Category: Uncategorized

Becoming Close and Critical Readers of Persuasive Texts

Two weeks ago, my fourth graders began an inquiry into the use of persuasive language in our reading workshop. This, of course, as a part of our unit of inquiry into “how we organize ourselves.” Armed with three essential questions for reading or listening to persuasive language closely and critically, we’ve explored print ads, commercials, picture books with persuasive characters, news articles, book reviews and editorials.

The world is filled with persuasive language, and curating a collection which models this type of language in the form of texts and videos is a challenge. One must consider the prior experiences of the students, their reading abilities, and their interests; not to mention teaching and learning goals. I set off preparing for this unit with the goal of having a collection of persuasive language that was large enough and broad enough to meet the needs and interests of my diverse class.

Commercials:

Our first entry into the world of persuasion was with t.v. commercials. I set up a youtube account with a collection of age-appropriate commercials that advertised products in different areas around the world. You can read more about these and the first phase of this unit in my last blog post.

Print Advertisements:

In order to find a selection of print advertisements, I started from scratch. I googled “print advertisements.” This was more successful than I anticipated, but I quickly found that I could search “best print ads of 2015,” and “best international advertisements.” These led me on a path to dozens of fourth-grade appropriate, culturally diverse advertisements. I purposefully chose a selection of ads which had a variety of purposes, ranging from selling goods, to don’t text and drive, to campaigning for the environment. We started off together, analyzing a print advertisement advocating for the ocean environment.

I chose this advertisement as our shared piece for several reasons. First, it was published in quite a few languages-same advertisement, different language. While we discussed the English version of the advertisement, native speakers of Spanish, Italian and Korean were also able to explore it in their mother tongue. Second, there were multiple messages in this advertisement, ranging in complexity. This would allow the students who needed more practice with identifying the purpose a point of entry, while allowing for more deeper exploration for those students ready for a challenge. I noticed more students were participating in the analysis than in previous days, using the three questions. Still, some found this type of thinking to be overwhelming and needed more support-my first strategy group for this unit! After our shared practice, students were sent off with the choice to look at other print ads in the collection I’d created, or going back to look at more commercials on our youtube channel.

Stories With Characters Using Persuasive Arguments:

This was the easiest preparation for me. I already had a collection of picture books from previous years. Some of my favorite titles include: Hey, Little Ant, by Phillip M. Hoose, My Brother Dan’s Delicious, by Steven L. Layne, Earrings, by Judith Viorst, Can I Keep Him?, by Steven Kellogg, and the I Wanna books, by Karen Kaufman Orloff. The kids love all of these books and they serve as powerful mentor texts down the line in writer’s workshop. If you know of other great mentor texts, please let me know!

News Articles/Editorials/Blogs:

My students have already been exposed to book blogs and book reviews from our “Readerly Life” unit. I used a review from this mother and son blog, giving students more exposure to how we use persuasive language, but also letting them see the role of multiple perspectives. I found a bunch of editorials, articles and reviews, mostly by luck and perseverance on the internet. I also trolled Newsela, and made a collection of opinion articles for kids. This is where I got the bulk of my articles. If you don’t know Newsela, I highly recommend you check it out. It’s a free source for news articles for students of all ages. It’s a very user-friendly, searchable site and you can create digital collections online, saving the articles you want to use for a given purpose. The articles are available on multiple reading “levels” so that students can find a just right version to read. There are even more perks to this site, but I haven’t used it to it’s fullest potential yet. (How am I doing with my use of persuasive language in this section?)

I printed out copies of every article I used. My students have access to the websites, but during reader’s workshop I prefer that they can interact with the print, old-school style. I’m not yet convinced that reading online supports close or critical reading, and I like that students can mark up the texts. I’m open to discussion on this, so go ahead and do your best to persuade me otherwise;-).

So, another week has passed, and my readers are becoming increasingly close readers of, and listeners to, persuasive texts. Through mini-lessons and guided practice, they have learned to determine the author or speaker’s purpose, how to identify and consider the reasons the author or speaker gives, and to use their own experiences, knowledge and understandings to think critically about the author or speaker’s perspective or goal.

On Monday, we launch our focus on persuasive language in our writer’s workshop!

