W.11-12.1: Writing Arguments for a Real Audience, with Counterclaims Weighed Fairly
In plain English: W.11-12.1 is the Common Core ELA standard that asks students in grades 11-12 to write arguments analyzing substantive topics or texts, using valid reasoning and relevant, sufficient evidence. Students make precise, knowledgeable claims, weigh claims and counterclaims fairly for a specific audience, link ideas clearly, keep a formal tone and end with a conclusion that follows.
Write arguments to support claims in an analysis of substantive topics or texts, using valid reasoning and relevant and sufficient evidence.
a.Introduce precise, knowledgeable claim(s), establish the significance of the claim(s), distinguish the claim(s) from alternate or opposing claims, and create an organization that logically sequences claim(s), counterclaims, reasons, and evidence.
b.Develop claim(s) and counterclaims fairly and thoroughly, supplying the most relevant evidence for each while pointing out the strengths and limitations of both in a manner that anticipates the audience's knowledge level, concerns, values, and possible biases.
c.Use words, phrases, and clauses as well as varied syntax 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.
d.Establish and maintain a formal style and objective tone while attending to the norms and conventions of the discipline in which they are writing.
e.Provide a concluding statement or section that follows from and supports the argument presented.
Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts & Literacy · Domain: Writing Standards · Cluster: Text Types and Purposes · Official standard
W.11-12.1 asks students to write arguments that analyze substantive topics or texts, and the five parts of the standard raise the bar from grades 9-10: claims must be knowledgeable as well as precise, counterclaims must be developed fairly and thoroughly, and the writer must anticipate a specific audience's knowledge level, concerns, values and possible biases. This lesson gives students a text worth arguing about, Mark Twain's "Corn-pone Opinions" (written in 1900, first printed in 1923), in which he claims that a truly independent opinion is "a most rare thing--if it has indeed ever existed." Readers who like to think for themselves have every reason to resist that claim, which makes them the audience students must write for.
Students study an original model essay that takes a qualified position and uses real research, Solomon Asch's conformity experiments, as evidence for both its claim and the counterclaim. They map its organization and links, profile its audience, weigh evidence for and against, and revise a weak draft. For homework they plan and draft their own argument on a second question from the same essay.
Learning Objectives
By the end of this lesson, students will be able to:
Write a precise, knowledgeable claim about a text, state its significance and distinguish it from alternate and opposing claims
Develop a claim and a counterclaim fairly, supplying the most relevant evidence for each and naming the strengths and limitations of both
Profile an audience's knowledge level, concerns, values and possible biases, and adjust an argument to anticipate them
Link the sections of an argument with words, phrases, clauses and varied syntax that clarify how claims, reasons, evidence and counterclaims relate
Keep a formal style and objective tone that follow the conventions of literary analysis, and write a conclusion that follows from the argument
Prior Knowledge Required
Students should already be comfortable with:
Writing an argument with a claim, counterclaims, reasons and evidence at grades 9-10 W.9-10.1
Delineating and evaluating an argument's reasoning and evidence RI.9-10.8
Citing strong and thorough textual evidence RI.11-12.1
Quoting from a text and punctuating quotations correctly
"Think of one opinion you hold that most of your friends share: about music, a team, a phone, a school rule. Write one sentence on how you came to hold it, and one sentence on what evidence would show you had simply absorbed it from the people around you."
Take four or five answers. Students usually find the first sentence easy and the second hard, which is the point: it is difficult to prove to yourself that an opinion is your own. Tell students that in 1900 Mark Twain argued that almost nobody holds a first-hand opinion, and that today they will write an argument about whether he was right, for readers who, like them, would prefer to believe they think for themselves.
Direct Instruction20-25 minutes
What W.11-12.1 asks. An argument at this level analyzes a substantive topic or text and supports its claims "using valid reasoning and relevant and sufficient evidence." The five parts ask for more than the grades 9-10 version: (a) a precise, knowledgeable claim whose significance is clear, set apart from alternate or opposing claims, in an order that sequences claims, counterclaims, reasons and evidence; (b) claims and counterclaims developed fairly and thoroughly, with the strengths and limitations of both, for an audience whose knowledge, concerns, values and possible biases the writer anticipates; (c) words, phrases, clauses and varied syntax that link the sections and clarify how claim, reasons, evidence and counterclaims relate; (d) a formal style and objective tone that follow the norms of the discipline; and (e) a conclusion that follows from the argument.
Read Twain's opening aloud. Context: Twain grew up in Hannibal, Missouri, a slaveholding town, and wrote this essay in 1900; it was printed only after his death. Gloss corn pone, a plain cornbread, standing here for a person's living.
1Fifty years ago, when I was a boy of fifteen and helping to inhabit a Missourian village on the banks of the Mississippi, I had a friend whose society was very dear to me because I was forbidden by my mother to partake of it. He was a gay and impudent and satirical and delightful young black man--a slave--who daily preached sermons from the top of his master’s woodpile, with me for sole audience. He imitated the pulpit style of the several clergymen of the village, and did it well, and with fine passion and energy. To me he was a wonder. I believed he was the greatest orator in the United States and would some day be heard from. But it did not happen; in the distribution of rewards he was overlooked. It is the way, in this world.
