Mini-Workshop
Writing a Persuasive Essay
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Assignment
Choose an Issue
Identify Your Thesis and Call for Action
Consider Purpose and Audience
Support Your Position
Organize Your Support
Practice and Apply
Writing a Persuasive Essay
Assignment: Write a persuasive essay defending
your position on an issue that is important to you.
You probably express your opinion on some issue
or another almost every day. Which issues do you
care about the most? Writing a persuasive
essay can help you convince others to agree with
you. For this essay, you’ll develop a strong
argument targeted to a particular audience.
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Writing a Persuasive Essay
Choose an Issue
Issue: a topic about which reasonable people
have opposing views
Look around for issues that intrigue you.
• What have you seen on the
television news or read in
the newspaper?
• What would you like to see
changed in your school or
community?
Writing a Persuasive Essay
Choose an Issue
List several issues. Look at each one and ask:
Do I really care
about this issue?
Does it have clear
pro and con
arguments?
Is it narrow enough
to argue in 1,500 words?
If you answer yes to all three questions, you
know you have a good topic for your essay.
Writing a Persuasive Essay
Choose an Issue
Would these issues make good topics for a
persuasive essay?
The public schools must prepare all
students for college.
Protecting the environment is
important.
The bike path system in this city
needs to be improved.
No
(too broad)
No (no clear
con argument)
Yes, meets
all criteria
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Writing a Persuasive Essay
Identify Your Thesis and Call for Action
Write a thesis statement that defines your
perspective, or position, on the issue.
The City Council should establish a budget and a
plan to repair, expand, and maintain the bike path
system downtown.
Also, develop a call for action—a sentence that
tells readers what you want them to do.
Concerned citizens are urged to write their City
Council members and ask them to place this
matter on the agenda for the next meeting.
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Writing a Persuasive Essay
Consider Purpose and Audience
Your purpose is to persuade your audience. First,
analyze your audience so you can tailor your
argument to them.
What are the audience
members’ ages, interests,
education levels, values?
Decide what evidence,
reasons, and language
to use.
What do they already
know about the issue?
Determine how much
background to provide.
Where do they stand on
the issue?
Prepare to address any
objections to your thesis.
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Writing a Persuasive Essay
Support Your Position
Include solid reasons why your readers should
believe or act as you suggest.
Logical appeal: engages
readers’ ability to think clearly
Emotional appeal: stirs readers’
feelings; personalizes the issue
Ethical appeal: establishes you
as a fair and knowledgeable speaker; calls
upon readers’ sense of right and wrong
Writing a Persuasive Essay
Support Your Position
Classify each statement below as a logical,
emotional, or ethical appeal.
Just last month, a bicyclist was killed when he
was hit by a bus on Main Street. Surely his
family wishes there had been a bike path.
emotional
appeal
More bike paths would encourage people to
ride their bicycles to school or work, creating
less pollution from automobile exhaust.
Everyone would benefit from that.
ethical
appeal
Much of the money that would be needed to
improve the bike path system could come from
the mass transit budget.
logical
appeal
Writing a Persuasive Essay
Support Your Position
Back up your reasons with solid evidence—facts,
statistics, anecdotes, expert testimony, and
examples.
Reason: More bike paths would lead to a reduction in
air pollution.
Evidence: Two years ago Bridgeton, a
town similar to our own in size, climate,
and demographics, reported a 5 percent
reduction in toxic fumes from auto
emissions after twenty-six new bike
paths were constructed.
statistics
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Writing a Persuasive Essay
Organize Your Support
Arrange your reasons by order of importance.
Capture readers’
attention early.
OR
Make a strong
final impression.
Body Paragraph 1
strongest reason
Body Paragraph 1
second strongest reason
Body Paragraph 2
another good reason
Body Paragraph 2
another good reason
Body Paragraph 3
second strongest reason
Body Paragraph 3
strongest reason
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Writing a Persuasive Essay
Use the guidelines in this
presentation to
• choose an issue
• formulate a thesis statement and a call for
action
• gather and organize support
Write your persuasive essay and share it with
your intended audience.
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