Points of View on Sleep (Grades 6-7)

• Four informational texts
• 4-6 weeks instruction
• Argument writing

What is this unit about?

A primary focus of this unit is learning how to comprehend and analyze points of view and arguments. Through engaging in this unit, students learn how to analyze professional writers’ arguments by focusing on the authors’ points of view, the reasons they give and how they support those reasons with relevant and credible evidence. Students also learn about what makes arguments effective, and use that knowledge to analyze several published arguments.

This unit’s texts present points of view about sleep and the amount of sleep that a teenager should get. Through the course of this unit, students deepen their understanding of sleep by reading, writing, and talking about the ideas that are being debated in the texts.

Finally, this unit is about learning how to write an essay that argues for which author best supports his or her argument by analyzing the use of reasons and evidence from credible sources. The focus is on determining which argument is most clear and coherent and best supported with relevant and credible textual evidence.

In this unit, students read, write about, and discuss four texts to deepen their understanding of the following overarching questions:

• What are the authors’ points of view about sleep?
• What are characteristics of an effective argument?
• How do the authors organize their arguments and support them with evidence from credible sources?

What content will students learn?

Students will expand their knowledge base about:

• sleep and points of view about sleep.
• how authors use reasons, and evidence to develop and support their arguments.
• what it means for evidence to be credible.
• how authors convey a point of view.