The annual Elie Wiesel Writing and Visuals Arts Competition is open to students in grades 6 through 12 and serves to inspire middle and high school students and teachers to learn more about the Holocaust, racism, bigotry, and the dangers of prejudice. The questions posed each year guide students to explore the lessons of the Holocaust while examining contemporary issues such as bullying, peer pressure, unthinking obedience to authority, and indifference.

This resource provides ideas for administering an argument writing assignment that involves responding to a prompt about the value of a four-year college degree and completing reading or research to find facts to engage with as students support their claim. The information provided is specific to the state of Virginia in terms of both the suggested resources for research and the Virginia Standards of Learning rubric. Teachers can use this to prepare students for the End of Course writing assessment.

This resource is a quick reference guide for students as they develop body paragraphs in response to persuasive writing tasks, such as the Writing SOL Short Paper. The resource includes various strategies that students can use for elaborating on ideas and exemplar paragraphs based on a released SOL prompt.

This resource is a quick reference guide for students as they develop body paragraphs in response to persuasive writing tasks, such as the Writing SOL Short Paper. The resource includes various strategies that students can use for elaborating on ideas and exemplar paragraphs based on a released SOL prompt.

This resource is a quick reference guide for students as they develop body paragraphs in response to persuasive writing tasks, such as the Writing SOL Short Paper. The resource includes various strategies that students can use for elaborating on ideas and exemplar paragraphs based on a released SOL prompt.

This resource is a quick reference guide for students as they craft effective introduction paragraphs in response to persuasive writing tasks, such as the Writing SOL Short Paper. The resource includes essential components, stylistic options, guiding questions, and an exemplar paragraph based on a released SOL prompt.

This resource is a quick reference guide for students as they craft effective introduction paragraphs in response to persuasive writing tasks, such as the Writing SOL Short Paper. The resource includes essential components, stylistic options, guiding questions, and an exemplar paragraph based on a released SOL prompt.

This resource is a quick reference guide for students as they craft effective introduction paragraphs in response to persuasive writing tasks, such as the Writing SOL Short Paper. The resource includes essential components, stylistic options, guiding questions, and an exemplar paragraph based on a released SOL prompt.

This resource is a quick reference guide for students as they craft effective introduction paragraphs in response to persuasive writing tasks, such as the Writing SOL Short Paper. The resource includes essential components, stylistic options, guiding questions, and an exemplar paragraph based on a released SOL prompt.

This resource is a quick reference guide for students as they craft effective introduction paragraphs in response to persuasive writing tasks, such as the Writing SOL Short Paper. The resource includes essential components, stylistic options, guiding questions, and an exemplar paragraph based on a released SOL prompt.

This represents an entire unit designed to be cross curricular in nature for English 11 and VA/US History. The Historical Fiction Research Unit Google Doc can be found here and contains various links to additional resources to support this unit of study.The "before", "during", and "after" are included in each day for this series.  The unit will take approximately 12 days.

We can look at art to analyze and interpret the ideas at play; we can also use art as a prompt for creativity; but these two things don’t have to be mutually exclusive. Use this simple creative writing exercise to help students collaboratively use creative thinking in tandem with critical thinking as they make meaning from an abstract artwork.

This lesson remixes an original lesson plan entitled "The Poetry of Emily Dickinson" by Melissa Strong: Melissa Strong. Retrieved from the Digital Public Library of America .

In this lesson, activities 1 and 2 from the original source are combined so that students emulate the writing style of Dickinson to write their own original poetry based on modern issues concerning women. An extension activity asks students to transfer their understanding of how literary elements shape meaning to different poets who each have a distinct style.

This resource provides a rubric written for high school students to self-assess their persuasive writing. Teachers may also use it for assessment. In this remix, the purpose of three different types of argument writing--arguments of fact, value, and policy--are described.

Remixed from Clarity Innovations' "Persuasive Writing Rubric--High School" available here: https://www.oercommons.org/authoring/22756-persuasive-writing-rubric-high-school.

 Students will craft a persuasive presentation of information for a cause they believe needs to be improved to convince the citizens within their home community. Students are encouraged to explore pamphlets, petitions, and commercials to best find the way that they will present their information. Additionally, students will be selecting their own, school-appropriate, topics to address. The linking factor will be a persuasive outline for each assignment.** This performance assessment was developed by a collaborative team of teachers and division staff from Middlesex, Poquoson, and West Point school divisions.

For the following project, students will be engaging in real-world topics research on a topic of their choice and producing an essay or proposal that argues their position on that topic.  This is a persuasive paper, not an expository paper.  They will need to take a position regarding the position they choose and support it using research.

This resource provides an explanation of, sample directions for, and suggested logistics to implement a reflection and revision assignment after students have completed at least one draft of a writing assignment. The assignment requires students to pinpoint problematic issues in the writing and to focus revisions on those. The assignment requires both reflective writing about and actual revision of particular problems in order to develop awareness of their individual struggles with writing and practice solving those problems.

This is a document to help students reflect on their choices for persuasive technique and rhetorical devices.