• Watch carefully to see how students participate in shared-writing activities. If you see any students hanging back, take time to ask them one-on-one about their understanding. Watch for overall patterns in the class to assess understanding of each concept.

“Let’s practice.” Write the following titles on the board. Help students determine what they are and then underline them or put them in quotation marks accordingly.

Kids Who Have Pets Are More Responsible, Parenting Magazine
Chapter 6: How to Encourage Recycling in Your School
Reading Together: The Importance of a Community Library by Chaundra Bookish

Students likely have samples, so to check for understanding, ask them to write their sources in the correct format. Check their titles and approve the citing format for their essays.

Part 2

Demonstrate how to use information in the opinion writing map to compose an opinion paper; the first step involves writing an introductory paragraph. Using the samples from the previous lessons, have students analyze how the writers begin their paper. You may also want to refer back to the Time for Kids Web site as a sample. Note for students that the claim or position statement is generally in the introduction and has supporting ideas that accompany it.

Give students the Opinion Writing Maps they completed in Lesson 2. Students should write an introductory paragraph that includes the claim or position statement sentence stating their position or establishing a claim, along with the two or three main reasons that support their claim. Circulate around the classroom and offer support to students as they compose their introductory paragraph. Save the rest of the writing for the next part of the lesson.

Part 3

“What is the purpose of our writing?” (to communicate our opinion and support it with logical reasons and research-based evidence). Next, ask, “Who is your audience?” Have students write down their answer, and make sure each student has identified his or her correct audience. “What are some techniques that you might use to communicate well with your audience?” This series of questions and answers provides a quick review of the main goals of the unit.

Next, revisit the work already done during the shared writing about broccoli. Offer students the opportunity to make any additional suggestions/revisions to the class paper.

Using the Opinion Writing Map, work together to decide what technique students would like to use, that is, how they want to organize the paragraphs (most important to least, logic to facts).

The next step is to demonstrate how to compose a “main reason” paragraph using the Opinion Writing Map. In this case, the main idea or topic sentence comes from the main reason box on the map, and the supporting information comes from the smaller boxes to the right of it. Explain to students that they should think about how to order the logical reasons and facts so that their papers are as clearly and effectively organized as possible. “Based on what we’ve talked about, what should be the first logical reason or fact we should write?” Continue in this manner until the paragraph is written. Ask, “Would anyone like to add anything or make a revision?” Add suggestions as appropriate, then move to the second (and third) paragraph, following the same writing pattern.

If addressing a counterargument or an opposing viewpoint has not come up naturally, read back through the essay with students to find a place where discussion of a counterargument would fit. It could be as simple as a dependent clause added to a sentence, or a sentence added to a paragraph that contains a related point. Remind students that this is an opportunity to use the conjunction but that they wrote practice sentences with in Lesson 1.

Once the class paper is written, say, “Now you are going to have the opportunity to put your own opinion paper together using the same steps.” Have students return to the maps they created in Lesson 2. Help individual students think through their “main reason” paragraphs as needed.

Part 4

“Now we are going to write the concluding paragraph for our opinion essay. What are some things we might want to include?” Solicit ideas from students. Some ideas might include summing up the paper, restating the main idea (claim or position statement), etc. Remind them that no new ideas should be introduced in this paragraph. As ideas are provided and you are recording them, think aloud so that students understand exactly what your thought processes are. “Ask yourself, ‘Is the organization effective and logical? Will readers understand exactly what I am trying to say or why I have the opinion that I do?’” Be sure to invite ideas from students.

After writing the concluding paragraph, review the steps that you took to compose the paragraph. Then have students work on their own concluding paragraph. Provide support as needed.

Once students have finished their concluding paragraphs, model how to use the Opinion Writing/Editing Checklist (LW-5-1-3_Editing Checklist.doc). Then have them share their papers in small groups and fill out the editing checklist in pairs. If possible, collect the papers and give students your feedback as well.

Model how to rewrite a paper using the shared class paper. Demonstrate how to edit for content and organization first, then look at each sentence and make grammar and spelling changes as needed.

Extension:

• Students can review additional sample student opinion papers for strategies and techniques.