The argumentative writing is a formula and the state assessment writing is a formula writing practice examined in the next section coexisted in the span of about three weeks. Mr. Royal intentionally connected these two practices in order to prepare students for the state assessment
were accompanied by similarities in how he talked about how and why to engage in the practices. Mr. Royal was also more likely to position the class as students in these practices, rather than as writers.
In Mr. Royal’s classroom, argumentative writing was used to demonstrate understanding of reading, specifically the philosophical novel The Alchemist. Students gained access to this practice by using structural elements of arguments. According to Newell, VanDerHeide, and Wynhoff Olsen a structural argumentative epistemology is one in which students learn to identify and apply “argument elements” to create essays that develop a recognizable structure (2014, p. 97). For Mr. Royal, two structural terms of access were key. The first was the analytical thesis, which he defined as a thesis that makes an argument (as opposed to a thesis that is informational and sets up topics that will be described). Student theses needed to contain a subordinating conjunction as well to show a relationship between the ideas of the argument. The second was an argument writing “formula” consisting of claims, evidence, and reasoning. The Mr. Royal first taught students how he wanted them to write thesis statements:
1. Mr. Royal: Subordinate conjunctions. {Mr. Royal at blackboard pointing at words on it} These are words like--I want you to write every one of these down because you will need to use them in your paper: in order, because, since, so that, although, therefore, unless, until, as, as if, which, even though. 2. {pause of over 20 seconds as students write words from the board} 3. Mr. Royal: Subordinate conjunctions are words like in order, because, since, so that,
although, therefore. What's a subordinate conjunction do? How's it function in a sentence? [2] Coordinate conjunctions connect words or
phrases. What do subordinate conjunctions do? [3] They do more than just connect. [5] Everett.
4. Everett: They relate two topics.
5. Mr. Royal: They show a relationship between two phrases. That's key. They show a rela-tion-ship between words or phrases in a sentence.
6. {pause of over 20 seconds as students write definition from the board and Mr. Royal writes an example sentence}
7. Mr. Royal: So for example, “I went to the grocery store so that I could make dinner.” What's the conjunction in that sentence? Sunny.
8. Sunny: So that.
9. Mr. Royal: What two phrases is it connecting? Hazel. 10. Hazel: I went to the grocery store
11. Mr. Royal: That’s one.
12. Hazel: So that I could make dinner
13. Mr. Royal: That's two. What's the relationship between these two phrases in the sentence? How does one depend on the other one? Lily.
14. Lily: In order to [make dinner] you have to get food
15. Mr. Royal: OK so in order for phrase two to even happen, in order to make that dinner, it's dependent on phrase one. You have to go to the grocery store first in order to get the ingredients.
Mr. Royal had introduced subordinate conjunctions in an essay early in the school year, but he had not discussed their place in his construction of thesis statements before. On this day of whole class instruction, Mr. Royal coached students in naming and recognizing relationships
created by subordinate conjunctions so that the structure of their thesis statements was in place for the claims he wanted them to make.
Near the end of the period, Mr. Royal introduced students to a second requirement for thesis statements:
1. Mr. Royal: (reading) “Is the thesis statement analytical? The thesis statement should do more than announce the topic of your essay. It should reveal what position you will take and how you plan to address the subject at issue.” So I wrote, “Avoid making pro/con judgments that oversimplify issues.” So my origin--this is my thesis statement. It's pretty weak. “We must save the planet.” Why is that a weak thesis statement? “We must”— that's my thesis statement. “We must save the planet.” It's going to come at the end of my introduction. Eric.
2. Eric: […]
3. Mr. Royal: It doesn’t explain why we must do what? 4. Eric: [save the planet]
5. Mr. Royal: Save the planet. Hazel. 6. Hazel: […] conjunction.
7. Mr. Royal: It doesn’t have a subordinate conjunction. Robert. 8. Robert: […]
9. Mr. Royal: OK James.
10. James: It’s just like a really […]
11. Mr. Royal: I don't know how many people would argue with that. Is that an arguable position? Who would argue that you don't want to save the planet?
Maybe someone [like] Eric, but for the most part: it doesn't have a subordinate conjunction, it's not analytical, it doesn't say why we should do anything. So on the blackboard I wrote, “We must save the planet because” let's just brainstorm a list of reasons why.
Mr. Royal wanted thesis statements that established positions for argument. The first clause established the position (We must save the planet), the subordinate conjunction introduced a related second clause (because), and the second clause stated the unifying argument (we need to pass it on to future generations).
