Lesson video

Hello, everyone! It's Mr. Brown here, with your writing lesson, and today it's a really good one because we're going to be generating points to use in our persuasive letter.

Let's get going.

Okay! Our learning objective for today is, "To generate points for a persuasive argument." To generate, which means make, points for a persuasive argument.

In this lesson, you will need an exercise book or a piece of paper, a pencil, pen, something to write with, and your brain.

You're going to be doing lots of thinking today, lots of thinking.

Not just literacy things and writing things, but your own ideas as well.

Okay, we're first going to have to think about our topic.

What is the topic of our persuasive letter in this unit going to be? We're then going to start generating points for that topic.

We're then going to be planning our two topic points.

But, let's get warmed up.

I thought we'd get warmed up with our persuasive techniques, which are, of course, flattery, presumption, and veiled threat.

Can you please read my three examples down at the bottom, with those bullet points, and decide whether that is an example of flattery, presumption, or a veiled threat.

Pause the lesson, and have a go at those three now.

Okay! I hope you had a go at that.

Let's see.

So, "I have no doubt that you will make the right decision." That was our first example.

We then have, "If you do not react to this situation, the consequences could be huge." That's our second example.

Then finally, "Someone as intelligent as you, knows what the right decision is." What do you think? Which one is flattery? Well, definitely, "Someone as intelligent as you, knows what the right decision is." The way that you're saying, you know, "You are so intelligent that I know you're going to make the right decision." You're getting the person on side, by telling them how clever they are.

Okay, presumption.

"I have no doubt that you will make the right decision." So, you are presuming that they are going to make the right decision.

And then finally, that veiled threat.

"If you do not react to this situation, the consequences could be huge." Quite a scary one, that one.

Okay, let's have a look at our topic.

And, whenever we're working, we need to consider PALLP.

This is what it stands for: Purpose Audience Language Layout And punctuation.

And in particular, we're going to be focusing on that purpose, and audience today.

"To write a letter to the Education Secretary asking for it to be mandatory that all schools in the UK must have a school uniform." That is going to be our topic for this unit.

That's the purpose of our letter.

And that's the audience, the Education Secretary is our audience.

Now, the Education Secretary changes fairly regularly, and the Education Secretary is the person who is responsible for- A person in the government who's responsible for all the education across the country.

So all the schools, everything, this person is responsible for overseeing everything.

Okay? We are going to write to them.

And we are going to be asking if they will change the law, so that it is mandatory- Do you know what the word "mandatory" means? Mandatory is the same as compulsory, you'll see that word in our lessons soon, as well.

And they both mean you have to do it.

It is mandatory that you have a driving licence before you can drive a car.

Exactly.

We are going to ask that it become mandatory that all schools in the UK must have a school uniform.

Now, lots of schools in the UK do have a school uniform.

Does yours have a school uniform? Probably, because 90% of schools do, but there are still 10% of schools that do not.

And the government only advises that you have a school uniform.

They don't say you have to.

So this could be a change that we actually could try and make.

"Do you agree or do you disagree with this idea?" Do you think it's a good idea, that all schools have to have a school uniform? Or do you think it's a bad idea? Does your school have a school uniform? If so, do you like it? Do you think it's a good idea, or would you change it? Now, whether you agree or disagree with this idea, for the purposes of our unit, we are all going to agree with this.

So let's start generating points.

"Before we can even think about writing our persuasive letter, we must first generate points to use, to persuade the Education Secretary to make this change." So let's start with, "Why is school uniform a good thing?" Okay? Even if you feel, personally, that school uniform is not a good thing, for this purposes, you will agree with us.

And this is such an important skill, being able to see someone else's point of view, is essential.

Now I have started you off with, "It helps everyone to feel included." Having a school uniform makes everyone feel like they are part of the school, so it helps to feel included.

Okay, what I want you to do now is pause the lesson, and have a go at writing as many points as you can- so that is not a long speech- just a reason why school uniform is a good thing.

To help you, the word "because" will unlock this.

You could just go, "School uniform is a good thing because.

." And then just give me one reason.

I've said, "Helps everyone to feel included." Why else is school uniform a good thing? Pause the lesson, see how many points you can get.

Off you go.

Okay, let's see how you got on.

Let's look at a few more examples that I came up with.

"It is cheaper for parents and carers." Certainly cheaper than buying different clothes for each day.

"It can be passed down to siblings." So, if you outgrow a school jumper, you could pass it down to a younger brother or sister, who is small enough to be able to fit it.

