persuasive essay hsc

ENG 12: Craft of Writing: Module C: Home

Writers on Writing

• The Garret Podcast
• Hanya Hanagihara: the Books that made me
• Meg Rosoff: the Books that made me.

Other writings

• Queen Elizabeth I - speech to the troops at Tilbury, 1588
• Chief Joseph - Thunder Traveling to the Loftier Mountain Heights - 1877 Cheif Joseph of the Nez Perse, North America 1877. Speech of surrender to US troops.
• William Wilberforce - speech to House of Commons on Abolition of SLavery, 1789

Writers of note

• Geraldine Brooks
• Helen Garner
• Tara June Winch
• Michael Ondaatje
• Graham Greene
• John Steinbeck
• Kate Grenville

Four text types

• New text types in Module C Imaginative Persuasive Discursive Informative

Selected texts should include texts that exemplify writing styles as well as those that comment on writing so that students have opportunities to:

imitate specific aspects of writing – narrative, character, point of view, argument, figurative language, genre, perspective and style

write in a range of forms and for different contexts

explain the effects of their writing choices for audiences and purposes

reflect on their own writing as required by the module. (NESA )

• 2019 HSC Module C Marking feedback HSC markers have provided feedback about 2019 responses, in general terms.
• Characterisation and narrative voice.
• Luke Bartolo : The craft of writing (blog)

Discursive writing

Dictionary meaning of DISCURSIVE:

Tending to  digress  from the main point;  rambling . From  https://www.yourdictionary.com/discursive

• Definition and examples of DISCURSIVE
• The what and how of discursive writing (Art of Smart)
• Michel de Montaigne's essays (Guide to the classics) The Conversation - the article describes Montaigne's rambling style of writing which has been acknowledged by some as the precursor to modernistic writing.
• Montaigne- philosopher of life. What can we learn from Montaigne? The Guardian
• JK Rowling's speech "The fringe benefits of failure..."
• Tim Minchin's occasional address, graduation ceremony 2013 University of Western Australia. In this speech, Tim Minchin meanders through various topics, sprinkled with humour and digressions, finally reaching his concluding statement.

Persuasive writing

• Persuasive essays
• How to write a persuasive writing piece for Module C

The Books that made us (Series, ABC TV 2021)

Recommended books - unique style of prose.

Recommended books- Evocative and emotional

Recommended books - Character and plot design

Bleak House by Charles Dickens .This is a free edition with Project Gutenberg. The prose of this novel will stay with you. It has an enduring quality mainly because of the language Dickens attributes to his characters. The plot is as complex as the legal case it refers to. Dickens is a masterful storyteller. It is a huge novel, not for those afraid of reading...but when the book is this good, what does page number matter? Skilful students may take up the Dickens baton and run with creating their own quirky characters using unique dialogue and descriptive language, as well as creative naming techniques.

Recommended books - Biographical

Book recommendations - Historical, time and place.

Book recommendations - Landscape

• Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad A novel set in the late 1800s in the Congo, it is a story within a story. Marlowe narrates his story of his journey up the Congo River to a group on a boat sitting in the Thames.

Book recommendations - Short stories

• Last Updated: Nov 29, 2021 3:33 PM
• URL: https://libguides.brigidine.nsw.edu.au/craftofwriting

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Practising discursive writing – resource 4

This resource will support students to practise writing discursively.

This resource will support students to practise writing discursively. Students will be provided the opportunity to experiment with their own writing through a series of activities. There is a student resource booklet accompanying this presentation.

To support your learning and teaching of this unit access the:

Practising discursive writing – resource 4 part 1 transcript (DOCX 169KB)

Practising discursive writing – resource 4 part 2 transcript (DOCX 182KB)

Practising discursive writing – resource 4 student resource (DOCX 247KB)

The HSC hub was created in 2020 – some resources may contain references to 2020 conditions and dates. Please check NESA HSC key dates and exam timetables and coronavirus advice .

We are working on accessibility for all of our support materials. If you need any assistance, please get in touch with us at [email protected] .

Exam Advice

How to Ace your HSC English Exam

When I was completing year 12, I discovered a simple trend when completing HSC English – you either love it, or you hate it. HSC English is the only compulsory subject required for you to complete and while many students are more mathematically or scientifically gifted, studying your required texts is a must for success in your ATAR.

