●B (background)

●A (article details)

●A (audience)

●C (contention)

● I (intention)

● T (tone).

●Your writing should feel natural and organic, so address each element in whichever order makes sense for the particular piece you’re looking at.

●A (argument)

●L (language devices)

●E (evidence)

●E (effect on target audience)

●Language devices: How does the language used help the writer to share their contention and argument? What techniques are used to support it – rhetorical questions, evidence, alliteration, pun, exaggeration, metaphor, emotive language, emotional appeals, attacks, generalisation, fact or opinion? Consider how two or three techniques can work together for an intended effect.

Students have been stuck studying these plays for hundreds of years. And doesn’t it feel like it? I’m sure the English teachers are sick of teaching the same materials their whole career, too. Why should we be studying the same texts our parents studied when they were at school? Shakespeare’s language is strange and confusing, and his ideas are ancient. Does anyone even know what his characters are saying? We’re so busy translating the words in these plays that we barely begin studying the underlying issues and ideas. Many students already find English a difficult subject, and it seems cruel to make them study language that no one uses anymore. There is very little chance that we are ever going to need to know Shakespeare anywhere outside of an English exam room: high school should be preparing us for real jobs in real life. We should be studying books in modern English, about modern characters who we can relate toand who deal with situations and conflicts we are likely to face in our own lives. Instead, we are being asked to study texts by dead white males, and Shakespeare is the worst offender.

I propose a new reading list of titles that have some actual diversity, and come from the last century at least. The most recent play we read was all swords and kings and witches, which aren’t exactly major concerns of modern times. The students here at Seaview Secondary have all kinds of different backgrounds, and we deserve to have those reflected in the materials we study. This is a compulsory subject, after all, so I believe it’s only fair that everyone studying it should see themselves represented on the page.

And because we’re the ones studying these works, we deserve a real say in the material we spend all semester on and write numerous essays about. We are able to choose our subjects, so we should have some say on what we actually study in them. If we’re more interested in what we study, our marks will improve too. I’m not saying we should ban Shakespeare – I encourage everyone who is still interested to read as many plays as they like. But high school is hard enough without a syllabus full of texts that we can’t relate to, don’t care about and can barely begin to understand. Let’s take Shakespeare out of the curriculum and put him back in the past where he belongs.

Student elections are taking place at Seaview Secondary College, and the use of William Shakespeare’s plays in the school’s English curriculum has become a hot issue. Meera Matthews’ key election promise is to lobby the school’s management team to remove all Shakespearean texts from English courses. She presented her views at a student election rally. At the end of her speech, drama captain Ned Nashville made a comment. 

Meera’s speech and Ned’s comment were published in an online student newsletter, Seaview Soapbox. 

Audience- the Seaview secondary school, teachers and students attending the school election rally

●Effect on target audience: Comment on what you think the writer’s intention is in using this specific language. What effect might they want it to have on the reader? How might these words / images make the reader feel? What might they encourage the reader think? Could these devices persuade the reader to  act in any way? Always be as specific as possible here.