Argumentative letter: Better writing requires more reading

(I want more while I have the chance)

Dear Principal Smith,
Recently, I have added more direct reading into my 9th grade
composition courses, which you have expressed concerns about. Let
me describe what has happened in my courses.
I have added five additional mentor texts for students to read in my
class; however they have also used the texts as models for their
writing. I have built these models from ideas in Write Like This, by
Kelly Gallagher, and award-winning English teacher; The Writing Thief
by Ruth Culham, Deeper Writing by Robin Holland, and Text Structures
from the Masters by Gretchen Bernabei and Jennifer Koppe.
I know that you may be concerned about adding more reading to our
curriculum when we already read a great deal. Let me assure you, this
additional reading, and the writing models we use from it, is truly
having a breakthrough with my students in the past four weeks.
I had seven to eight students in all the sections of composition
combined that until now almost never (perhaps once a week) engaged
with writing activities or put forth even a beginning to their formative
and summative writing assignments. In the past four weeks, all of
these students have completed formative writing assignments and I
have seen growth in not only the mechanics of their writing, but the
ideas they are generating. One student, who as I said, had shown little
participation in other writing activities, wrote an essay on why
something goes viral that was both coherent and well-thought out.

Given the outcomes that have occurred, I would like to continue these
results by incorporating more new mentor texts into my classroom, and
workshopping with all the writing teachers to implement these ideas
into all classrooms for the remainder of the year.
If we wait until next year, we may lose our opportunity to influence
many students who feel stuck with the currently writing curriculum.
Please support us and let us continue this wonderful work
Sincerely,
Jessie T. Morgan

----------------------------------------------------------------------------I based this style of an explanatory argument (from one person to

another) on Bernabei and Koppes text structure of a letter from
William Hornady to SF Baird in 1886 when traveling West for the first
time (p.102-103).
Its a really interesting approach to get students writing and is very
easy for any student to think about and start writing about.
Here
1.
2.
3.
4.

is the structure of the text that the authors provide:

We recently did this
We got this
So that makes me want this
Because in the future it will be too late.

My RAFT brainstorming for this letter:

Role: English teacher
Audience: An administrator who believes you must heavily decrease
the amount of reading work in your writing instruction; the two are
separate spheres
Format: letter

Topic: For students to become better writers, they must read more.
Mentor texts are vital for my students success as writers. Why I will
not cut back on the amount of reading used for writing instruction.

SOURCES:
Bernabei & Koppe, 2016