As HSC crunch-time approaches, it is worth considering the various ways you can prepare for your HSC English exam. Here are some tips that will prepare you for your exam.

Table of Contents

• Read your texts

Answer the Question

Do not memorise, gain feedback, think outside the box for your module c piece, yes, you have to read your texts.

During year 12, I kept hearing of ‘advice’ from past students stating, “you don’t need to read your text, just read a summary”. FALSE! The HSC English syllabus was re-written commencing in 2019 to stop this exact process from occurring.

As evident in the first year of the new syllabus, questions are now detailed, theme-orientated and specific. Let’s take a look at a couple of these questions from last year’s HSC exam.

The two above examples demonstrate the unpredictability of the modern HSC English exam. I will tell you first-hand and from the views of friends from other schools, many of these themes were only briefly touched on during school time.

Therefore, understanding all themes from your prescribed text will be key in allowing you to have a great understanding of any of the topics that may be thrown at you. 

Being prepared for your exam is only half the process. The other half is making sure you answer ALL questions in your exam to the best of your ability. Your ability to answer the essay question well is the first thing the HSC marker is looking for, from the start of your introduction.

This is why you need to insert the words of the question into a short and snappy thesis for the marker (who is often speed-reading) to immediately place yourself in the top bands. I will stress, the question must not only be answered in the introduction of your piece, but be evident consistently throughout your essay, where you should be linking back to the words of the question at the end of each paragraph.  

But how can I prepare for these questions? I understand, being a new year to the syllabus there is a limited amount of questions available to you. But this should not stop your ability to interact with new questions as part of your study.

So I’m suggesting to find past trial exams from other schools that fit your text. Ask your teacher to give you a question to answer. Whatever it may be, the best way to prepare yourself for the unpredictability of the HSC is to keep completing questions, especially under timed conditions when the exam begins to approach.

As I indicated above, there is no way you can memorise all your essays and expect to achieve a great mark in this way. This essay will only be satisfactory AT BEST. Many students fall into the trap of writing the exact same essay they used in previous assessment tasks and will become too complacent to develop a new strategy. This is the difference between a great essay and a mediocre essay. 

In entering the exam, your greatest change at succeeding is to create a series of essay plans and outlines to help you break down your essay ideas into simple points. This may involve having a few extra quotations up your sleeve in case the question isn’t your first choice preference. Memorising an essay will not allow you to improvise during the exam and will keep you struggling for time which should be utilised planning how you are going to adapt to the question. 

There is no use writing a new essay if you are not going to ask for feedback. So whenever you have written a new essay, ask your teaching to take a look at it. Your teacher will provide you with key points which you should consider to improve your essay-writing skills for the next time and will enlighten you on your journey of improvement throughout the year. I get it, sometimes teachers rarely respond to your constant emails and often provide you unclear feedback on your writing. So I encourage you to ask your teacher specific questions on your writing to avoid getting a vague response. For example, don’t just ask “Ms can you take a look at this essay”. Instead, attempt to be more specific, like “Ms do you feel as though my topic sentence successfully links back to what I have introduced in my thesis or is there a way I can make this more clear”. By drawing your teacher’s attention specifically to an area of concern, you are more likely to improve your phrasing.

Additionally, ask a friend or even a family member for advice. When we are writing, we often do not see our mistakes first-hand and a phrase which may appear like it makes sense, may in fact not. This is why even this article you are reading was also read by the publisher. So seek advice from another student for advice. I sometimes found this more useful than asking a teacher as my friends were often blunt with me and could provide advice on the same mistakes that they made. 

The new HSC English syllabus requires you to have understanding on how to write a creative story, a discursive piece or a persuasive essay. Therefore, you must experiment with all these structures and find which suits your writing skills the best. The pieces that stick out the most to HSC markers are those that are unique, descriptive and clear. Simple is not bad.

Instead of writing a highly plot driven story with 10 different scenes and twists and turns, be clear, introduce limited characters and have a clear setting and plot. The question you will be asked for Module C is going to be very flexible. Be sure to engage with the stimulus and have a few ideas in mind before entering the exam. Also, spend 5-10 minutes planning your piece as this will provide you direction and structure.

Overall, the HSC English Exam is one of the most stressful and unpredictable exams you will have to take. By being strategic in response to your questions, you will be organised, prepared and have limited anxiety as the exam approaches.

With these tips, you will sharpen your analysis and writing skills, allowing you to ace your exam.

