute the other side? Hard evidence is always more convincing than simply stating your opinion. Anyone can disagree with your opinion, but if you have statistics to back up your opinion, your argument will be harder to simply dismiss as personal opinion. When it’s clear to your audience that you know what you’re writing and speaking about, this will help establish your credibility.

Cite Sources with Some Clout Which source would a reader find more credible? The New York Times http://www.myopinion.com Which person would a reader be more likely to believe? Joe Smith from Fort Wayne, IN Dr. Susan Worth, Prof. of Criminology at Purdue University Let’s say you’re doing a persuasive paper on crime, and you want to convince your audience that crime rates are down. Which source has more clout? If you were going to cite an expert to back up your argument, which person would be more convincing for your readers? Joe Smith, who was interviewed by the local paper? Or Dr. Susan Worth, who has recently published a study on the rate of violent crime in the United States?

Establish Credibility Cite credible sources Cite sources correctly and thoroughly Use professional language (and design) Edit out all errors The credibility of your sources and the amount of support you have to back up your claim will do much to persuade your audience and establish your credibility. Remember too that even if your ideas are well-supported, errors like incorrect grammar or poor organization can also hurt your credibility, which is why it’s so important to not only do you r research and get your ideas down, but to revise your writing as well. Polished documents are taken more seriously by an audience. The more credible your audience perceives you to be, the better chance you have of them taking your viewpoint seriously.

Cite Sources Ethically Don’t misrepresent a quote or leave out important information. Misquote: “Crime rates were down by 2002,” according to Dr. Smith. Actual quote: “Crime rates were down by 2002, but steadily began climbing again a year later,” said to Dr. Smith. It might be tempting to use only certain parts of information to support your argument, especially if you’re having a hard time finding sources to support your stance on a topic. Doing so, however, is unethical. You are not presenting accurate information to your audience, and if your reader decides to further read your cited source, you will quickly lose credibility when they discover your dishonesty.

Tactics to Avoid Don’t lecture or talk down to your audience Don’t make threats or “bully” your reader Don’t employ guilt trips Be careful if using the second person, “you” Don’t speak or write to your audience as if they don’t know anything, especially if you’re writing for an audience that does have knowledge about the topic already. It’s insulting. People are more willing to listen if you address them as equals. Has anyone ever sent you on a guilt trip about something? How did it feel? It’s not a very effective tool for getting people on board either. Last, people sometimes use the second person “you” when they are trying to get the audience to relate to a topic; however, this can sometimes be perceived as accusation. For example, let’s say you’re writing about the environment. You write, “With every soda can you throw away, you make a landfill bigger.” Your audience will probably resist this because they may feel as if you’re accusing them of being the problem. Try rewriting it in a more neutral way: “Aluminum cans can easily be recycled rather than taking up room in landfills.” Don’t put your audience on the defensive. If they’re mad, they won’t listen to what you’re saying.

Have More Questions? Visit us at the Writing Lab Heavilon Hall 226 4-3723 http://owl.english.purdue.edu/writinglab Visit us online at the OWL http://owl.english.purdue.edu Are there any questions about persuasive writing? As you begin working on your persuasive documents, make an appointment or drop by the Writing Lab to sit down with a writing consultant. Feel free to bring what you have, including your assignment sheet, questions, and notes or a draft of your essay if you have it started already.

The End