I wanted my 7th grade LA students to be more engaged in the argumentative writing process. We know that middle school students love to engage in debate, so why did it feel like pulling teeth to get them to do it in a more formal, structured way?
Choice became a key component in driving engagement in argumentative writing. My experience told me that 7th grade students cared very little about the text book prompt of Should we continue to invest valuable resource in funding space travel? and far more about topics that had relevance to their everyday lives.
I then curated a list of topics as well as pro and con articles that had a more appealing nature to my audience. Students were able to choose from topics including:
- How much screen time is too much?
- When is it right to take a stand?
- Should school start times be later for older students?
- Do school dress codes go too far?
- Are video games addicting?
Then I taught the elements of argumentative writing. There was very little change in how I taught this process, but the difference was now the students were eager to learn and read more to build their case.
The final aspect of the argument unit was also vastly different when I had an eye towards students being knowledge constructors. I didn’t want them to simply write another essay on their topics. I wanted to show them that this is a wider area in which to demonstrate their ideas and thoughts. So began the creation of our classroom podcast.
Students submitted and voted on a title of our podcast and agreed upon ‘Our Side of the Story’. They worked to transform what would have been an argument essay into a script for a podcast. We researched and listened to examples of real world podcasts and made note of elements that made them exciting and really drew in their listeners.
Finally, with a subscription to SoundTrap for Education, students were able to record and publish their podcasts. This project gave them a purposeful audience and real world example of knowledge construction. SoundTrap was extremely easy for my 7th grade students to use and they really enjoyed the challenge of learning a new too - empowering them to take control of their learning. With so many students that age aspiring to have an online presence, creating podcasts was right up their alley, not to mention a nice backdrop for teaching about intellectual property and respecting copyright issues - key components of becoming digital citizens.
I would encourage all teachers to think about different ways our students can construct and demonstrate their growing knowledge by producing creative artifacts and making meaningful learning experience for themselves. Please reach out for any help or brainstorming ideas. And don’t be intimidated by learning the
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