Joshua Salameh

Joshua Salameh is a former HSC student, achieving his certificate in 2019. He is currently attending the University of Technology Sydney completing a Bachelor of Business / Bachelor of Laws. As a dedicated NESA Distinguished Achiever, he has a passion for assisting fellow students and providing advice on the misery of school and university. Connect with me @Facebook or @Linkedin

How to Write a Persuasive Essay (This Convinced My Professor!)

Table of contents

Meredith Sell

You can make your essay more persuasive by getting straight to the point.

In fact, that's exactly what we did here, and that's just the first tip of this guide. Throughout this guide, we share the steps needed to prove an argument and create a persuasive essay.

This AI tool helps you improve your essay > This AI tool helps you improve your essay >

Key takeaways: - Proven process to make any argument persuasive - 5-step process to structure arguments - How to use AI to formulate and optimize your essay

Why is being persuasive so difficult?

"Write an essay that persuades the reader of your opinion on a topic of your choice."

You might be staring at an assignment description just like this 👆from your professor. Your computer is open to a blank document, the cursor blinking impatiently. Do I even have opinions?

The persuasive essay can be one of the most intimidating academic papers to write: not only do you need to identify a narrow topic and research it, but you also have to come up with a position on that topic that you can back up with research while simultaneously addressing different viewpoints.

That’s a big ask. And let’s be real: most opinion pieces in major news publications don’t fulfill these requirements.

The upside? By researching and writing your own opinion, you can learn how to better formulate not only an argument but the actual positions you decide to hold. 

Here, we break down exactly how to write a persuasive essay. We’ll start by taking a step that’s key for every piece of writing—defining the terms.

What Is a Persuasive Essay?

A persuasive essay is exactly what it sounds like: an essay that persuades . Over the course of several paragraphs or pages, you’ll use researched facts and logic to convince the reader of your opinion on a particular topic and discredit opposing opinions.

While you’ll spend some time explaining the topic or issue in question, most of your essay will flesh out your viewpoint and the evidence that supports it.

The 5 Must-Have Steps of a Persuasive Essay

If you’re intimidated by the idea of writing an argument, use this list to break your process into manageable chunks. Tackle researching and writing one element at a time, and then revise your essay so that it flows smoothly and coherently with every component in the optimal place.

1. A topic or issue to argue

This is probably the hardest step. You need to identify a topic or issue that is narrow enough to cover in the length of your piece—and is also arguable from more than one position. Your topic must call for an opinion , and not be a simple fact .

It might be helpful to walk through this process:

• Identify a random topic
• Ask a question about the topic that involves a value claim or analysis to answer
• Answer the question

That answer is your opinion.

Let’s consider some examples, from silly to serious:

Topic: Dolphins and mermaids

Question: In a mythical match, who would win: a dolphin or a mermaid?

Answer/Opinion: The mermaid would win in a match against a dolphin.

Topic: Autumn

Question: Which has a better fall: New England or Colorado?

Answer/Opinion: Fall is better in New England than Colorado.

Topic: Electric transportation options

Question: Would it be better for an urban dweller to buy an electric bike or an electric car?

Answer/Opinion: An electric bike is a better investment than an electric car.

Your turn: Walk through the three-step process described above to identify your topic and your tentative opinion. You may want to start by brainstorming a list of topics you find interesting and then going use the three-step process to find the opinion that would make the best essay topic.

2. An unequivocal thesis statement

If you walked through our three-step process above, you already have some semblance of a thesis—but don’t get attached too soon! 

A solid essay thesis is best developed through the research process. You shouldn’t land on an opinion before you know the facts. So press pause. Take a step back. And dive into your research.

You’ll want to learn:

• The basic facts of your topic. How long does fall last in New England vs. Colorado? What trees do they have? What colors do those trees turn?
• The facts specifically relevant to your question. Is there any science on how the varying colors of fall influence human brains and moods?
• What experts or other noteworthy and valid sources say about the question you’re considering. Has a well-known arborist waxed eloquent on the beauty of New England falls?

As you learn the different viewpoints people have on your topic, pay attention to the strengths and weaknesses of existing arguments. Is anyone arguing the perspective you’re leaning toward? Do you find their arguments convincing? What do you find unsatisfying about the various arguments? 

Allow the research process to change your mind and/or refine your thinking on the topic. Your opinion may change entirely or become more specific based on what you learn.