Mr. Royal’s approach to thesis statements contrasts with the three-part thesis template taught by many ELA educators which sets up the five-paragraph essay that has dominated secondary writing for over a quarter of a century now (Nunnally, 1991 in Wesley, 2000). I asked Mr. Royal about that difference in our post-research interview:
The essays that I saw from seventh grade that do that, that list A B and C. I mean they just weren't strong enough, they weren't forceful enough, they weren't arguing anything. It was just kind of list--it was a list, that's all it was. So I mean I've been working with the seventh grade teachers to kind of take a shift from just listing three things, to like, “How can we start getting the kids to at least think about creating a claim, or a strong and forceful claim that the kids can elaborate on in the paper,” so. And it's tough to say, “Oh:: the list is bad,” maybe you can make a list and you are arguing something. It's just it becomes so formulaic for the kids. It's like a thesis statement's one of the hardest things to write in the paper, and I think what I was thinking in seventh grade--and the kids are coming to my eighth grade class, I was like, “Thesis statements. These are easy. It's a formula A B and C. You just plug in your three talking points and that's it,” and I
don't know, that's not how I would have written a thesis statement or approached them, so. (interview, August 19, 2014)
Mr. Royal’s preference for analytical thesis statements was a reflection of his understanding of student needs and his own experiences. Drawing on his experiences as a student-writer, a writing major, and a teacher to whom students had returned to discuss their writing after leaving his class, Mr. Royal positioned students as needing to emphasize claims over formulas in how they wrote thesis statements.
Given the list-like thesis statement’s easy transference to the five-paragraph essay model so prevalent in middle and secondary education, and valued on many standardized tests, Mr. Royal’s sponsorship of analytical thesis statements could have led to multiple outcomes for students. First, students may decide not to appropriate analytical thesis statements if his method differs from all or most of the instruction his students encounter elsewhere in middle or secondary education. However, given that most post-secondary writing expands beyond the constraints of the list-like thesis template, the students that do appropriate the kind of thesis statements Mr. Royal sponsored may have found themselves more prepared for the post- secondary knowledge economy.
While he resisted formulas in thesis statements, he embraced the concept for body paragraphs. The second structural element of argument that functioned as a term of access to the practice for students was Mr. Royal’s “formula” for writing body paragraphs: claim, evidence, reason, and counterargument. The formula was pervasive in Mr. Royal’s instruction as he had students memorize and apply a version of Toulmin’s (1958) model in each of their body paragraphs:
1. Mr. Royal: Alright. (reading) “What is argument writing? Last year you wrote a persuasive essay. In persuasive writing you often appeal to emotions and use style to persuade your readers. Your single purpose is to be
convincing. In argument writing”--or excuse me—“Argument writing on the other hand mainly involves using claims, evidence, reasons or warrants, and counterarguments. It's the kind of writing you need to know for success in college and in life.” Have we heard these terms before? Claims, evidence, reasons and warrants, and counterarguments? Where have we heard or used those terms before? Claims, evidence, and reasons. Lily.
2. Lily: Like in courts
3. Mr. Royal: Oh so outside school. OK um good, a lot of times those terms are used like in police dramas or detective dramas in school--or excuse me—on television. Blake.
4. Blake: In science class we learned counterargument.
5. Mr. Royal: K good. You learned counterargument. Did you use claims, evidence, and reasons last year?
6. Some Stud.: No
7. Fem. Stud.1: Yeah remember […] 8. Fem. Stud.2: I don’t remember
9. Fem. Stud.3: Yeah the bullying […] reasons why we shouldn’t […] and evidence that [it’s bad]
Although Mr. Royal thought students would respond with academic uses of the formula, Lily had her favorite topic in mind: the work of lawyers. Mr. Royal acknowledged her perspective and eventually encouraged the rest of the class to connect the formula to other areas of life through a discussion of advertisements, but he intended to use the introduction to argumentative writing to prepare students to see the formula as preparing them for future academic economies.
Though Mr. Royal never referenced it as such, the formula he asked students to follow placed them within the “college and career readiness” economy of the Common Core State Standards where student-writers “Write arguments to support claims with clear reasons and relevant evidence” (W.8.1), “Introduce claim(s), acknowledge and distinguish the claim(s) from alternate or opposing claims” (W.8.1a), and “Support claim(s) with logical reasoning and relevant evidence” (W.8.1b). Mr. Royal’s sponsorship practices in the argumentative writing is a formula literacy practice exemplify how abstract sponsors produce material effects in local contexts of instruction.
We can see the potential effects of the CCSS by looking at the writing standards from the National Council of Teachers of English and International Reading Association. Those standards do not construct argument writing as a separate practice from other kinds of writing like informational writing. Standard five says, “Students employ a wide range of strategies as they write and use different writing process elements appropriately to communicate with different audiences for a variety of purposes.” Standard six says, “Students apply knowledge of language structure, language conventions (e.g., spelling and punctuation), media techniques, figurative language, and genre to create, critique, and discuss print and nonprint texts.” Neither standard specifies how students should construct arguments as the CCSS do. As a result, teachers would have more leeway to teach that genre and other genres in ways they felt were
most appropriate. Some teachers may find that standards paradigm freeing, while others may find it too vague to be useful. As abstract sponsors, then, standards communicate to teachers the means by which they should construct writing practices for students. They also help establish the academic economies supported by student writing. One of the reasons to define expectations for writing as explicitly as the CCSS do would be to set up a system by which all students are judged for their contributions to the same academic economy. Individual teachers become local administrators of that universal academic economy, but in contexts like Mr. Royal’s the standards could remain relatively abstracted because his school had granted him the authority to make curricular decisions. Thus, for argument writing, Mr. Royal was able to emphasize both academic and non-academic literacy economies that did not directly connect to those sponsored by the CCSS and other state standards. However, the CCSS standards became much more concrete sponsors of instruction and learning when Mr. Royal prepared his students for the state assessments.