How I Teach Students to Write Historical Arguments
It never occurred to me that, every bit a high school history teacher, I would demand to teach students how to write. Just with students who struggle with writing in general and who have never really written in a history class, it became part of my job description. The writing we practice in my earth history form is based on a claim and supported with bear witness. This is the procedure I utilize to teach students to write historical arguments.
Note: Virtually of what I practice comes from the College, Career and Community Writers Programme (C3WP), a part of the National Writing Project. I did some training with the Oregon Writers Projection in this Program and without information technology I would have no idea how to teach argument writing. I am and so grateful for this programme.
Footstep 1: Assemble information
Historical arguments come at the end of a unit. Students have spent time with the textile that they volition be writing nigh. For case, the first writing assignment they do is a paragraph nearly which map project schools should use to teach geography. Before writing, nosotros explore various map projections, become over the pros and cons, and read about the map projections. By the time they write, students have a lot of data to form a claim and to use for show.
Pace 2: Form an opinion
My students often struggle to grade opinions about the topics we are studying. And so, I have built opinion formation and discussion into my lesson structure. We have discussions nigh why things happened the mode they did, how things could have happened differently, etc. We take these discussions throughout the year, and then students practice forming opinions and using testify to support those opinions.
For instance, in early units we expect at European exploration and imperialism. This unit of measurement does not end with a full-blown writing assignment, simply conversations about how the world might exist different without imperialism be throughout the units. They get comfortable having these conversations and figuring out what they think about a topic. (I use guidance from Constructing Meaning and Avid to help them learn to talk to each other.)
Step 3: Make a claim
I teach writing claims, or thesis statements, offset using tools from C3WP. Claims are "debatable and defensible," meaning they are not a fact and they tin can be backed up with evidence. I spend a lot of time focusing on the "because" of the thesis: they must include why in their merits. So, they can't just say, "School should start later on." Instead, information technology must be something similar "School short offset later because students need more than sleep to succeed in school." Nosotros go through several "merits" statements to determine if they are actually claims or not. So nosotros rewrite them to make them amend. Side by side, we build a merits together around a topic we are discussing in form.
At the commencement of the twelvemonth, I give students a sentence frame like this one:
"Schools should use ___________________ map projection because ______________ and _____________."
Equally the year goes on, claims get more than nuanced. We start to admit other perspectives and make claims more specific.
Step iv: Provide evidence
Since claims are laid out with specific reasons to support the opinion, these reasons get the evidence. I label them as Reason 1, Reason 2 and Reason 3 and each reason is discussed specifically after the claim. In a paragraph writing assignment, they write from one reason to the next with phrases similar "some other reason," "also," and "finally" to link the reasons together.
When students write total essays, each reason gets its own paragraph. Reason 1 becomes the topic of the first body paragraph, reason 2 becomes the 2nd torso paragraph, etc. I use the following outline to assistance students write body paragraphs:
- Sentence one: First reason from claim
- Sentence two: Quote or summarize a piece of evidence that supports your reason
- Sentence iii: Explain how this evidence supports your reason
- Judgement four: Quote or summarize a piece of evidence that supports your reason
- Sentence five: Explain how this evidence supports your reason
- Sentence 6: Restate your reason from your claim
More sentences can be added for more evidence or explanation, but this basic layout helps kids feel like they know what to practice.
Extensions and struggles
This is a very basic outline of how I teach students to write historical arguments. Information technology is meant to be a starting point. Eventually, students start creating more nuanced claims, looking at opposing arguments, justifying evidence sources, etc.
Educatee evidence can be a problem. To begin, I have them only utilize sources from class. That way, I know the information is correct and they should know how the fabric we used in class can support their claims. I detect that starting time writers often can't connect something they observe online to discussions we've had in class.
Students also may struggle with explaining show. They think that simply quoting a source proves their point. They need to be shown how to connect evidence to a claim with an explanation.
I've had pretty good luck with this format of instruction writing, but I'd love to hear your ideas, too!
How do y'all teach students to write historical arguments? Come up and share your ideas in our WeAreTeachers HELPLINE group on Facebook.
Plus, slam-dunk argumentative writing prompts for high school.
Source: https://www.weareteachers.com/write-historical-arguments/
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