Argument Checklists and Unpacking the Evidence

Here is a link to the 8th grade argument checklist we discussed in class.  

Here is a link to the 8th and 9th grade argument checklist I mentioned in class.  

Honors: Always check those sources!  I shared yet another article about a supposedly reliable source (this time a faculty member from the University of Delaware) whose research and conclusions were being funded by a group with a clear stake in his results.  On the surface the information appears to be credible, but a little digging revealed a clear conflict of interest.  Careful!

We took a quick look at your drafts and then looked into unpacking/explaining your analysis of your evidence.  Too often people confuse evidence with analysis leaving the readers to draw their own conclusions from the information.  Don't be that writer.

Make it a point to fully unpack and explain the evidence that you include in your arguments.  Make your points clearly.  Remember numbers and statistics can be twisted to support anything. Unexplained information can be misinterpreted as well.  That's what we demonstrated through our reading and writing of the "Shoot-out" excerpts today.

Tonight I want you to select two body paragraphs form your argument paper and rewrite them by adding evidence and more insightful and detailed analysis.  Set the original and the new and improved paragraphs up next to each other for easy comparison.

Tomorrow we will spend a bit of time on intros and quote insertion.  This paper will be turned in on Monday.  We'll work a bit with our nonfiction presentations tomorrow as well.

Standard: We duplicated much of what the honors classes did today as we worked on taking our dog drafts to the next level.  Several of us had paragraphs of evidence with no analysis or paragraphs of analysis with no evidence.  Be sure that you are unpacking the evidence fully to make your arguments as strong as possible.

Like the honors classes I want you to work on adding evidence and analysis to your original body paragraphs tonight.  Challenge yourself to unpack the evidence fully. We'll see how well we did tomorrow.