2He interrupted his preaching, now and then, to saw a stick of wood; but the sawing was a pretense--he did it with his mouth; exactly imitating the sound the bucksaw makes in shrieking its way through the wood. But it served its purpose; it kept his master from coming out to see how the work was getting along. I listened to the sermons from the open window of a lumber room at the back of the house. One of his texts was this:
3“You tell me whar a man gits his corn pone, en I’ll tell you what his ’pinions is.“
4I can never forget it. It was deeply impressed upon me. By my mother. Not upon my memory, but elsewhere. She had slipped in upon me while I was absorbed and not watching. The black philosopher’s idea was that a man is not independent, and cannot afford views which might interfere with his bread and butter. If he would prosper, he must train with the majority; in matters of large moment, like politics and religion, he must think and feel with the bulk of his neighbors, or suffer damage in his social standing and in his business prosperities. He must restrict himself to corn-pone opinions--at least on the surface. He must get his opinions from other people; he must reason out none for himself; he must have no first-hand views.
5I think Jerry was right, in the main, but I think he did not go far enough.
61. It was his idea that a man conforms to the majority view of his locality by calculation and intention.
7This happens, but I think it is not the rule.
82. It was his idea that there is such a thing as a first-hand opinion; an original opinion; an opinion which is coldly reasoned out in a man’s head, by a searching analysis of the facts involved, with the heart unconsulted, and the jury room closed against outside influences. It may be that such an opinion has been born somewhere, at some time or other, but I suppose it got away before they could catch it and stuff it and put it in the museum.
9I am persuaded that a coldly-thought-out and independent verdict upon a fashion in clothes, or manners, or literature, or politics, or religion, or any other matter that is projected into the field of our notice and interest, is a most rare thing--if it has indeed ever existed.
Mark Twain, Corn-pone Opinions, the opening (paragraphs 1-9 of the essay) (1923). Public domain (published 1923). Source text.
Then hand out the model essay, written for readers in an English 11 class who have read the whole of Twain's essay. Students highlight the claim in one color, reasons and evidence in a second, and the counterclaim and response in a third. Work through the examples below.
1In "Corn-pone Opinions," an essay he wrote in 1900 and never published in his lifetime, Mark Twain agrees with Jerry, the enslaved preacher of his boyhood, that people take their opinions from their neighbors, and then he goes further. An independent verdict on "a fashion in clothes, or manners, or literature, or politics, or religion," he writes, is "a most rare thing--if it has indeed ever existed." Some readers will dismiss Twain as a cynic; others will call him simply right. Both answers are too easy. Twain is right about the force he describes, the need for approval, but wrong about its reach: conformity is strong and usually unnoticed, yet it breaks more easily than he admits, often when a single person disagrees. The difference matters, because a reader who believes independence is impossible has no reason to attempt it.
2Twain's first reason holds up. He argues that people change their minds without reasoning, and his hoopskirt example is exact: passers-by are "shocked," yet "Six months later everybody is reconciled." When he asks, "Was the acceptance reasoned out?", the answer is plainly no, since nobody in his example can say why the fashion became acceptable. Modern psychology supports him. In Solomon Asch's experiments in the early 1950s, college students judged which of three lines matched a fourth after several other people, who were secretly working for the experimenter, gave the same wrong answer. The students went along with the wrong majority on about a third of those trials, and about three-quarters went along at least once, although the right answer was plain to see.
3Twain's second reason, that people do not notice their own conformity, is also strong. Conformity, he writes, is usually "unconscious and not calculated." Asch reported that participants who conformed underestimated how often they had done so. That finding is a warning for every reader of this essay, including its writer: the feeling of thinking for oneself is not proof of it.
4Twain's defenders could press further. If students yielded on a question as simple as the length of a line, then opinions on what Twain calls "great political questions," which no one can check against a card, must be borrowed even more often, and Twain's "none but corn-pone opinions" would be exact. This counterclaim has real force, since questions of value leave the group's pull unopposed by any visible fact. Its limitation is that it stretches a laboratory result about strangers and lines to the whole of life, which the experiments did not test.
5The same experiments also point the other way. About a quarter of Asch's students never went along with the majority, and when one other person in the room gave the correct answer, conformity dropped sharply. Asch's subjects were male college students of one era, so the figures cannot be applied everywhere; still, they show that independence is not a myth but a habit that is easier with an ally. Twain himself proves the point: "I think Jerry was right, in the main," he writes, "but I think he did not go far enough." His essay disagrees with the teacher he admired.
6"Corn-pone Opinions," then, is best read not as proof that independent opinion is impossible but as an account of why it is hard. If, as Twain writes, "Self-approval is acquired mainly from the approval of other people," the remedy follows from his own diagnosis: seek the approval of people who respect disagreement, and be, for someone else, the one voice that makes independence easier.
SVHS lesson authors, Model essay: How Rare Is a First-Hand Opinion? (2026). Original passage written for this page.
