CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.9-10.1d

ELAGrades 9–10Text Types and Purposes

The Standard

Establish and maintain a formal style and objective tone while attending to the norms and conventions of the discipline in which they are writing.

Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts

What This Standard Means

Students need to write arguments that sound appropriate for school, academic, or discipline-based writing. They should avoid slang, casual phrasing, emotional exaggeration, and personal attacks. They also need to match the expectations of the subject, such as using evidence-based language in history or precise terms in science.

Mastery looks like a steady formal voice from start to finish. Claims, reasons, and evidence feel controlled and fair. Students often get stuck by sounding too conversational, using “I think” too much, adding loaded words, or switching tone between serious analysis and casual commentary.

Ways to Teach It

Give students a casual argument paragraph and have them revise it into a formal academic version using a provided word bank.
Ask students to explain how tone changes when writing about the same issue for a friend, a principal, and a history teacher.
Use a three-item exit ticket: circle one informal phrase, replace it, and explain why the new wording fits better.
Show a workplace email and a group text about the same problem, then compare which language choices fit each audience.