South Dakota ELA 11-12.WHST.1.c
The Standard
- 11-12.WHST.1
- Write arguments focused on discipline-specific content.
Use appropriate and varied transitional words, phrases, and clauses to link the major sections of the text, create cohesion, and clarify the relationships between claim(s) and reasons, between reasons and evidence, and between claim(s) and counterclaims.
South Dakota English Language Arts Standards (2025) · Writing Standards for Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science and Technical Subjects
Teacher's field guide
What This Standard Means
What Students Need to Do
- Students guide readers from one section of an argument to the next. They choose transitions that show when they are giving a reason, backing it with evidence, or addressing an opposing view.
What Mastery Looks Like
- A student can connect a claim to a reason, introduce data that supports the reason, and clearly mark a counterclaim. Their transitions vary and match the relationship between the ideas.
Common Misconceptions
- Students may put however before evidence that supports their own reason. Others start every paragraph with also, even when the next paragraph presents an opposing view.
How to Assess It
- Exit ticket: Turn these notes into a short argument using three different transitions: schools should start later; teens need more sleep; 18 of 25 teens in a sample survey reported first-period fatigue; some families need early drop-off.
Lesson moves
Ways to Teach It
Give pairs four paper strips labeled claim, reason, evidence, and counterclaim; have them arrange the strips and write a fitting transition between each.
Put however between a reason and supporting evidence, then ask partners to explain why the link sounds wrong.
Play transition swap: groups replace repeated also in a four-paragraph argument, earning points only when each new phrase fits the relationship.
Give students a mock school board agenda and sleep data; have them draft a comment connecting a later-start claim to a bus-route objection.
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The Grades 9–10 version of this standard.
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