A precise, knowledgeable claim
Compare three versions of the claim: "Twain has a point about conformity." "Twain is completely right: nobody thinks for themselves." And the model's sentence in paragraph 1.
Result: The first is too vague to argue with, and the second overstates what any evidence could show. The model's claim is precise because it splits Twain's argument in two: he is "right about the force he describes, the need for approval, but wrong about its reach." It is knowledgeable because it names the exact point in dispute (how often conformity breaks) and the writer has evidence on both sides of it.
Distinguishing the claim from alternate claims
How does paragraph 1 set the claim apart before stating it?
Result: It names two easy answers, "Some readers will dismiss Twain as a cynic; others will call him simply right," and rejects both ("Both answers are too easy") before stating a third position. A reader now knows what the essay is not arguing, so the claim cannot be mistaken for either extreme.
Developing a counterclaim fairly
In paragraph 4, how does the writer treat the view that Twain is exactly right?
Result: The writer states it at full strength, using the essay's own evidence ("If students yielded on a question as simple as the length of a line"), grants its strength ("This counterclaim has real force"), and then names its limitation: it "stretches a laboratory result about strangers and lines to the whole of life." The response in paragraph 5 also admits a limitation of the writer's own evidence: Asch's subjects "were male college students of one era."
Links that clarify relationships
Find the sentences that join the sections, and say which relationship each one shows.
Result: Each body paragraph opens with a sentence that names its job: "Twain's first reason holds up" links the claim to a reason; "Modern psychology supports him" links that reason to its evidence; "Twain's defenders could press further" turns to the counterclaim; "The same experiments also point the other way" links the counterclaim to the response. The semicolon and colon in paragraph 1 do similar work inside one sentence. Diagram 1 maps them.
Formal style, objective tone and the norms of literary analysis
What conventions does the model follow?
Result: It names the author in full, then by last name; puts the essay's title in quotation marks; describes the text in the present tense ("he writes"); fits each quotation into the writer's own sentence; and identifies the research it cites by researcher and date. The tone stays objective even when it disagrees: the writer grants Twain's "first reason holds up" and includes itself in the warning ("including its writer").
Guided Practice15 minutes
Pairs read the later Twain passages, which the model also quotes, and build an audience profile. Gloss an empress: probably Empress Eugénie of France, who was widely credited with making the hoopskirt fashionable in the 1850s; and the bloomer, a short skirt over loose trousers promoted by the American reformer Amelia Bloomer around 1851. The paragraphs are numbered.
1A new thing in costume appears--the flaring hoopskirt, for example--and the passers-by are shocked, and the irreverent laugh. Six months later everybody is reconciled; the fashion has established itself; it is admired, now, and no one laughs. Public opinion resented it before, public opinion accepts it now, and is happy in it. Why? Was the resentment reasoned out? Was the acceptance reasoned out? No. The instinct that moves to conformity did the work. It is our nature to conform; it is a force which not many can successfully resist. What is its seat? The inborn requirement of self-approval. We all have to bow to that; there are no exceptions. Even the woman who refuses from first to last to wear the hoopskirt comes under that law and is its slave; she could not wear the skirt and have her own approval; and that she must have, she cannot help herself. But as a rule our self-approval has its source in but one place and not elsewhere--the approval of other people. A person of vast consequences can introduce any kind of novelty in dress and the general world will presently adopt it--moved to do it, in the first place, by the natural instinct to passively yield to that vague something recognized as authority, and in the second place by the human instinct to train with the multitude and have its approval. An empress introduced the hoopskirt, and we know the result. A nobody introduced the bloomer, and we know the result. If Eve should come again, in her ripe renown, and reintroduce her quaint styles--well, we know what would happen. And we should be cruelly embarrassed, along at first.
[...]
2[...] Broadly speaking, there are none but corn-pone opinions. And broadly speaking, corn-pone stands for self-approval. Self-approval is acquired mainly from the approval of other people. The result is conformity. Sometimes conformity has a sordid business interest--the bread-and-butter interest--but not in most cases, I think. I think that in the majority of cases it is unconscious and not calculated; that it is born of the human being’s natural yearning to stand well with his fellows and have their inspiring approval and praise--a yearning which is commonly so strong and so insistent that it cannot be effectually resisted, and must have its way.
[...]
3Men think they think upon great political questions, and they do; but they think with their party, not independently; they read its literature, but not that of the other side; they arrive at convictions, but they are drawn from a partial view of the matter in hand and are of no particular value. They swarm with their party, they feel with their party, they are happy in their party’s approval; and where the party leads they will follow, whether for right and honor, or through blood and dirt and a mush of mutilated morals.
Mark Twain, Corn-pone Opinions, later passages (three excerpts, with cuts marked) (1923). Public domain (published 1923). Source text.
Profile the audience. With Diagram 2 covered, pairs write a four-row profile of the model essay's readers: what its readers already know, what worries them, what they value and what they are inclined to believe without evidence. Teacher note: push past "they are teenagers." A useful bias is the one the model names in paragraph 3. Pairs then uncover Diagram 2 and compare.
