Writing Lessons for Persuasive Letters Grade 2, CRM 3, Arcs 5-6

(2 Weeks of Lessons)

Recommendations for Texts

Mentor Texts:

I Wanna Iguana by Karen Kaufman Orloff

I Wanna New Room by Karen Kaufman Orloff

Should We Have Pets? By Sylvia Lollis

Dear Mr. Blueberry by Simon Jones

Dear Ms. LaRue by Mark Teague

Should we Have Pets? A Persuasive Text

by Sylvia Lollis

Yours Truly, Goldilocks by Alma Flor Ada

Otto runs for President by Rosemary Wells

Emily’s Runaway Imagination by Beverly Clearly

Click, Clack, Moo Cows that Type by Doreen Cronin

Martin’s Big Words by Doreen Rappaport

How Oliver Olson Changed the World

by Claudia Mills

Additional Resources:

The Conferring Handbook by Lucy Calkins

Texas Write Source Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

Unit Materials:

Example editorial letter, chart paper, markers, 3x5 index cards, mentor texts,

Persuasive Writing Planner, envelopes

Websites:

Great resources for writing letters

http://www.readwritethink.org/classroom-resources/lesson-plans/dear-librarian-

writing-persuasive-875.html

Persuasion Map Planning Sheet

http://www.readwritethink.org/files/resources/lesson_images/lesson875/Persuasio

nMapPlanning.pdf

List of persuasive words

http://www.readingrockets.org/content/pdfs/persuasivewordsphrases.pdf

Teaching Notes:

Julie Wollman-Bonilla says, “Writing is a powerful tool for influencing others,

getting what you want, and problem-solving. In order to write in ways that meet

their needs, children must think about how to get their readers’ attention and be

persuasive and clear. Learning to write persuasively is a valuable, life-long skill. In

addition, chldren need to write for real purposes and audiences if they are to learn

that writing is personally meaningful and a powerful communication tool.”

Adjust these mini-lessons and student writing times as appropriate for your

students. Some lessons will take more than one day to complete.

Reminder: Keep mini-lessons focused and concise. Mini-lessons should be no

longer than 10 minutes. Students should write independently for twenty to twenty-

five minutes daily.

Day 1: Sharing a Persuasive Mentor Text

1. Tell students today they will begin a new writing unit, writing a persuasive letter. Ask

students if they have ever wanted to change somebody’s mind. Have them share an example

with a partner in a think, turn, and talk format.

2. Tell them that when we try to change somebody’s mind to our opinion or thoughts it is called

persuading.

3. Read aloud the book, I Wanna Iguana or another recommended persuasive text. Discuss what

the main character wants in the story. Talk about the reasons the character gives and the

persuasive language that is used in the text.

4. Create a chart with the title of the book, what the character wants, and the reasons the

character gives to support this opinion.

5. To get students thinking of persuasive topics, give them the following questions to think

about and allow them to free write in any form.

Have student volunteers share their responses with the whole class.

Mini Lesson

Independent Writing

Peer Sharing

When did you try to persuade a family member to do something for you or with you? Did it work? What techniques did you use? What should you have said or done differently to accomplish your goal?

Day 2: What does it mean to persuade?

Have an example editorial letter ready to read aloud for today’s lesson.

1. Remind students of the mentor text you read together yesterday. Remind them that when

someone is trying to persuade, they state their opinion and give reasons to support their

opinion.

2. Review what the character wanted and his reasons from yesterday’s text.

3. Explain to students that sometimes people try to persuade others with their writing. Read

aloud an example editorial or letter that shows an example of a persuasive text.

4. Explain that when you write to persuade, you are trying to convince someone to agree with

your opinion. The author should have good reasons to support his/her opinion.

5. Begin to model the writing of a very basic persuasive letter to the class, perhaps a letter to

persuade them to stop eating junk food. You may modify the letter found in Texas Write

Source, p. 150.

6. As you model, review the parts of a friendly letter: date, salutation or greeting, body, closing,

and signature. Be sure to remind them of the capital letters in the date, salutation, and closing.

7. After writing your opinion in your letter (that they should stop eating junk food), give each

set of partners one 3x5 index card. Have partners work together to write 1-2 reasons why it is

a good idea to stop eating junk food.

8. As partners share their ideas with the class, create a list with their index cards. Combine

reasons that repeat the same idea.

9. Write their reasons to stop eating junk food into the body of the letter. Don’t worry if there

are too many reasons. You can teach this revising process later when they are writing their

own letters.

10. Write a short closing paragraph similar to the one shown in Write Source.

11. Complete your letter with a closing and signature.

Ask students to turn to a partner to talk about what they have learned about writing a persuasive

letter today. Ask volunteers to share their thoughts. Clarify any misconceptions.

Mini Lesson

Independent Writing

Peer Sharing

Day 3: What is your opinion? Who is your audience?

1. Tell students that today you will begin to brainstorm some possible ideas for persuasive

letters they can write.

2. Ask them to open their Writer’s Notebooks to the responses they wrote on Day 1 of this unit

(when they tried to persuade a family member.) Tell them that these are some good

examples of persuading a family member.