Integrating A Persuasive Language Study Into A PYP Unit of Inquiry

Working at a PYP school, there is often discussion around how we can incorporate quality literacy teaching and learning into a program of inquiry. Here is an example of how this can be done by using the unit of inquiry and key concepts as a base, and “workshop” style mini-lessons and engagements as a vehicle for students to develop their skills and understanding.

At the end of an inspiring two days with Georgia Heard and Kathy Collins last month, we were asked to reflect on our take-aways. Long-term, mid-term and immediate-I had so many ideas vying to be my main focus, but Kathy Collins’ session on close reading was right on time for the unit I was starting with my fourth graders that Monday.

As a part of our “How We Organize Ourselves” unit, we explore the marketplace. Our language integration for this unit focuses on persuasive speech and texts. The unit has moved this year, and now occupies a comfortable six weeks, split up by our February break. In the past, it would get crammed in right before the Christmas break, vying with holiday festivities, special events, and waning attention spans; along with all of the other “loose ends” that we wanted to tie up before a three week break. The time now allocated to this unit has it brimming with possibilities. There is more time for students to pursue their own inquiries into the marketplace, as well as for some in-depth exploration of language within and beyond the context of the unit. Students can be afforded compelling opportunities to become critical readers of (or listeners to) persuasive and argument language; as well as skilled users of this genre when their writing or speaking goal is to persuade or convince others.

We’ve always looked at different forms of advertising during this unit, and we extend the literacy integration to include persuasive essays and stories. This usually begins with an exploration of advertising gimmicks, such as slogans, logos, smart facts, spokespeople, etc. Students learn about these gimmicks and then use them to advertise their own products and services, which they work on developing and preparing to sell at our grade 4 marketplace. We then usually continue building on our understanding of persuasive language, by examining author/creator’s purpose, and craft moves for persuasive essay writing. We would read persuasive texts together, but there was never much time for a reading unit. This has always been frustrating for me, as there are so many amazing links to the skills habits our readers need to develop, but there was never any time. Until this year…

Coming up to this unit, I knew that my students needed to work on their critical reading skills, and to recognize the need to develop their own ideas about what an author is saying. While persuasive texts are not the only ones requiring these skills, they do provide a very concrete point of entry for fourth graders to develop the skills and dispositions to read/listen to what is being communicated closely, consider it critically, and make determinations based on their own experiences, knowledge and feelings related to the text.

Planning ahead, I developed three questions for students to use as they practiced close reading of/listening to persuasive language:

  • What is the author/creator trying to convince me of or persuade me to do?
  • What strategies is the author/creator using to persuade/convince me?
  • What are my thoughts, connections, questions and reactions to this?

Modelling and then releasing responsibility:

Students began using these three prompts as they watched television commercials on youtube. I first modelled “close watching” using a commercial from my childhood, for Kellogg’s Frosted Flakes. I pointed out the jingle (I know I’m not the only person out there who can sing the “Tony the Tiger” song by heart). I noted the use of healthy, active children, playing sports and showing off their energy. I talked about Tony, the spokes-tiger. I then modelled reflecting on what the advertisement was telling me, and what it was trying to get me to do. At this point, students were catching on and joining in, thinking along. We captured our ideas on the chart below and then I sent them off with a pre-selected collection of commercials from around the world, to practice this very same thinking. 

Close Listening to Commercial
Some of our thoughts in response to the Frosted Flakes commercial.

As the students practiced close listening, I noticed that many were easily picking out the purpose of the commercials, as well as some of the more obvious advertising gimmicks, but many students found it more challenging to discuss their own ideas/reactions to the commercials.

The next day, we engaged in a similar engagement with a print advertisement. This was definitely more shared reading than modelling. As the students became more comfortable with the type of thinking we were practicing, they took on more responsibility.

As our unit unfolds, students are able to revisit the collection of commercials and print ads that I had curated for them during the readers workshop, as well as explore other persuasive, and non-persuasive texts. I will continue to look for ways to support them as they develop their understanding of persuasive language, how it is used, and how they can be critical consumers when they are on the receiving end. Very soon, we will start looking at all of these ideas as writers and creators of persuasive texts and language.