Find the move for each row. For each factor, pairs quote the sentence in the model that answers it. Teacher note: the one-sentence description of the line test answers knowledge level; paragraph 5 answers the concern and the value; paragraph 3 answers the bias.
Weigh the evidence both ways. Pairs choose one quotation from these passages that most helps the counterclaim in paragraph 4, and say what it cannot prove. Teacher note: paragraph 3's "they think with their party, not independently" helps, but it is Twain's opinion about political campaigns, not evidence that no one ever reasons.
Test for sufficiency. Pairs decide whether the model's evidence would still be enough if the Asch findings were removed. Teacher note: no. Twain's own examples show that conformity happens, but only the experiments show how often it breaks, which is the heart of the claim.
Independent Practice15 minutes
Each student revises the weak draft below into the opening and first body paragraph of a stronger argument. Use the five parts of the standard as the checklist: a claim a reader could disagree with, set apart from other claims; reasons tied to evidence that is relevant and sufficient; a counterclaim treated fairly; linking words that show relationships; a formal tone and the conventions of literary analysis; a conclusion that follows. Students annotate every change with the part (a-e) it serves. Quiz questions 13, 15, 16 and 17 use this draft.
1Twain Is Right About Everyone
2Mark Twain was totally right in "Corn-pone Opinions." Everybody copies everybody. Twain said people started liking the hoopskirt after six months. He also said "It is our nature to conform." That proves it. Also my friends all bought the same shoes last year, so that proves it too.
3Some people might disagree but they are just wrong. Nobody really thinks for themselves.
4Twain said we get our opinions from the people around us. This is why there are so many different political parties. People want to be liked. So they agree with their friends. This is the main reason and there are other reasons too.
5In conclusion, schools should ban phones, because social media makes conformity way worse.
SVHS lesson authors, Weak draft for revision: Twain Is Right About Everyone (2026). Original passage written for this page.
Closure10 minutes
Exit ticket: (1) Write the one sentence of your revision you are proudest of, and name the part of W.11-12.1 it serves. (2) Name one belief your readers probably hold without evidence, and one sentence you could write to anticipate it.
Teacher note on language: the Twain passages are quoted exactly. In paragraph 1 of the opening, Twain describes Jerry as a "young black man--a slave"; "gay" there has its older meaning, cheerful. Twain renders Jerry's speech in dialect spelling ("whar," "gits," "'pinions"), a convention of his time for representing the speech of enslaved Black people; discuss it as Twain's choice, and note that the essay treats Jerry as the thinker whose idea it builds on. "A man" means any person, as it did in Twain's day. The model essay describes Jerry as an enslaved preacher.
For homework, students plan and draft their own argument on a new question about the same essay, using both Twain passages: in paragraph 4 of the opening, Jerry's idea is that people conform on purpose, for their "bread and butter"; later, in paragraph 2 of the second passage, Twain says conformity is mostly "unconscious and not calculated." Which of them is closer to the truth?
Differentiation Strategies
For Struggling Students
Give a claim frame: "Twain is right that ___, but wrong that ___, because ___"
Give the audience profile with the first column filled in, so the student writes only the moves
Provide a bank of linking words sorted by relationship: claim to reason (because, since), reason to evidence (for example, as ... shows), claim to counterclaim (admittedly, critics could reply, even so)
Let the student revise only the weak draft's first paragraph before moving on
For Advanced Students
Write the counterclaim paragraph a second time for a different audience, a psychology teacher who knows the Asch studies well, and explain what changed
Find one sentence in the model essay whose reasoning you think is weakest, and rewrite it
Read the rest of Twain's essay and decide whether its ending strengthens or weakens the model essay's claim
Assessment Guidance
What to Look For
The grade 11-12 marks are knowledge and fairness. Strong claims name the exact point in dispute rather than a topic; weak ones agree or disagree with the whole text. Look for counterclaims stated at full strength with their best evidence, and for writers who admit a limitation of their own evidence; a counterclaim set up only to be knocked down does not meet part (b). Check that audience moves are real sentences in the draft, not a list in the margin. Watch for linking words that do not match the relationship ("for example" before a reason), a tone that turns sarcastic toward the other side, past tense for what the text says, and conclusions that do not grow out of the argument.
02
Classroom Activities
3 Activities
1
Know Your Reader
15 minGroups of 3
Each group rewrites the same short counterclaim paragraph for three different audiences and records what changed. The activity makes part (b)'s audience clause concrete: the same evidence needs different framing for readers with different knowledge, concerns, values and biases.
The Base Paragraph
"Some readers will say that the hoopskirt proves nothing about serious beliefs, since fashion is supposed to change. That objection is fair: a dress is not a creed. But Twain's point is about how the change happens, not what changes. His passers-by move from shock to acceptance in six months without a reason, and nothing in the example suggests that beliefs are immune to the same pull."
The Three Audience Cards
Ninth graders who have not read Twain and do not know what a hoopskirt is.
A history teacher who knows the 1850s well and doubts that an essay can prove anything about human nature.
Members of the school's debate team, who pride themselves on arguing positions they do not hold and think conformity is someone else's problem.
