Planning part one of the main body of a persuasive letter
I can plan the first main body paragraph of a persuasive letter, inspired by a text.
Lesson details
Key learning points.
- An introductory sentence indicates what the paragraph will be about.
- The purpose of the main body paragraph is to specifically detail key persuasive arguments.
- Points backed up by evidence, statistics, quotes or anecdotes are more effective.
- Writing clearly and cohesively is a vital element of persuasion.
Common misconception
Pupils may mix up physical and mental health benefits, leading to an unclear argument in the main body paragraph.
The first learning cycle task involves pupils categorising key arguments across the two main body paragraphs.
Main body - paragraphs which include key persuasive arguments
Specific information - clear, exact and particular information
Physical health - the healthy functioning of the body
Mental health - the healthy functioning of the mind
This content is © Oak National Academy Limited ( 2024 ), licensed on Open Government Licence version 3.0 except where otherwise stated. See Oak's terms & conditions (Collection 2).
Starter quiz
6 questions.
introduction -
states the letter's purpose
main body -
explores key persuasive points in detail, backed up by evidence
conclusion -
summarises the key information of the letter and outlines next steps
paragraphs which include key persuasive arguments
specific information -
clear, exact and particular information
physical health -
the healthy functioning of the body
mental health -
the healthy functioning of the mind
introductory sentence -
states the main argument of the paragraph
adds further explanation and evidence to support the point
linking sentence -
links to the next paragraph
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Persuasive Sentence Starters
Updated: 10 Aug 2020
Have your students begin their persuasive writing with a strong sentence starter.
Editable: Word
Non-Editable: PDF
Pages: 5 Pages
- Curriculum Curriculum: NC
Years: 2 - 7
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These persuasive sentence starters will help to get your students… well, started! Set them out on the right track with these strong opening statements. Give your students a copy each for their books or display them around your classroom.
An editable version is available for you to add your own sentence starters.
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- Sentence Starters Ks2 Worksheets Resources
Sentence openers – Best KS2 worksheets and resources
Help children improve and vary sentence openers in creative, persuasive and essay writing with these activities, ideas, lessons and more…
What are sentence openers?
How to use sentence openers in your classroom, sentence starters classroom display, ks2 sentence starters game, six ways to open a sentence video, sentence starter examples sheet.
Sentence openers, also known as sentence starters, are a word or phrase used to begin any given sentence. It’s useful for children to learn to work on these to vary their language and therefore improve their writing.
Just like people, sentence openers come in many shapes and sizes. Some are a classroom staple and useful for many writing opportunities. Others are created for a more specific purpose. They can help to:
- activate prior knowledge
- give examples
- summarise
You can use them at any point in the lesson to structure meaningful conversation. They can be useful at the beginning of a piece of writing, in the middle, or even towards the end – whenever you think they will clarify learning or aid progress.
Lose those exasperated refrains of “I don’t know what to write”, and get pupils off to a flying start with these irresistible sentence openers for KS2 from Collette Waddle…
I’ve been a teacher for nearly 20 years, and almost every educator I know has suffered this pain: delivering what you believe is an engaging, stimulating, practically BAFTA-winning introduction to writing, only to be met with “I don’t know what to write,” or “What are we doing?”.
So often, the difficulty comes not from writing in general, but rather getting pupils to start writing. Enter sentence openers for KS2.
We all know those pupils that struggle to write, and often it’s the ones that don’t read a lot. There are many reasons for this correlation, but I think one key factor is that they don’t have that bank of imaginative ideas that reading provides, to dip into.
Sentence openers are great for providing these ideas that allow children to get going. For me, they’ve been a game-changer.
I made up a few within a lesson one day and popped them on the working wall . It was a ‘spur of the moment’ idea, but it really worked.
“Sentence openers are great for providing these ideas that allow children to get going”
The less confident children used them, found a voice and began to engage, safe in the knowledge that they were on the right track. Others even added their own suggestions.
So, how did it work?
If you haven’t come across them much before, sentence openers, also known as sentence stems, give all pupils the chance to contribute, orally or in writing, while using complete sentences.
They’ll help the children begin their composition, while (sneakily) encouraging practice of the vocabulary and grammar conventions you want them to learn.
Using sentence openers successfully
Create .
When thinking about writing genres, create your starters and always include genre-related key vocabulary, phrases and language structures. Start small and keep sessions speedy, oral and fun at first.
Adapt
Once pupils have mastered using them, download these ready-made sentence starter clipboards . Use as they are, or adapt to suit your style, teaching, children or aims. You choose. Just be sure to build in progression.
Model
Show pupils how to use sentence starters. Don’t just focus on the writing, but the thinking, the choosing, and the ‘hmmm, that one doesn’t quite work, I need to change it’ moments.
