back Return to Unit Two:MWF
Class Plan -- Unit Two, Day 30
Goals Assignment for Day 31
Give students a sample argument to analyze for key features (claim, appeals, evidence, positioning among perspectives, dealing with opposing positions). Students should annotate the argument and/or provide their answers on a separate sheet of paper.

Activities:
Daily - Postscript to Arguing Proposal. Design a couple of questions which ask students to review the process of putting together the proposal, including which parts gave them the most difficulty, and what areas of their proposal they're still unsure about or dissatisfied with.

Discuss the postscript briefly and collect the proposal packets.

Introduce Arguing Assignment - Discuss what the term "to argue" means. You might want to point out that the etymological meaning is "to make clear" (from the Latin arguere).

Generate a list of what a good written argument should contain. Students are likely to have experience with writing arguments, so they will be able to identify key features such as dealing with opposing viewpoints, providing evidence, avoiding logical fallacies, etc.

Pass out your Arguing paper handout and highlight key aspects.

You will want to connect the Arguing paper to the previous assignments in the course which have led up to it, particularly those in Unit II.

Academic arguments - You will want to introduce key features of academic arguments at this point. Prepare some examples from your example case. You want to emphasize that it is impossible to define "academic writing" as Two thing, but that there are some common features across disciplines. These include acknowledging the perspectives and what has been written on the issue and positioning Two's argument within those perspectives and positions, privileging logical and character appeals over emotional appeals, and providing evidence for claims.