"It is recognisable on trips." When schools go on trips, it can be quite hectic and busy, it's hard to see which children are actually part of your school party, if someone wandered off, but if they were in a uniform, you can see straight away.

"Ah, they belong to our team." Okay, I'm going to give you another opportunity to pause the lesson, to see if these have inspired you to think of any other points.

Off you go.

Okay, let's have a look at some others.

"There is no competition between pupils." If children are all wearing the same, there's no competition over who's got the coolest t-shirt, or who's got the nicest trousers.

It doesn't exist, everyone's wearing the same.

"It's suited for its purpose." School uniform is very much suited for its purpose.

It's made so that it's comfortable, and flexible, it's not too tight, it's not too loose.

And finally, "It's formal, which helps create a working mentality." If children come to school and they're just wearing ripped jeans, and a hoodie, that's not going to create the same mentality, the same focus and formality for work, as wearing a uniform with a tie.

It just says, "You know what? I'm here to work, I'm not here just to relax." Okay, so those are the points that I came up with.

We now need to decide which two are our top points.

Okay? These will be the ones that are the most persuasive.

Now, they may be separate points here, that you could link together, to make one point.

But we are looking here, while we write a letter, for two clear, separate points- topics, I guess you could say, that we are going to talk about when we are persuading.

Okay, have a little look through.

Which two stand out to you as being our best ones? The ones that you could say the most about.

The ones that might provoke an emotional response in the recipient of our letter.

What do you think? I think the ones we are going to use are, "It's cheaper for parents and carers," and then I thought I could link in, "Can be passed down to siblings." So I'm going to make sure I can kind of touch on that point within "Cheaper for parents and carers." And, "no competition between pupils," because I think I can talk about things like teasing and maybe bullying there, which will provoke an emotional response, definitely, when you're reading this letter.

Okay, I want you to pause the video to complete this task.

"Try and generate explanations and evidence for each of our chosen points.

This will help you to prepare for planning our persuasive letter." So we said that our two points are, "Cheaper for parents and carers," and, "No competition between pupils." I want you to try and come up with explanations and evidence, so proof, of things that we can use in our argument for these.

So, for "Cheaper for parents and carers," talk about how expensive buying different clothes can be.

Talk about how money could be used better by parents and carers.

Then give examples from your own life.

Has there been times when you've wanted something and it's been too expensive? Think about that.

I want you to take your time with this task, and have a good long think.

Speak to any friends, family, or carers, if you can, and discuss their opinions, too.

Use your family and friends to be able to help you with this.

Okay? Off you go.

Okay.

So, let's have a look at, first of all, "Cheaper for parents and carers." Let's focus on that.

"School uniform is cheaper for parents and carers." Our explanations, first of all, "You only need to buy one or two sets of uniform per child." That is a really solid reason why uniform is much better than just wearing your own clothes.

"The cost of uniform is usually low, especially unbranded items." So if your jumper doesn't need to have your school badge on it, then it's going to be relatively cheap.

"Pressure from children for designer clothes if a school didn't have a uniform." Lots of children want the latest clothes, with sport brands on, or logos from their favourite TV show, or cartoon characters, but they're expensive.

So, taking that pressure away is a really, really positive thing, by having a uniform.

"School uniform can be handed down to younger siblings when a child grows out of it, saves lots of money." We talked about that.

Now let's move on to our evidence.

"Being the youngest of three boys, I had lots of uniform handed down." So I'm using my own life, my own life experiences, as my evidence.

I can talk about when I had handed-down uniform.

"The cost of buying different outfits for each day of the week works out much more expensive than one or two full sets of uniform." A really clear point, and I can talk about the actual cost.

I can pull figures out there, can't I? Okay, now it's your turn again, I want you to pause the video to have a go, but this time, for, "No competition between pupils." What's the explanation? And what's the evidence that you can find for "No competition between pupils"? Off you go.

Okay.

Well done! Our agenda: We looked at our topic, which we said is going to be writing to the Education Secretary asking for school uniform to be mandatory across the United Kingdom.

We were generating points, we talked about all the different points that we could generate, and then we picked our top two points and we started the planning process of those.

Well done! Another lesson done.

Great work today.

Well done, everyone.

I will see you for our next lesson, as we continue to be able to prepare to write our persuasive letter.

Lots of preparation goes into writing a persuasive letter, and you're getting to see that, step by step through our lessons.

Take care.

I'll see you soon.