Model changing your mind, and the messy planning and writing process: just do it with the sentence starters as part of the journey.
Practise
Review the starters you use regularly, and provide examples of how children could potentially complete some of them (oral or written). Complete a couple deliberately wrong and watch the fireworks!
Can children identify what’s wrong with the rest of the sentence? Can they correct it? Create opportunities for practice.
Review
Once pupils are confident with sentence starters, they can share their ideas. You can critique results, giving kind, constructive feedback.
A crucial piece of advice to give to pupils is: “Vary your sentence starters.” Even with strong sentence openers, writing becomes bland if they overuse the same ones. Encourage variation.
Write your own bland version and read it out in a monotone voice, just to drive home the point.
Revisit (regularly)
Plan regular revisits. To encourage progression, challenge pupils with sentence starters that are just above their current assessment level. Make them work for it!
Sentence openers activities to try
As well as making sure you’re following the right processes, engaging activities can also help bring your writing lessons to life. These are my favourites for helping pupils use sentence starters:
Connections
Cut out (or just mix up on a worksheet) a selection of sentence starters and endings. Pupils need to match up each starter with the correct ending.
Are there any starters that work with more than one ending? Why? This activity is great for provoking discussion on the ways we use language.
Upgrade
Prepare some sentence starters and give a copy to each pupil. Then, give them two to three minutes to complete each one, using information from recent learning.
After three or four minutes, the children should swap their sentences with a partner and add to or edit the information on their partner’s sheet. After another three or four minutes, pupils should then swap back and review their edited list.
Sentence starters reboot
Get pupils to choose a paragraph from an old piece of writing that they want to improve, and have them redraft it using sentence starters.
Encourage them to focus on choosing the starters that are going to provide the best flow, will have the best impact, and will make their writing the best it can be.
This is a good opportunity to discuss who the intended audience of the writing is, and whether children can figure out which type of sentence starters will work best.
For example, are they trying to:
- introduce something?
- support an argument?
- give examples ?
- summarise a point of view?
News at 10
This follows on well from ‘sentence starter reboot’, and involves pupils presenting their writing as a news report, using the appropriate sentence structures.
You could even turn your classroom into a news studio and have the children take it in turns to read their work, and give each other constructive feedback.
Prior knowledge tap
For this activity, give the children a time limit and see how many sentence starters they can come up with. You could try prompting them with questions like: “ How many sentence starters that you would expect to see in a set of instructions can you write in four minutes?”
Interactive dice
Try adding sentence starters for KS2 onto interactive dice, so pupils have a fun way to practise their vocabulary. In groups of three or four, depending on the size of your class, each pupil takes a turn rolling the die, and then the rest of the group need to come up with different possible endings to the starter that has been rolled.
The bonus is that these are easy to adapt, depending on your class needs or learning aims.
Collette Waddle is a UKS2 teacher and resource creator. Follow her on Twitter @ColletteR .
This classroom display pack from Plazoom features a set of six posters illustrating different ways to begin a sentence, using eye-catching images surrounded by example sentences – verb, adverb, simile, preposition, conjunction and onomatopoeia.
Plus, blank versions of the posters are also included, so children and teachers can add their own text suggestion.
With this KS2 grammar game from Plazoom you can help children explore different ways of starting sentences.
In it, there are two sets of cards: the blue cards contain examples of adverbs , conjunctions, onomatopoeia, prepositions, questions, similes and verbs that can be used to start a sentence, while the yellow cards contains clauses which can be added to the blue sentence starters.
If you don’t mind the overly dramatic American narrator, this video handily walks children through opening sentences with the subject, where or when something happens, questions, an ‘-ing’ phrase, verbs ending in ‘-ed’ and ‘-ly’ words.
Each one is backed up with examples and is clearly explained for students to follow and use.
This eight-page PDF of sentence openers sorts its examples into six different styles of writing, such as diary writing , information texts and recounts, then provides a selection of options for each.
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IMAGES
COMMENTS
Persuasive writing is a type of non-fiction writing that aims to persuade the reader to agree with a point of view outlined in a text or complete an action based on what they have read. There are many different forms of persuasive writing seen within our daily lives, including newspaper articles, essays, brochures, and reviews.
Persuasive sentence starters. Add to My Folder. Join Scholastic Resource Bank: Primary from just £15.00. a year to access thousands of KS1 and KS2 resources. Use these sentence starters to help children practise making persuasive arguments. PDF [300 KB]
Age range: 11-14. Resource type: Other. File previews. docx, 806.92 KB. Sentence starters for oral discussion Persuasive speaking sentence help. Creative Commons "Sharealike".
Cut out these sentence starters and give to children to use as practice in persuasive arguments. Created Date: 8/22/2012 2:22:04 PM ...