Procedure
Each group member takes one card and rewrites the paragraph for that audience in five minutes
Members read their versions aloud; the group lists every change and labels it K (knowledge level), C (concerns), V (values) or B (possible biases)
Groups decide which audience was hardest to write for and why
Teacher Notes
Card 1 calls for knowledge moves: define the hoopskirt, summarize Twain's claim. Card 2 calls for concern and value moves: grant that one example is not proof, and point to where the argument uses research. Card 3 calls for a bias move: show that people who believe they are independent can still conform. Accept any change the group can label and defend.
Discussion Questions
Which change did not alter the argument at all, only its framing? Is that honest?
When does anticipating a bias become flattering the reader?
2
Strength and Limit Ledger
15 minPairs
Pairs sort six evidence cards to the claim or the counterclaim of the model essay and record one strength and one limitation of each. Part (b) asks for the most relevant evidence for each side and for the strengths and limitations of both, so a writer must know what every piece of evidence can and cannot prove.
The Six Evidence Cards
Twain's hoopskirt paragraph: shock turns to acceptance in six months (second passage, paragraph 1).
In Asch's experiments, students went along with a wrong majority on about a third of the critical trials.
In the same experiments, about a quarter of the students never went along with the majority.
Twain on dinner tables (from a paragraph the lesson does not print): in England, the six or eight wine glasses once set at each place have dropped to three or four within twenty-five years.
An invented class survey: 19 of 24 students said they chose their phone brand mainly because their friends had it.
Twain on elections: people "swarm with their party, they feel with their party" (second passage, paragraph 3).
Procedure
Pairs place each card under Claim, Counterclaim or Both, and write one strength and one limitation on the ledger
Pairs star the single most relevant card for each side
Two pairs compare stars and settle one disagreement by pointing to what the claim actually says
Answer Key for the Teacher
1: both; vivid, but one example about fashion. 2: counterclaim, or both; measured, but about lines, not beliefs. 3: claim; the most relevant for the claim, since it shows conformity breaking, though the subjects were one group of male college students. 4: counterclaim, or both; a concrete change in manners with no reasoning behind it, but it is Twain's recollection, not a record. 5: counterclaim; close to students' lives, but invented here, self-reported and from one class, so it could never be sufficient alone. 6: counterclaim; relevant to politics, but it is Twain's opinion, not data. Accept other placements the pair can defend.
Discussion Questions
Which card would a skeptical reader attack first, and how would you defend it?
Card 5 is invented for practice. What would a real survey need before you could cite it?
3
Seams and Links
15 minPairs
Pairs repair a short argument whose linking words have been removed, then label each link by the relationship it shows. Part (c) asks for words, phrases and clauses as well as varied syntax, so pairs must use at least one link that is a whole clause or a sentence pattern, not only a single transition word.
The Paragraph with Gaps
"Twain's hoopskirt example still describes how fashion spreads online. [1] a style can go from strange to ordinary within weeks, and few people who adopt it can say why. [2] a sneaker that looks odd in January can look normal by March once enough accounts post it. [3] fashion is the easiest case for Twain, since clothes carry no moral weight. [4] the example shows the pattern his argument needs: a change of taste with no reasoning behind it."
Procedure
Pairs fill each gap and label it: claim to reason, reason to evidence, claim to counterclaim, or counterclaim to response
Pairs rewrite one gap as a clause or a colon instead of a single word
Pairs exchange with another pair and check that each link names the right relationship
Answer Key for the Teacher
[1] "The reason is that" or "After all," (claim to reason). [2] "For example," or "Consider how" (reason to evidence). [3] "Admittedly," or "A skeptic could reply that" (claim to counterclaim). [4] "Even so," or "Still," (counterclaim to response). A colon after "online" can replace gap 1 and turn two sentences into one.
Discussion Questions
Which gap had the most possible answers, and why?
What happens to a reader when a link names the wrong relationship, for example "therefore" before a counterclaim?
03
Diagrams & Visual Aids
2 diagrams
Diagram 1: The Model Essay's Organization
The six paragraphs of the model essay (T3) and the job of each. The sentence between two boxes is the opening of the next paragraph, which tells the reader how the new section relates to the last: claim to reason, reason to reason, claim to counterclaim, counterclaim to response, and argument to conclusion. The counterclaim box is shaded differently.
Diagram 2: Writing for These Readers
An audience profile for the model essay, whose readers are English 11 students who have read Twain's whole essay. Each row pairs one of the four factors in part (b) with the move the writer makes, and the paragraph where it happens. Pairs build a profile like this in Guided Practice and for their own homework audience.
04
Homework Assignment
~30 min
W.11-12.1 Homework: Jerry or Twain?
Directions: Your question: Who is closer to the truth about why people conform, Jerry, who says people conform on purpose to protect their "bread and butter" (opening, paragraph 4), or Twain, who says conformity is mostly "unconscious and not calculated" (second passage, paragraph 2)? Your readers are the members of the school's student council, many of whom have part-time jobs and have read only the two passages. Use both Twain passages, cited by passage and paragraph. You may add one fact from outside the essays if you can name its source.
