Standard: 10.3.2.

ii: Develop the topic with well-chosen, relevant, and sufficient facts, extended definitions, concrete details,
quotations, or other information and examples appropriate to the audiences knowledge of the topic. (CCSS: W.9-10.2b)
Learning Target: I can discover and analyze mentor texts in order to create an argument that appeals to a specific audience.
Success Criteria: The students ticket out the door will have them thinking about their 1) created topic, 2) who their audience is, and
3) how to best appeal to their audience.

Materials:
Google Slides prepared and easily accessible for the students.
Class copies of Persuasive techniques handout
Plan:
What Im Doing

Why?

Before Class

Students will come into class and find their seats.

They will complete their gratitude journal by either
writing or speaking with their peers. There will be
direction on the board for the students to have their
W14 warm up out or easily accessible. I will check for
completion during their MoZ.
I will make sure that I read the POD and the LT aloud
for the students, as I forgot the last lesson.

Routine. Climate/culture. Habit building.

Beginning of Class

I will ask the students for a super-quick refresher on

the rhetorical appeals that we discussed last week.
Students will analyze data from the Pew Research
Center that says that most people receive their news
from social media.
How do you get your news? Do you think where you
receive your news affects how you receive your
news? Check out some of these charts/graphs. How
do you think this changes the way news sites present
the information they want to push out?

Routine. The students are analyzing data on how

audiences view and receive their news. Getting
students to look at an analyze data connects to the
mathematics standard and gets students thinking
about the logistics behind who they write to.

Activity

Once students have finished their MoZ, we will briefly

go over the persuasive techniques handout. Students
may give examples,
With a partner, students will find a video or image
advertisement that they believe effectively appeals to
specific audience. Once they have found that video,
they will discuss with a partner what makes that ad
effective and paste it to a shared Google
presentation.
They will also write a short blurb about who they
believe is this ads targeted audience.
We will go through each of the groups ads and why
they believe whoever they chose is the targeted
audience.
Check back w/ LT
I will have the students stand up and switch groups,
the goal being to have one person from each
different ad in their new group.
With their new group, based on what they have seen
from the different advertisements and what we have
talked about as a whole class, they will determine the
top three ways to appeal to an audience.
Each group will post their three ways in the slideshow
document. Once they are all finished, I will pull the
students back together as a class and we will
determine a top 5 list which they will then use for
their activity.

I am turning it over to the students. Im allowing them

to find the mentor texts that get a reaction from them.
Going through the mentor texts together will help the
groups who may have been struggling see what
other groups in the class were thinking, helping them
make connections between what they are working on
and what others are.
Allowing the students to stand up and switch groups
will get their blood pumping and keep the kinesthetic
learners engaged and away from boredom.
The students are then self-generating a list of what
they should be looking for when appealing to an
audience.
Coming back together and seeing what everyone
wrote down will allow us as a class to collaborate and
create a list, created by the students, that they will
use as a guide while appealing to an audience for
their persuasive letters they are to begin writing later
this week.

If Time Activity

We will briefly discuss what topics they chose for

their warm up. These topics will then be shaped into
the topics for their persuasive letter assignment that
will be due the following week before they leave for
Thanksgiving break.
I will then break the students up into three different
groups.
1) The students who did not complete their warm-up.

We need to come back to their warm-up for the week

since the purpose of the warm-up was to get them
thinking about what/who they would like to write their
persuasive letter about/to.
There will be a few students who have not completed
their warm-up. They will have time to do so, but
because they were unprepared, will not have time to
work closely with finding and appealing to their

Closure

2) The students who may still need help determining

the audience of their letter.
3) Students who are ready to start drafting their
claim.
If the students get finished drafting their claim, they
will begin to do research for sources that will support
that claim.

audience. Some students may be able to figure out

their audience quicker than others. This allows the
students to move at their own pace and figure out
what/who they are to write about/for specifically.

For their ticket out the door, on a half sheet of paper,

I will have the students write down 1) who their
specific audience is, and 2) 2-3 ways they plan on
appealing to that audience specifically with an
explanation as to why.

This will show me that the students are thinking

about 1) their topic, 2) their audience, and 3) the
ways in which they will appeal to their audience. This
will show me if they hit the learning target or not.

Reflection:
My goal for this lesson was to push myself to be more uncomfortable and turn the learning over to the students more than I have
done in the past. Although I originally planned to have the lesson be less structured, I felt too uncomfortable and safe-guarded my
lesson which might be why the pacing was so off.