Teaching students about writing argumentative papers

Some more resources that I have found after last week's session and look forward to sharing with my mentoring student this coming Monday, this time focusing specifically on argumentative essays (which one of his papers seemed to be roughly emulating):

• Argumentative Essay Slide-Guide
• Purdue's Online Writing Lab

With developing writers, I am increasingly getting the sense that one of the key lessons that needs to be taught is that they must consciously decide which type of writing they are performing. Part of this decision should be explicitly aided by the teacher's instruction, for instance through explicit instructions and mentor texts prior to the going out and writing a given assignment. Another part of this is to give them the tools to know how different forms of writing are differently capable of presenting the thesis or information they are trying to communicate. 

While some of the writing samples my student has created are better geared toward a simple report format, with presentation of a series of interesting facts being the goal of his writing product, other samples are clearly reaching toward the presentation of a contentious argument. Young writers do not necessarily differentiate between different forms of non-fiction writing, but helping them to realize that different objectives require disparate writing forms is a key to helping them to learn to write with more precision, control, and intent. 

Quick links/resources on mentoring student writers

The following is a short list of resources I found that have helped me to consider how best to mentor student writers:

• Using Mentor Texts to Motivate and Support Student Writers
• Undergraduates mentor high school writing students
• Mentor Texts - Good Essay Writing
• Writers in Schools: A Program of Literary Arts

The Essay and writing Convincingly

I think that teaching students the essay is still highly relevant. Contrary to what seems to be an increasingly popular belief, I know that the essay is a powerful, convincing, and entertaining literary medium. I think that students should learn it because I think learning it empowers them to communicate and think more effectively, not only as scholars or professionals but as citizens and neighbours.

The way I consider it, the essay is defined more by structure than by anything else; it is its structure more than anything else that makes it a distinct form of writing. The structure of essays is predicated on an organization around the natural flow of a clear, convincing argument, with an introduction, the arguments, and a conclusion. Showing students that introducing, arguing, and concluding an argument may seem repetitive, but in fact works, might be the best way to get them "on board" with learning what at times can feel like Latin. It is important to show them how this structure mirrors many other literary forms they may be more familiar with, like a movie, and also show how when deployed well (i.e. a good clip of a lawyer closing a case from a movie) this form can be helpful to them in far more than just their summative writing exercise.

The essay may be defined by structure, but I think that other key elements of the essay are important for students to learn. Teaching them about choosing and preserving an appropriate voice is really important. Voice in essays should cultivate and convey a clear sense of the author, one that derives directly from their chosen relationship to the audience. Voice is itself defined largely by dichotomies: formal/informal, academic/personal, past/present, historical/literary, emotional/detached, etc. When teaching voice, a clip like this one from Taylor Mali (http://youtu.be/OEBZkWkkdZA) can help introduce the importance of this idea. Teaching students to be aware of their voice when writing and speaking has ramifications well beyond the essay.

Teaching the essay is by no means easy. It brings together much of what is taught in English classes from k-12 into a single written exercise that begins with a blank page and demands that students produce a product that reflects structured, well thought-out (in advance) work. Introducing them to it slowly via scaffolding, and more importantly showing them why it is important to learn to write an essay are key components of successful essay-teaching.