Persuasive Letter Lesson Plan

The lesson plan below is intended to work with elections covered by ProCon, but may be adapted to work with other elections.

Objective:

Students will write a persuasive letter arguing whether to make Election Day a national holiday, whether to lower the voting age to 16, or whether to automatically restore voting rights to people convicted of felonies.

Students will:

• analyze opinions
• form their own opinions
• respectfully include their opinions in a persuasive letter

Resources/Materials:

• ProCon.org election coverage
• ProCon.org articles:
  • “Election Day National Holiday”
  • “Lowering the Voting Age“
  • “Felony Disenfranchisement “
• “Who Represents Me” resource from Ballotpedia

Preparation:

• Teachers may print the ProCon.org article to eliminate the need for student internet connections.
• Teachers should decide if students will be able to choose their own topics from the three choices, or if the topic(s) will be assigned.
• This assignment may be completed in class or as homework.

Activity:

1. Have students read the chosen ProCon.org article.
2. Students should carefully consider their opinions on the topic.
3. Students should then write a letter arguing their point to a person who could make a change or maintain the current status. Letters could be written to federal elected representatives (the President, senators, or representatives), state or local elected officials (the governor, mayor, or city council people), business people who might offer holiday days to employees, or others. Direct students to “Who Represents Me” on Ballotpedia to determine their officials based on their addresses (they do not need to enter their email addresses to access the information).
4. Plan Variation:
   a. Have students address the letter to their classmates (as if it might be published in a school newspaper to convince their classmates of their argument), their communities (as if it might be published in a local newspaper as an op-ed piece), or as a social media post. Or, a combination of formats to allow the students to explore their argument in various formats for a variety of audiences.

Evaluation:

• Quality of writing
• Ability to express opinion