Once you’ve done enough research to feel confident in your understanding of the topic and your opinion on it, craft your thesis. 

Your thesis statement should be clear and concise. It should directly state your viewpoint on the topic, as well as the basic case for your thesis.

Thesis 1: In a mythical match, the mermaid would overcome the dolphin due to one distinct advantage: her ability to breathe underwater.

Thesis 2: The full spectrum of color displayed on New England hillsides is just one reason why fall in the northeast is better than in Colorado.

Thesis 3: In addition to not adding to vehicle traffic, electric bikes are a better investment than electric cars because they’re cheaper and require less energy to accomplish the same function of getting the rider from point A to point B.

Your turn: Dive into the research process with a radar up for the arguments your sources are making about your topic. What are the most convincing cases? Should you stick with your initial opinion or change it up? Write your fleshed-out thesis statement.

3. Evidence to back up your thesis

This is a typical place for everyone from undergrads to politicians to get stuck, but the good news is, if you developed your thesis from research, you already have a good bit of evidence to make your case.

Go back through your research notes and compile a list of every …

… or other piece of information that supports your thesis. 

This info can come from research studies you found in scholarly journals, government publications, news sources, encyclopedias, or other credible sources (as long as they fit your professor’s standards).

As you put this list together, watch for any gaps or weak points. Are you missing information on how electric cars versus electric bicycles charge or how long their batteries last? Did you verify that dolphins are, in fact, mammals and can’t breathe underwater like totally-real-and-not-at-all-fake 😉mermaids can? Track down that information.

Next, organize your list. Group the entries so that similar or closely related information is together, and as you do that, start thinking through how to articulate the individual arguments to support your case. 

Depending on the length of your essay, each argument may get only a paragraph or two of space. As you think through those specific arguments, consider what order to put them in. You’ll probably want to start with the simplest argument and work up to more complicated ones so that the arguments can build on each other. 

Your turn: Organize your evidence and write a rough draft of your arguments. Play around with the order to find the most compelling way to argue your case.

4. Rebuttals to disprove opposing theses

You can’t just present the evidence to support your case and totally ignore other viewpoints. To persuade your readers, you’ll need to address any opposing ideas they may hold about your topic. 

You probably found some holes in the opposing views during your research process. Now’s your chance to expose those holes. 

Take some time (and space) to: describe the opposing views and show why those views don’t hold up. You can accomplish this using both logic and facts.

Is a perspective based on a faulty assumption or misconception of the truth? Shoot it down by providing the facts that disprove the opinion.

Is another opinion drawn from bad or unsound reasoning? Show how that argument falls apart.

Some cases may truly be only a matter of opinion, but you still need to articulate why you don’t find the opposing perspective convincing.

Yes, a dolphin might be stronger than a mermaid, but as a mammal, the dolphin must continually return to the surface for air. A mermaid can breathe both underwater and above water, which gives her a distinct advantage in this mythical battle.

While the Rocky Mountain views are stunning, their limited colors—yellow from aspen trees and green from various evergreens—leaves the autumn-lover less than thrilled. The rich reds and oranges and yellows of the New England fall are more satisfying and awe-inspiring.

But what about longer trips that go beyond the city center into the suburbs and beyond? An electric bike wouldn’t be great for those excursions. Wouldn’t an electric car be the better choice then? 

Certainly, an electric car would be better in these cases than a gas-powered car, but if most of a person’s trips are in their hyper-local area, the electric bicycle is a more environmentally friendly option for those day-to-day outings. That person could then participate in a carshare or use public transit, a ride-sharing app, or even a gas-powered car for longer trips—and still use less energy overall than if they drove an electric car for hyper-local and longer area trips.

Your turn: Organize your rebuttal research and write a draft of each one.

5. A convincing conclusion

You have your arguments and rebuttals. You’ve proven your thesis is rock-solid. Now all you have to do is sum up your overall case and give your final word on the subject. 

Don’t repeat everything you’ve already said. Instead, your conclusion should logically draw from the arguments you’ve made to show how they coherently prove your thesis. You’re pulling everything together and zooming back out with a better understanding of the what and why of your thesis. 

A dolphin may never encounter a mermaid in the wild, but if it were to happen, we know how we’d place our bets. Long hair and fish tail, for the win.

