More about your essay

I've had a few people ask me some questions about tomorrow - so let's clarify:

• Yes, it's the same prompt as before. 
• All of your collected revision materials will be stapled and turn in tomorrow for an assessment grade. When I look at this, I will assess a grade based on evidence of meaningful revision. Changing one or two words is not meaningful; we've spent almost a solid week on these revisions. 
• Your final essay will be a major grade. It will be graded according to the state rubric. It will not be averaged with your original grade. Essays will be shared with other English II teachers to ensure calibration - especially essays that are scored highly. 
• You can use any revisions, editing, extra drafting, notes, a dictionary, and a thesaurus tomorrow during class in order to produce the best final draft possible. You may not use technology (Googling!) and I'm not going to answer any questions (except questions about the directions).

Next: Some people have asked me if I have any recent STAAR-based examples of the whole "call-to-action" thing.

Matter of fact, I do:

The choice is to live in an urban city or a rural small town, and after weighing the pros and cons of city and country life, the reasonable person will be convinced that country life is the right choice for them. Trading in the pantsuits and a professional life for a more relaxed one is a no-brainer, and it is a chance that must not be passed up by anyone. 

Why it works: You notice that this example contains some of the DIDs that we looked at previously - "pantsuits" and whatnot. You see that the essayist wrote "the reasonable person will be convinced," and that's what I'm talking about when I'm talking about the concept of ethos. Ethos is the credibility of the speaker (persona) based on an assumed shared sense of morality or values with their audience. You see that they're assuming that a "reasonable" person agrees with them. See how that works?

It is, of course, a matter of preference and comfort as to the environment a person chooses to live in, but it is crucial  that all people understand the great benefit of the interactions and cohesiveness that exist in cities. It is equally important to embrace urban developments as beneficiaries to all levels of population organization, as the main goal of urbanization is to move forward.

Why it works: This one doesn't have such an obvious call to action. Instead, this essayist chose to focus on the "so what?" question. They make their reader see why the issue is important by literally telling the reader directly why it is important. This is something you can end your essay with. Sit back and ask yourself - so what? Why would your average person care about this issue? What things can I bring up that might be moving? You could start by saying, "This is important because..." or "This should be important to you because..."