Part 1: Claim and Audience (Problems 1-2)
Write your claim in one or two sentences. Make it precise enough that a reader could disagree, add one sentence that establishes why the question matters, and add one sentence that distinguishes your claim from at least one alternate or opposing claim (Jerry's, Twain's, or a claim that both are partly right).
Build an audience profile for the student council with four rows: knowledge level, concerns, values and possible biases. For each row, write what these readers bring and one sentence you will put in your argument to anticipate it.
Part 2: Organization and Counterclaim (Problems 3-4)
Outline your argument: claim, two reasons, the evidence for each reason, the counterclaim, and your response. For each reason, explain in one sentence why the evidence is relevant and whether it is sufficient, and explain why your order is logical.
Draft your counterclaim paragraph. State the strongest opposing claim with its most relevant evidence from the passages, name one strength and one limitation of that counterclaim, and name one limitation of your own evidence.
Part 3: Introduction, Conclusion and Revision (Problems 5-6)
Draft your introduction and your conclusion. The conclusion must follow from and support the argument you outlined.
Revise the draft for cohesion and style. Underline every link between sections and label it claim to reason, reason to evidence, or claim to counterclaim; use at least one clause or sentence pattern, not only a single word, as a link. Then fix any informal words, keep a formal and objective tone, and check the conventions of literary analysis: present tense for the text, the author named, quotations fitted into your sentences and cited.
Rubric
Criterion
Full Credit (2 pts)
Partial Credit (1 pt)
No Credit (0 pts)
Claim and Organization
Precise, knowledgeable claim with significance, distinguished from alternatives; logical order
Claim clear but vague or undistinguished, or order unclear
No arguable claim
Evidence and Reasoning
Relevant, sufficient evidence from both passages; reasoning valid; strengths and limitations of both sides named
Evidence relevant but thin, or limitations named for one side only
Little or no evidence, or reasoning that does not follow
Audience and Counterclaim
Counterclaim at full strength; all four audience factors anticipated in actual sentences
Counterclaim weakened, or two or three factors anticipated
No counterclaim or audience moves
Cohesion, Style and Conclusion
Links labeled and accurate, including a clause-level link; formal, objective tone; conventions followed; conclusion follows
Some links or conventions missing, or tone slips
Informal tone, few links, or no conclusion
05
Quiz: 20 Questions
Interactive, with answers
Instructions
Question 1 uses Twain's opening (T1) and questions 2, 18 and 19 use the model essay (T3), both in Direct Instruction; questions 13, 15, 16 and 17 use the weak draft (T4, in Independent Practice); questions 17 and 20 also use Twain's second passage (T2, in Guided Practice). Questions 3-12 and 14 give you what you need. Paragraphs are numbered. Your score updates as you answer, and Reset quiz clears everything.
Multiple choice: pick an option to check it. Short answer: write your answer, then reveal the model answer.
0 of 20 answered · 0 correct
Question 1 of 20 · Multiple Choice
Which of these claims about the opening of Twain's essay (T1) is the most precise and knowledgeable?
Answer: A
Choice A names a specific, arguable point and shows knowledge of the text: Jerry is enslaved, his sawing is "a pretense" that "kept his master from coming out," and his idea is that a man "cannot afford views which might interfere with his bread and butter." A reader could dispute what Twain means by the choice, which makes it a claim. Choice B names a topic, not a claim. Choice C is praise that no evidence in the text could test. Choice D is too vague to argue with.
Question 2 of 20 · Multiple Choice
Which sentence from paragraph 1 of the model essay establishes the significance of its claim?
Answer: D
Significance answers "so what?": this sentence says why the claim matters to a reader's own behavior. Choice A states the claim itself, not why it matters. Choice B names alternate claims. Choice C quotes Twain's claim, the text under analysis, not the writer's reason for caring.
Question 3 of 20 · Multiple Choice
A writer claims: "Twain overstates how rarely people think for themselves." Which sentence best distinguishes this claim from an alternate claim a reader might confuse it with?
Answer: C
A reader could mistake "Twain overstates" for the claim that conformity is rare; choice C rules that out and says exactly where the writer stands. Choice A adds background, not a distinction. Choice B is about the readers' taste. Choice D is an unsupported sweeping statement that also blurs the claim.
Question 4 of 20 · Multiple Choice
A student arguing that Twain's essay underrates independent thinkers wants to answer the strongest objection early. Which outline still sequences claim, counterclaim, reasons and evidence logically?
Answer: D
A counterclaim may come early if it is answered at once; the reasons then follow, each with its own evidence, and the conclusion comes last. Choice A concludes before the argument is made. Choice C gives evidence before the reader knows what it supports and leaves the counterclaim unanswered. Choice B separates the reasons from their evidence and never answers the counterclaim.
Question 5 of 20 · Multiple Choice
A writer arguing for a later school start time writes: "Opponents point out that a later dismissal would cut into practice time, a real cost for students who play sports. That cost falls on the players, while more morning sleep would reach every student, and moving some practices to Saturday mornings would shrink it further." What is the writer doing?