For those of us who relish 50-degree days, sharp air, and the vibrant colors of fall, New England offers a season that’s cozier, longer-lasting, and more aesthetically pleasing than “colorful” Colorado. A leaf-peeper’s paradise.

When most of your trips from day to day are within five miles, the more energy-efficient—and yes, cost-efficient—choice is undoubtedly the electric bike. So strap on your helmet, fire up your pedals, and two-wheel away to your next destination with full confidence that you made the right decision for your wallet and the environment.

3 Quick Tips for Writing a Strong Argument

Once you have a draft to work with, use these tips to refine your argument and make sure you’re not losing readers for avoidable reasons.

1. Choose your words thoughtfully.

If you want to win people over to your side, don’t write in a way that shuts your opponents down. Avoid making abrasive or offensive statements. Instead, use a measured, reasonable tone. Appeal to shared values, and let your facts and logic do the hard work of changing people’s minds.

Choose words with AI

You can use AI to turn your general point into a readable argument. Then, you can paraphrase each sentence and choose between competing arguments generated by the AI, until your argument is well-articulated and concise.

2. Prioritize accuracy (and avoid fallacies).

Make sure the facts you use are actually factual. You don’t want to build your argument on false or disproven information. Use the most recent, respected research. Make sure you don’t misconstrue study findings. And when you’re building your case, avoid logical fallacies that undercut your argument.

A few common fallacies to watch out for:

• Strawman: Misrepresenting or oversimplifying an opposing argument to make it easier to refute.
• Appeal to ignorance: Arguing that a certain claim must be true because it hasn’t been proven false.
• Bandwagon: Assumes that if a group of people, experts, etc., agree with a claim, it must be true.
• Hasty generalization: Using a few examples, rather than substantial evidence, to make a sweeping claim.
• Appeal to authority: Overly relying on opinions of people who have authority of some kind.

The strongest arguments rely on trustworthy information and sound logic.

Research and add citations with AI

We recently wrote a three part piece on researching using AI, so be sure to check it out . Going through an organized process of researching and noting your sources correctly will make sure your written text is more accurate.

3. Persuasive essay structure

If you’re building a house, you start with the foundation and go from there. It’s the same with an argument. You want to build from the ground up: provide necessary background information, then your thesis. Then, start with the simplest part of your argument and build up in terms of complexity and the aspect of your thesis that the argument is tackling.

A consistent, internal logic will make it easier for the reader to follow your argument. Plus, you’ll avoid confusing your reader and you won’t be unnecessarily redundant.

The essay structure usually includes the following parts:

• Intro - Hook, Background information, Thesis statement
• Topic sentence #1 , with supporting facts or stats
• Concluding sentence
• Topic sentence #2 , with supporting facts or stats
• Concluding sentence Topic sentence #3 , with supporting facts or stats
• Conclusion - Thesis and main points restated, call to action, thought provoking ending

Are You Ready to Write?

Persuasive essays are a great way to hone your research, writing, and critical thinking skills. Approach this assignment well, and you’ll learn how to form opinions based on information (not just ideas) and make arguments that—if they don’t change minds—at least win readers’ respect. ‍

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Persuasive writing is about much more than PEEL, TEEL, NAPLAN, the HSC – or any other acronym!

If you can convince other people that your opinion is correct, you have a big advantage in life.

Learning to write strong, persuasive arguments can help you to participate and succeed, including as a student, employee, business owner, consumer, vendor, and citizen. It’s a useful skill in many face-to-face and in online settings, including in community meetings and on social media platforms like YouTube, Twitter, and Instagram. 

In a democracy, communities, states, and nations benefit from the spirited interactions of informed individuals exchanging different perspectives with arguments that acknowledge and evaluate different views rationally, supported by evidence. Sadly, this is often not the case, with increasing levels of political polarisation and a decreasing tolerance for rational debate around a range of important social, economic, health, scientific, religious, intellectual, human rights, and environmental issues.

For students, learning to write arguments has an additional and more concrete benefit: it’s the main form of assessment in many school subjects, including many humanities subjects in the Higher School Certificate ( HSC ). In general, argumentative essays become more frequent and important for students as they progress through school.

In Australia, the National Assessment Program – Literacy and Numeracy ( NAPLAN ) has a big – and some think outsized – influence on how argumentative essays are taught and tested. NAPLAN requires students in Years 3, 5, 7, and 9 to write an argument or a narrative in response to a provocative prompt, e.g. that “Too much money is spent on toys and games”. 