3. Explain that we can also write to persuade about topics related to school, to our friends, our

community, etc.

4. Model thinking aloud about different topics that are important to you. Share with students

that when we write a persuasive letter, we are writing about a topic that means a lot to us, so

we have to think about many different ideas to find one that is near and dear to our heart.

5. Begin a chart that includes 2 columns: Opinion and Audience. Explain to students that,

depending on the topic, their letter would need to be written to a different audience.

6. Add the following example to your chart: Adding a food item to the lunch menu (opinion

column) would be a letter written to the cafeteria manager (audience).

7. Have students think, turn, and talk with a partner about other possible ideas that are related

to school. (Adding a book to the library, longer recess time, sitting with their friends at

lunch, etc.)

8. To encourage more ideas, suggest that they think about things that bother them at school,

things they would like to see changed, and improvements that could be made.

9. Add all possible ideas to the chart and determine who the audience would be for each idea.

10. Ask students to think and talk with their partners about ideas they have to persuade

someone at home.

11. Because these are more personal to each child, allow time for them to think and write ideas

in their Writer’s Notebooks independently.

Mini Lesson

Independent Writing

12. Use these questions to stimulate their thinking:

Choose some students to orally share their lists. You will add their ideas to your chart during

tomorrow’s lesson.

Day 4: Focusing on Persuasive Language

1. Ask students to share with the class some of the ideas they wrote during yesterday’s lesson to

persuade someone at home.

2. Add their suggestions to your Opinion / Audience T-chart and write the person or people

who would be the appropriate audience for each topic.

3. Re-read the mentor text from Day 1 or choose another book that has good persuasive

language to create a chart of persuasive words and phrases.

4. Tell students that this time you are going to concentrate on the type of language the author

used to persuade or convince the reader.

5. As you encounter persuasive words and phrases, point them out to your students and add

them to your chart. Here is a beginning list of persuasive words, but it will be more effective

if your students hear the words as they are used in the context of the story.

Mini Lesson

Peer Sharing

What things are you responsible for at home? Do you have too many responsibilities? Too few? How do you feel about your responsibilities? Do you think someone else should be more responsible? What do you think is ‘unfair’ in your life? Why is it unfair? How could you persuade someone to see how unfair it is?

6. Have students choose a topic from your chart and work with a partner to practice writing an

opinion and reasons to support this opinion. Remind them to use the persuasive language

you added to the chart today.

7. Students may use this Persuasive Writing Planner to help them organize their thoughts.

Have 1-2 partners share with the class the opinions and reasons they developed with their partner

today.

Day 5: Choose a Personal Topic and Plan for the Persuasive Letter

1. Read aloud another persuasive mentor text. Discuss and/or chart the character’s opinion and

the reasons the character gave for his/her opinion.

2. Add to the chart of persuasive language any new words or phrases the class notices.

3. Tell students that today, they will choose their own topic and write a letter to the audience

they choose. Refer back to the Opinion / Audience T-chart that you created together over the

last few days.

4. Students may choose any idea from this chart, an idea that they have already worked on with

a partner, or any new idea they may have been thinking about.

5. Choose a topic that you know will be different from your students’ topics. One example

might be “Students should get 8-9 hours of sleep every night.”

6. Model using the Persuasive Writing Planner to plan your opinion, audience, and reasons.

7. Try to use two strong reasons and one that you consider weaker to use for future revising

lessons. You will continue to use this example in future lessons.

8. Highlight the persuasive words you used when writing your reasons.

Independent Writing

Peer Sharing

Mini Lesson

1. Tell your writers that you want them to do the exact same thing you modeled today, using the

Persuasive Writing Planner to plan their own persuasive letters.

2. Allow time for writers to think and work independently. They may ask a peer for help if

they are having trouble coming up with their own reasons.

3. After you know that most students have begun working, you can ask a few struggling writers

to join you in a small group for extra support.

Group students with a new partner and have them share their topic and the plan they worked on

developing today.

Day 6: Using Facts and Opinions to Support the Reasons

1. Have 1-2 students share their plan for their persuasive writing with the class. Remind the

class to listen for the persuasive language the students have used.

2. Remind students that they have learned about the differences between facts and opinions in

the past. Ask for students to define the difference and make a chart or refer back to the chart

you have previously made.

3. Explain that when authors write to persuade, they can use facts and opinions to support their

reasons.

Independent Writing

Peer Sharing

Mini Lesson

Writing Conventions: Use Articles: a, an, the Teacher should provide explicit instruction and modeling of the writing conventions during modeled

and shared writing. In addition, teacher should keep anecdotal notes to guide further instruction in

small group and individually.

4. Show students how they might add facts and opinions to their reasons to make their writing

more persuasive. Below is an example you can use.

5. You can rewrite each reason on a separate index card. This will give you the space you will

need to add your facts and opinions.

6. Explain that although you can include both facts and opinions, facts tend to hold more

weight and to be more powerful.

7. Reread your work to check to make sure it makes sense.

8. Have students review their reasons and practice creating facts and opinions to support each

reason.