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Use our persuasive sentence starters as a brilliant writing aid during your upper primary English lessons. With a wide range of opening statements to help children really make an impact with their writing, this is a great reference pack for children to use to enhance their literacy skills. There are lots of different ways that you could use ...
Persuasive writing examples for KS2. Advert. Have a break, have a Kit Kat. Just Do It. Speech. 'I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the colour of their skin but by the content of their character.'. Martin Luther King Jr.
Adverbs to start a diary sentence with: Hopefully Fortunately Unfortunately Fortuitously Luckily Unluckily Thankfully Lately Recently Incidentally Curiously Eventually Anyway Conversational manner with 'speech like phrases' By the way . . . To tell you the truth . . .
An introductory sentence indicates what the paragraph will be about. The purpose of the main body paragraph is to specifically detail key persuasive arguments. Points backed up by evidence, statistics, quotes or anecdotes are more effective. Writing clearly and cohesively is a vital element of persuasion.
Years: 2 - 7. Download. Preview File. Available on the Plus Plan. Have your students begin their persuasive writing with a strong sentence starter. These persuasive sentence starters will help to get your students… well, started! Set them out on the right track with these strong opening statements. Give your students a copy each for their ...
Persuasive Writing - sentence starters. My bottom set Y9 are writing persuasive speeches; this is just a small resource I've produced to help them vary their sentences a little more. Report this resource to let us know if it violates our terms and conditions. Our customer service team will review your report and will be in touch.
This is an editable resource that can be used alongside the teaching of persuasive writing for KS2 children. Each paragraph has its own choice of sentence starters that can be used by the pupils when writing their own persuasive text. It is colour coded and clearly presented for ease of use. The different sections are: Introduction. Paragraph 1.
This great persuasive writing resource for KS2 includes a super helpful PowerPoint that guides you through the process of writing a great piece of persuasive writing, as well as a structured worksheet to help your children plan and write their own persuasive essay.Set the worksheet for independent study in the classroom or at home, testing your ...
Sentence openers, also known as sentence starters, are a word or phrase used to begin any given sentence. It's useful for children to learn to work on these to vary their language and therefore improve their writing. Just like people, sentence openers come in many shapes and sizes. Some are a classroom staple and useful for many writing ...
It is important to use sequence words and phrases as sentence openers and connectives that persuade when writing persuasive language texts at primary level to link or connect your sentences, ideas and whole paragraphs together. Connectives (linking words) should be carefully chosen in persuasive writing to make sure your paragraphs are linked ...
Persuasive Sentence Starters (Naomi Axon) DOC; Persuasive Display (Michael Spalton) DOC; Persuasive Speech Writing Frame (Christa Cullen) DOC; Persuasive Writing Checklist (Daniel Barker) DOC; Pooh Bear/BB Wolf Letters (Georgina Hanbury) DOC; ... Persuasive Text T4W Boxing Up Proforma (Melissa Ward) DOC : Advertisement.
Teachers TV: KS2 Persuasive Writing. Subject: English. Age range: 7-11. Resource type: Audio, music & video. Videos. File previews. doc, 126.5 KB. doc, 113 KB. In this Key Stage 2 literacy 'Lesson Starters', suitable for Years 3-6, each of the five short video clips provides a stimulus for pupils to employ a range of persuasive writing ...
Our lovely persuasive writing vocabulary KS2 poster provides a fantastic new way to help children elevate their persuasive writing! This eye-catching persuasive writing word mat features heaps of handy words and phrases that pupils can use when writing compelling arguments. These are all organised into handy sections, allowing pupils to pick out what they need and when. These include ...
These sentence starter strips are a wonderful way to help your students take their writing to the next level! You might like to use these word cards as part of a display or an English learning wall, so your students can refer to them during independent writing tasks. This is a great way to help children to develop early research skills. Show more.
This features of persuasive writing checklist for KS2 includes important features such as arguments, evidence, a title and a conclusion, amongst others. The persuasive writing checklist can be edited with your own points of too if there are other things you want your students to include. Designed by teachers, it is great as an in-class activity ...
Subject: English. Age range: 7-11. Resource type: Worksheet/Activity. File previews. docx, 129.71 KB. Great resource to help children with persuasive writing for and against. I have shrunk the resource into A5 so that it can be kept inside books for children to refer back to during a unit of work.
Writing Planning Sheet Bundle for KS2. A KS2 Writing Planning Sheet set, containing 13 planning sheets for both fiction and non-fiction writing: * Balanced arguments * Biography/autobiography * Diary entry * Dilemma story * Explanation text * Instruction text * Newspaper * Non-chronological report * Persuasive article * Persuasive writing/speech * Spy Thriller story * Stories from other ...