In practice, many teachers dedicate lots of class time preparing students for NAPLAN writing tests. Some teachers are expected to “teach to the test” by reverse-engineering NAPLAN writing tasks by reference to marking criteria. 

1. How do teachers in Australia evaluate whether an essay is persuasive? 

There are many ways of assessing writing quality. For example, in our speech pathology practice we use norm-referenced, standardised writing tests , informal discourse level probes (e.g. adapted from researchers like Koutsoftas and Gray), and our own in-house criterion-referenced test to look at students’ writing strengths and challenges. We then work with clients and families to set functional writing goals, and to plan intervention, using an explicit, direct approach to teaching writing .

In Australia, we also look at the NAPLAN Persuasive Writing Marking Guide and the Australian Curriculum: English. These documents are both influenced by an academic theory of language and argument called systemic functional linguistics ( SFL ). 

I doubt many people outside the education sector know much about SFL. Even as a speech-language pathologist, I didn’t know much about the extent of its influence on how writing is taught and tested in Australia until I read a terrific recent paper by Damon Thomas from the University of Queensland (reference below).  

It’s worth looking at SFL and its claims, briefly, because the theory has a real world effect on the way that many primary and secondary students are taught to write essays in Australia. It also helps us to understand the jargon used to describe and evaluate persuasive writing.

2. We write differently for different purposes 

In (very) simple terms, SFL looks at the relationships between language and its functions in different contexts. It shares many common features with models of oral language used by speech pathologists in oral language therapy , including Bloom and Lahey’s famous model of language form, content and use . 

SFL is often depicted like this:

Source: Thomas (2022)

Without doing a deep dive into all the jargon, this is not the clearest model – unless you are a linguist.

In basic terms, SFL seeks to connect language structure (e.g. phonology, syntax) and content (e.g. vocabulary and semantics) with its purpose (function) in different real world situations and cultural contexts (e.g. real world social or academic situations). A detailed analysis of SFL and its claims is beyond the scope of this article, but you can read more about it here , here and in the research referred to below.

3. We write things for three main purposes: to engage, to inform, and to persuade

In SFL, written texts are typically grouped into three broad categories, based on function or purpose:

• Texts that engage , e.g. recounts and narratives ;
• Texts that inform , e.g. explanations and reports ; and
• Texts that evaluate , e.g. arguments and responses that persuade .

Over time, writers of written genres (types of text) have evolved different structures to achieve their different purposes. To become effective writers, students should be taught about these different structures, and practice writing different types of texts that are appropriate for the purpose and context. This insight has a big effect on the way the Australian Curriculum approaches writing instruction – from Kindergarten to the end of Year 12.  

4. There are four sub-types of persuasive writing

In this article, we’re focused on the structure of one subcategory of texts that evaluate: argumentative texts, also known as persuasive writing or persuasive texts . According to SFL, there are four sub-types (or genres) of these texts, which again differ in structure based on their purpose:

• Analytical expositions , written to persuade readers to believe one perspective on an issue. For example, a student might be asked to explain their views on whether mobile phones should be allowed in the classroom. 
• Hortatory expositions , written to persuade readers to take some action based on the writer’s position. For example, a student might be asked to write an essay to persuade (“exhort”) others to stop using plastic straws. 
• Discussions , written to discuss an issue from more than one perspective and to persuade readers to agree with one position. For example, a student might be asked to consider and evaluate arguments for and against Australia becoming a republic and to reach a well-reasoned conclusion. 
• Challenges , written to rebut an established position. For example, a student might be asked to argue that the minimum age for voting should be reduced to 16 years in the jurisdiction in which they live.

5. How many Australian students are taught to structure their persuasive writing responses: The five-paragraph structure and ‘PEEL’ paragraphs  

The structures of analytical, hortatory, discussion and challenge expositions are all slightly different, reflecting their different purposes. For example, the discussion text explicitly requires students to look at issues from multiple perspectives. Despite these differences, however, effective persuasive writing across the different genres typically involves writing texts with five main parts (or stages), in the following sequence:

• An introduction or thesis , usually including a statement of the student’s position and a preview of the arguments supporting it. 
• P oint or T opic of the argument;
• E laboration and explanation of the point;
• E vidence for the point, including examples; and
• L inking sentence, which connects the point back to the student’s thesis and/or to the next paragraph.  
• A conclusion or reiteration composed of a review of the main arguments, and a restatement of the student’s thesis or position. 