9. Some writers may want to work with a partner to help them come up with a variety of facts

and opinions.

10. Circulate around to assess students’ understanding and offer assistance as students work.

Have 1-2 students share the facts and opinions they generated for their personal persuasive

writings.

Independent Writing

Peer Sharing

Opinion: Students should get 8-9 hours of sleep every night.

Audience: Students in your class

One Reason: They can think better during the school day. Fact – It is hard to concentrate when you have to fight to stay awake.

Opinion – I don’t like it when I feel tired during the school day.

Another Reason: Sleep helps to keep our bodies healthy. Fact – When we sleep, our bodies fight illnesses.

Fact – We often catch a cold or flu when we are not getting enough sleep.

Day 7: Writing the Persuasive Letter

1. Tell writers how proud you are of the hard work they have been putting forth to write their

persuasive letters.

2. Today, they will insert their persuasive argument into the body of a letter.

3. Using your model topic and reasons (supported with facts and opinions) show how to write

the date and salutation for your letter. Begin your letter with some background information

about your topic and state your opinion in the first paragraph.

4. Show students that, in the second paragraph, you will use the information from your

Persuasive Planner and the index cards with facts and opinions to write this information in

complete sentences.

5. Complete your letter with a brief statement about your main opinion and write the closing and

signature for your letter.

6. Students will write their persuasive letters today in the same manner that you just modeled for

them.

7. After you are sure that all students understand their work for today and have settled in to

writing, ask a small group of struggling writers to work with you in a guided writing group.

Often these students just need frequent and immediate feedback in order to continue working.

Help them to formulate their thoughts when necessary.

Group students with a new partner and have them share their letters they have begun writing today.

Mini Lesson

Independent Writing

Peer Sharing

Conferencing:

Take time each day to conference with a few students. Here are a few possible conference questions.

How can you organize your ideas into a paragraph?

Can you check to see if you are including all the parts of a letter?

I’m not sure your reasons or facts support your thesis. Let’s work on that.

Day 8: Revise for Clarity and Strong Ideas

1. Tell writers that once they have completed the draft of their letter, they will revise to make

sure their reasons are strong and their ideas are clear.

2. When writing persuasive pieces, authors ask themselves which reason they feel strongest

about. They usually save their best reason for last to make the biggest impact.

3. Read aloud your draft of the letter you wrote yesterday. Talk about which of your reasons

you feel most strongly about and mark your draft to show how you will move this reason to

the end. Make sure to move the facts and opinions that are related to this reason as well.

4. Reread your draft with the above change. Continue to ask yourself whether these are your

best reasons. Show students how you might change or even eliminate an idea that does not

seem so important today, or you might add an idea you hadn’t thought about before.

5. Reread your draft again, this time to focus on whether your ideas are clear and interesting.

6. Add any connecting words or phrases or descriptive words that will make your writing more

clear.

7. Pair your students so that writers who are at about the same writing level will work together

on their revisions.

8. Students should sit side-by-side with their partners to read one partner’s letter at a time. The

listening partner should offer suggestions, but only the writer makes any marks on his/her

own paper.

9. Once a partner group has finished with one letter, they work together to revise the other

partner’s letter.

10. Allow time for students to work independently after they have worked with their partner.

Mini Lesson

Independent Writing

Conference Topics: “What part would you like to change?”

“What reasons are most important to you?”

“What fact do you know that would prove this idea?”

Do you have an opinion about this reason that you’d like to share?

Ask for volunteers to share with the class the revisions they made today.

Day 9: Edit and Final Draft

1. Congratulate your students on their hard work on persuasive letters.

2. Tell them that the next step is to edit their work to make sure it can be read by others.

3. Quickly review the editing marks. Model editing your piece using the editing symbols and

an editing checklist. (See the Editing Checklist below.)

4. Have students edit with a partner. Make sure the editing symbols and editing checklist are

visible to students.

5. Remind students that once they have finished editing, they should begin to write their final

draft.

Peer Sharing

Mini Lesson

Independent Writing

Editing Checklist for Persuasive Letter:

Do all sentences end with punctuation?

Do all sentences begin with a capital letter?

Do all nouns include the correct articles (a, an, the)?

Does the date, salutation, and closing of my letter include a capital letter and a comma in the correct places?

Are my words spelled correctly?

6. Remind them that it is important for their letters to be written as perfectly as possible,

especially since they are trying to persuade their reader to agree with their way of thinking.

Allow time for students to share how they edited each other’s work.

Day 10: Sharing and Delivering the Letters

1. Tell students that the final part of writing a letter is addressing the envelope.

2. Model for students how to address an envelope. (Optional: students add a creative stamp for

delivery within school.)

3. Provide envelopes. Have students put the finishing touches on their letters, address the

envelopes, search for addresses (if need be), and turn in their work.

4. Provide time for students to read their completed letters aloud to a small group.

5. If students have written letters to someone in the school, you may consider allowing the

student to hand deliver his/her letter.

Peer Sharing

Mini Lesson

Independent Writing

Peer Sharing