Answer: A
"A real cost" grants the counterclaim a strength; "falls on the players, while more morning sleep would reach every student" names its limitation; the Saturday plan answers it. Part (b) asks for exactly this fair treatment. Choice B ignores the first sentence, which states the objection. Choice C misreads a fair summary as an attack. Choice D ignores the response that follows the concession.
Question 6 of 20 · Multiple Choice
A writer arguing for a later school start time adds: "Sleep researchers use the term 'circadian rhythm' for the body's internal daily clock, which in teenagers tends to run later than in adults." Which audience factor does this sentence most clearly anticipate?
Answer: C
The sentence defines a term that readers may not know, so it anticipates their knowledge level. Choice A would appeal to what readers care about, such as health or fairness. Choice B would address a belief readers hold without evidence. Choice D would answer a worry, such as bus costs; the sentence says nothing about money.
Question 7 of 20 · Multiple Choice
The same writer adds: "Parents who work early shifts may worry about how younger children would get to school; under this plan, elementary schools would keep their current start times." Which audience factor does this sentence anticipate?
Answer: A
It names a practical worry some readers have and answers it, which anticipates their concerns. Choice B would explain a fact or term. Choice C would challenge an assumption readers hold without evidence. Choice D would appeal to a principle, such as fairness or health; the sentence answers a logistical problem instead.
Question 8 of 20 · Multiple Choice
A writer arguing that the school should keep its library open until 6 p.m. writes to the school board: "This board has long said that every student deserves a quiet place to study, whatever his or her home is like." Which audience factor does this sentence anticipate?
Answer: B
It appeals to a principle the readers already hold, equal access to a place to study, so it anticipates their values. Choice A would supply information the board lacks. Choice C would address something the board believes without evidence. Choice D would answer a worry about safety, which the sentence does not mention.
Question 9 of 20 · Multiple Choice
The library writer also writes: "It is easy to assume that only a few students would stay after school; last spring's sign-in sheets, however, show an average of 41 students a day after 3:30." Which audience factor does this sentence anticipate?
Answer: D
"It is easy to assume" names a belief the readers may hold without evidence and then tests it against data, so the sentence anticipates a possible bias. Choice A would appeal to a principle. Choice B would address money. Choice C would supply information about hours; the sentence corrects an assumption about demand instead. (The sign-in figures are invented for this question.)
Question 10 of 20 · Multiple Choice
Which word or phrase best fills the blank to show the relationship between a claim and its reason? "Twain's essay is more hopeful than it first appears, ___ its own author openly disagrees with the teacher he admired."
Answer: B
The second clause gives the reason for the claim in the first, and "because" names that relationship. Choice A signals evidence for a point already made, not the reason for a claim. Choice C signals a concession to the other side. Choice D signals a conclusion in the middle of a claim.
Question 11 of 20 · Multiple Choice
Which option best links a reason to its evidence? "Conformity often goes unnoticed by the people who conform. ___ Asch reported that participants who conformed underestimated how often they had done so."
Answer: C
The second sentence is evidence for the first, and "As his experiments showed" names that link while introducing the source. Choices A and B signal contrast, which would tell the reader the evidence works against the reason. Choice D signals a concession.
Question 12 of 20 · Multiple Choice
Which sentence best moves from a claim to a counterclaim while keeping an objective tone?
Answer: D
It introduces the opposing view fairly, crediting it to "a careful reader," and states its best version. Choices A and B insult the other side instead of stating its case, which breaks the objective tone required by part (d). Choice C uses "Therefore" to dismiss a counterclaim the essay has not yet stated.
Question 13 of 20 · Multiple Choice
The weak draft (T4) begins: "Mark Twain was totally right in 'Corn-pone Opinions.' Everybody copies everybody." Which revision best establishes a formal style and objective tone?
Answer: B
It uses formal words, the present tense for what the text says, and a measured claim ("largely support") instead of an absolute one. Choices A and C keep informal words ("so right," "honestly," "awesome," "basically sheep"). Choice D keeps "totally" and announces the essay's plan instead of making a claim.
Question 14 of 20 · Multiple Choice
Which sentence follows the conventions of writing about a literary text?
Answer: A
It refers to the author by last name, uses the present tense for what the text argues, and fits an exact quotation into the writer's sentence. Choice B uses the first name and the past tense. Choice C calls the essay a book and leaves the title without quotation marks. Choice D shifts into the writer's own unsupported judgment ("which they were").
Question 15 of 20 · Short Answer
The weak draft (T4) ends: "In conclusion, schools should ban phones, because social media makes conformity way worse." Explain why this does not meet part (e) of W.11-12.1, then write a better concluding sentence for the draft.
Model answer: The sentence introduces a new topic and a new claim, a phone ban, that the draft never argued, so it does not follow from or support the argument about Twain; "way worse" is also informal. Better: "Twain's hoopskirt shows how quickly people accept what they first mocked, and that pattern, more than any single example, is the strongest support for his claim that most opinions are borrowed." Rubric: 2 points for naming the new topic as the problem and writing a conclusion that follows from the draft's claim; 1 point for one of the two; 0 points otherwise.