This observation, derived from SFL, has led many Australian teachers to focus on teaching their students:

• the so-called five paragraph essay structure; and
• PEEL (or TEEL) paragraph writing structures for their arguments in essays, made up of P oint (or T opic), E laboration, E vidence, and L ink. (I prefer ‘PEEL’ over ‘TEEL’ as it helps some students to distinguish the specific p oint being made in an individual argument/paragraph from the overall t opic of the essay.)

In Australia, many high school teachers focus on teaching PEEL paragraph-writing to students. It is especially common to see students practising PEEL paragraph writing as they prepare for NAPLAN tests in Years 7 and 9. 

6. An example PEEL paragraph

Let’s say a student in Year 7 decides to disagree with the prompt that “too much money is spent on toys and games”. In the first paragraph, she states her position (her thesis ) and then previews her main arguments, stating that “Many toys and games help children to develop skills and fitness (argument 1), do not cost much money compared to other expenses like food and housing (argument 2), and can help bring families together, improving family life (argument 3). In paragraph two, the student might write a PEEL paragraph to state her first argument: 

7. There is much more to persuasive writing than the five-paragraph structure + PEEL

Unlike with speech and oral language, we are not biologically primed to learn to write . Students need to be taught how to do it. We’ve long advocated for explicit, sequenced writing instruction for all students, starting in Kindergarten . However, while explicit teaching of essay structures and PEEL can be helpful for beginners, it has also been criticised. 

Some researchers think an over-emphasis on the five paragraph structure and PEEL:

• constrains students’ writing development, forcing students to write ‘colour-by-number’ essays that slavishly follow predictable ‘formulae’ that dictate what they should write sentence-by-sentence;
• forces teachers to teach it as ‘the correct way’ to maximise NAPLAN and HSC results by gaming the marking criteria; and
• may even have contributed to declines in writing outcomes. 

In practice – working mainly with children with language and learning difficulties – we sometimes see students come to us trying to apply the PEEL formula without understanding the question. From time to time, we meet students who arrive at language therapy with pre-prepared, memorised essays (complete with quotes), with rigid plans to dutifully copy them out regardless of the question asked! This is – obviously – a terrible misuse of PEEL.

In writing, there is no single correct way to persuade – or, for that matter, to entertain, instruct, or explain things. Generations of students have learned to write persuasively without SFL concepts like PEEL. 

In the recent study cited below, Thomas looked at the structural features of 60 high-scoring arguments written by students in Years 3, 5, 7 and 9 as part of NAPLAN. He found, amongst other things, that many high-scoring students used the five-stage structure for their essays. However, he also found that many of them used a wider range of techniques and structures for their arguments and produced arguments that were longer and more nuanced. Further, many high scoring students didn’t include all elements of PEEL in their arguments. Notably, only three of the 60 essays included Link phrases. 

Expert writers go far beyond PEEL. For example, take a quick look at the different structures and approaches used by essay-writing masters in this very small and unrepresentative selection of essays:

• “ Does Truth Matter? Science, Pseudoscience and Civilisation ” by Carl Sagan
• “ Death of the Moth ” by Virginia Woolf
• “ The Meditations ” by Marcus Aurelius
• “ How to use the Power of the Printed Word ” by Kurt Vonnegut
• “ On the Vanity of Words ” by Michel de Montaigne
• “ Once More to the Lake ” by E.B. White
• “ How to Do What you Love ” by Paul Graham
• “ On Self-Reliance ” by Ralph Waldo Emerson

8. The cognitive demands of persuasive writing

In contrast to the expert essays linked above, many primary and high school essays are one-sided and poorly supported. It takes a lot of time and effort for students to develop the cognitive skills necessary to write sophisticated argumentative essays. 

Many students need to be taught explicitly how to look at issues from multiple perspectives. Many are likely to require significant teacher modelling and scaffolding to start with. For example, research tells us that:

• primary school-aged students rarely consider alternative perspectives when writing persuasive texts;
• many adolescents struggle to integrate multiple perspectives in their essays; and
• many older adolescents are unable to acknowledge and respond to counter-arguments in their writing.

Using our example above, our Year 7 student might have several good arguments to support her thesis against the idea that “too much money is spent on toys and games” but find it difficult to acknowledge in her essay that:

• other people think that too much money is spent on toys or games; and 
• there are good reasons to think they might be right, e.g. amount of annual toy waste, high average number of toys owned by children, money could be spent on other things like education, health and family experiences.

