To think "Persuasive Writing" lessons shouldn't encourage students to make up 'facts' and statistics?

[diagonallies]

My two DCs have both had several English lessons on the topic of persuasive writing in both primary and secondary school. These have focussed on persuasive techniques, but every time they have been told it's fine to make up some statistics or facts to strengthen their argument, presumably on the grounds that it's an English lesson, not a science lesson or a lesson on critical thinking.

But surely critical thinking should be at the heart of everything our children learn at school? If it's ok for future journalists, politicians, bloggers and advertising copywriters to make up persuasive stats in their English essays, then can we really be confident they will ever unlearn that?

From my perspective the original discussion ended days ago

At no point have you “discussed” anything.

many parents are educated to a much higher level than the teachers who are employed to teach their kids

That doesn’t mean they know anything about teaching.

Maybe you should also be teaching your students that the best way to end an online disagreement is to walk away, rather than to keep posting irrelevant insults and niggles that just push the thread back to the top of everyone's in-tray.

Sorry OP. That’s not in the curriculum I teach. That’s your job, not mine.

[ends]
Hahaha. Right. Good luck with that.

From my perspective the original discussion ended days ago, with several people (including teachers) agreeing with the original point and several (including teachers) not agreeing with it.
Aka in my mind the discussion ended when some people agreed with me.

When people disagreed, that discussion was already over.

Let's ignore the fact that the discussion has drawn clear distinctions between research for writing a topic piece for primary (where researched stats would be expected) and GCSE exams on unseen topics (where they wouldn't be). The point is that some people said in some contexts they teach research so the OP's point must be correct the whole time.

For what it's worth I don't buy the "I'm a professional therefore I know best" argument, and you won't find many people who do.
Generally professional, educated people work out who is worth listening to on professional issues.
Someone's opinions from outside the sector generally doesn't count.
We all know there are good and bad teachers, and many parents are educated to a much higher level than the teachers who are employed to teach their kids.
I'm educated to a higher level than some of the professionals whose services I use. Can I tell them how to do their jobs please?

I said earlier in the thread that I think teachers should be paid more, but it goes without saying that I would expect the overall quality of teaching to improve as a result - and of course it would, because more competitive salaries would attract higher calibre applicants.
Aka I think teachers should be paid more but only if they teach how I think they should.

Meanwhile in education there's lots of interesting pedagogical debate, debates surrounding the application of educational research, curriculum design and a range of professionals manage to have different points of view on these issues and engage in professional reflection.
Maybe we should lose all of that and do what the OP says because they know best.

Pretty shocked reading this thread.

I am a PS teacher and teach persuasive writing and it has never occurred to me to ask pupils to make up stats. There are lots of ways of avoiding this: 1) Incorporate the research into an appropriate science/geography etc lesson. Harder in secondary schools obviously. 2) Provide a list of facts on the board for children to choose from during the lesson. 3) (My most commonly used method) Set the task of finding appropriate stats and facts as homework.

I really am surprised that people think “It’s not part of the lesson objective therefore it doesn’t matter.” I am trying to educate the whole child and create and build on skills for life. In Scotland we are encouraged to use cross curricular links and think about skills for the workplace wherever possible, making up stats for ones own convenience just flies in the face of this.

It is worrying in this age of fake news that engaging in a similar practice, even if it is just for a school child’s essay, is being encouraged. Such a confusing message to send.

IHopeYouUnderstandWeArePuppets
I think there has to be an understanding that primary and secondary have different demands and are totally different.

I totally agree with what you propose when you're writing based on your topic work, or science and they have 1 teacher who is overseeing all subjects, who can dedicate a week to planning and researching an idea and so on.

That doesn't translate to 'you're in a 1h 45 minute exam at the end of y11 and you've got to write a piece of transactional writing on ANY non fiction topic. You have 45 minutes to plan and write it'.

I would never tell a primary teacher how to teach their stuff, so it would be nice if instead of being outraged primary staff could stop for a second and consider thay maybe how they do things doesn't automatically translate to a GCSE exam.

But as you've agreed with the OP I'm sure they'll do their usual thing of showing zero understanding and claim that what you've outlined is totally doable in 45 minutes in an exam hall.

We all know there are good and bad teachers, and many parents are educated to a much higher level than the teachers who are employed to teach their kids

I mean, technically, I am educated to a much higher level than the plumber coming round to sort my bathroom in a bit, by dint of the fact that I have a master’s degree, and he likely does not.

Doesn’t mean I can tell him jack shit about how to be a plumber, so why do so many people assume they can tell us about teaching pedagogy?

Hope

Are you familiar with the AQA English Language Paper 2/question 5?

Probably not smile.
It's always a problem on discussions like this. People only considering their own opinion and context and experience and what they do (or don't do in the case of armchair experts) and therefore deciding that any other approach must be wrong/ineffective/worth dismissing.

Then people who are seeking an echo chamber cherry pick from the thread and decide they must be right and anyone who disagrees couldn't have an equally valid professional view, they must be wrong.

We all know there are good and bad teachers, and many parents are educated to a much higher level than the teachers who are employed to teach their kids.

I don’t give a shit how educated someone is. If they’re not a qualified teacher, they have no place commenting on my pedagogy. If they are, but they’re not my colleague or peer, and I, not they, am employed to educate their child, then they should be professional enough to let me do so without undue interference.

So those students who never get beyond GCSE are never told they should reference any stats/facts they use, or to look for references in texts they read online. That's the problem.

Do you really think the fake news phenomenon is because GCSE students aren't being made to footnote their exam essays with verifiable citations?