Many people finish school and reach adulthood without learning to look at issues from more than one perspective or to anticipate or rebut counter arguments with evidence and reasons. We see the adverse effects of this problem play out daily in social media exchanges, especially on Twitter and Facebook!

To write persuasively, a student must learn:

• to accept that different people think different things from the student about all kinds of issues;
• to reflect on biases and the limitations of the student’s knowledge;
• that many real world issues are complex and nuanced, requiring sophisticated responses, trade-offs and an understanding of real world constraints;
• to use high quality evidence and reason to formulate, state and substantiate their position on a position; and
• anticipate, consider, and rebut counterarguments respectfully and with humility.

Over time, students (and adults) must learn how to consider different perspectives and arguments, to appraise multiple sources of (sometimes conflicting) evidence of varying quality, and to evaluate and make judgments between contrasting views. 

9. The many language demands of persuasive writing tasks

In high school, persuasive writing tasks, including many NAPLAN and HSC exams, require advanced and higher level language skills. To even understand the question, students need:

• oral comprehension skills , including well-developed background knowledge and inferencing skills, phonological, syntactic and semantic knowledge; and
• adequate reading skills , including work recognition skills. 

In addition to understanding the structure of argumentative essays, students need to plan and structure written responses using appropriate:

• simple , compound and complex sentences , and other complex syntax like relative clauses , that help provide the ‘machinery’ for students to express complex, nuanced ideas like “Although some people think that too much money is spent on toys and games, the better view is that money is often well spent on toys and games for several reasons including…”;  
• well-formed paragraphs (see also, paragraph models , and descriptive paragraphs , and recounts );
• rhetorical devices, like logos, pathos, ethos, rhetorical questions, repetition, anaphora, onomatopoeia, and synecdoche;  
• other higher level language and figurative language techniques like similes and metaphors , idioms , sayings , alliteration, assonance, personification, analogies , allusions, and hyperbole;
• humour, irony and sarcasm;
• vocabulary, including use of key academic verbs , and specific nouns and verbs and academic vocabulary generally ;
• cohesion, including verbal reasoning practice, linking ideas in different ways, e.g. with different combinations of because/but/so , before/after/until , if/while/although , despite/in spite of , and otherwise conjunctions and adverbs, transitions , and referring words (like pronouns , articles , determiners like “much” and “many” ), categories and semantic features ;  
• punctuation, e.g. capital letters and full stops , proper noun capitalisation , quotation marks ); and
• spelling .  

In some subjects, students also need to understand the language used in the text they are writing about , e.g. narrative structure for novels in English; as well as how to understand their school texts as a condition to writing about them.

This is all no small feat – especially for students with developmental and other language disorders , specific learning disorders (reading and/or writing)  – and other neurodevelopmental disorders like ADHD or autism, and some students with lifelong communication disabilities.

Bottom line

To prepare students for school success, the workplace, citizenship, and adulthood we need to teach them good argumentative writing skills, including how to tackle persuasive writing tasks at school. We’ve outlined some of the theories that underpin many teachers’ approaches to teaching and testing persuasive writing in Australia. We’ve also highlighted some of the cognitive and language challenges that make persuasive writing tasks so challenging for many students – especially in high school. 

Teaching beginners the five-paragraph essay structure, and the ‘PEEL’ paragraph writing strategy may assist. However, as students master the basics, they should be encouraged to look beyond these supports, to look at issues from multiple perspectives, and to use a greater variety of language structures and devices flexibly to improve the effectiveness of their writing and the persuasiveness of their arguments.

Main source and recommended further reading : Thomas, D.P. (2022). Structuring written arguments in primary and secondary school: A systemic functional linguistics perspective, Linguistics and Education, 72 , accessed online: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.linged.2022.101120 .

This article also appears in a recent issue of Banter Booster, our weekly round up of the best speech pathology ideas and practice tips for busy speech pathologists, providers, speech pathology students, teachers and other interested readers.

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Hi there, I’m David Kinnane.

Principal Speech Pathologist, Banter Speech & Language

Our talented team of certified practising speech pathologists provide unhurried, personalised and evidence-based speech pathology care to children and adults in the Inner West of Sydney and beyond, both in our clinic and via telehealth.

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