Question 16 of 20 · Short Answer
The weak draft offers this evidence: "Also my friends all bought the same shoes last year, so that proves it too." Is the evidence relevant and sufficient, and is the reasoning valid? Explain.
Model answer: It is loosely relevant, since it is an example of people making the same choice, but it is not sufficient: one group of friends cannot show that "Everybody copies everybody." The reasoning is also invalid, because the friends may have chosen the same shoes for other reasons (price, a sale, the same store), so the example does not prove they copied one another. "Proves" claims far more than one anecdote can show. Rubric: 2 points for judging relevance and sufficiency separately and naming the reasoning flaw; 1 point for one of these; 0 points otherwise.
Question 17 of 20 · Short Answer
The weak draft says: "Twain said we get our opinions from the people around us. This is why there are so many different political parties." What is wrong with the reasoning, and how could the writer use Twain's paragraph on parties (second passage, paragraph 3) instead?
Model answer: The conclusion does not follow: if everyone copied everyone, you might expect fewer opinions, not "so many different political parties." The writer needs the link Twain himself gives, that people "think with their party, not independently," which explains why each party's members agree with one another even though the parties differ. A better sentence: "Twain argues that people 'swarm with their party,' so conformity works inside groups, which is why rival parties can each be united." Rubric: 2 points for naming the gap in the reasoning and using the paragraph to repair it; 1 point for one; 0 points otherwise.
Question 18 of 20 · Short Answer
In paragraph 5 of the model essay, the writer says "Twain himself proves the point," because Twain disagrees with Jerry. Name one limitation of this evidence and write one sentence the writer could add to admit it without giving up the claim.
Model answer: One case cannot show how common independence is, and "proves" claims too much: Twain was a famous, well-read writer, not a typical person, and disagreeing with one teacher is not the same as holding opinions free of every outside influence. Added sentence: "One writer's disagreement with his teacher is only a single case, but it shows that the habit Twain calls nearly extinct was alive in Twain himself." Rubric: 2 points for a real limitation of this evidence and a sentence that admits it while keeping the claim; 1 point for one of the two; 0 points otherwise.
Question 19 of 20 · Short Answer
Explain how paragraph 6 of the model essay follows from and supports the argument. Quote one phrase that connects it to an earlier paragraph.
Model answer: The conclusion restates the claim as a reading of Twain, "not as proof that independent opinion is impossible but as an account of why it is hard," which is the qualified position of paragraph 1. Its remedy, to "seek the approval of people who respect disagreement," grows from paragraph 5's finding that conformity drops when one other person disagrees, and it uses Twain's own words about self-approval, so it adds no new topic. Rubric: 2 points for showing the link to the claim and to earlier evidence with a quotation; 1 point for one link; 0 points otherwise.
Question 20 of 20 · Short Answer
A new question: Twain writes that "An empress introduced the hoopskirt, and we know the result. A nobody introduced the bloomer, and we know the result" (second passage, paragraph 1). Does a person's rank still decide whether a new idea or style spreads? Write a precise claim, one sentence that establishes its significance, and one sentence that distinguishes it from an alternate claim.
Model answer: Claim: "Twain's contrast between the empress and the 'nobody' still holds for styles, which spread fastest from people who are already famous, but it holds less for useful ideas, which can spread from an unknown person when others find them worth repeating." Significance: "If rank still decides what spreads, readers should ask who stands behind a trend before they judge it on its merits." Distinction: "This differs from the view that anyone can now start a trend on equal terms; attention still goes first to people who already have it." Rubric: 2 points for a precise, arguable claim, a real statement of significance and a clearly different alternate claim; 1 point if one is missing or vague; 0 points otherwise.
0 of 20 answered · 0 correct
06
Frequently Asked Questions
10 Questions
What does W.11-12.1 mean?
It means students in grades 11-12 write arguments that analyze substantive topics or texts, supporting their claims with valid reasoning and relevant, sufficient evidence. Its five parts cover the claim and organization (a), fair development of claims and counterclaims for a specific audience (b), linking language (c), formal style and discipline conventions (d) and the conclusion (e).
How is W.11-12.1 different from W.9-10.1?
The structure is the same, but the demands rise. Claims must be knowledgeable as well as precise, and their significance must be established; counterclaims must be developed "fairly and thoroughly" with the most relevant evidence; and the writer anticipates the audience's values and possible biases as well as its knowledge level and concerns. Part (c) also adds varied syntax and cohesion.
What makes a claim "knowledgeable"?
A knowledgeable claim shows that the writer understands the topic well enough to name the exact point in dispute. "Twain has a point" is a topic; "Twain is right about the force he describes but wrong about its reach" shows the writer knows where the argument can be tested.
What does "establish the significance of the claim" mean?
It means telling readers why the claim matters: what follows if it is true, or what a reader might do or believe differently. One sentence is often enough, as long as it answers "so what?" rather than repeating the claim.
How many counterclaims does an argument need?
The standard does not set a number. What it asks is that counterclaims be developed fairly and thoroughly, with their strongest evidence and with both strengths and limitations. One counterclaim developed at full strength usually meets the standard better than three dismissed in a sentence each.
What are the audience's "possible biases"?
They are beliefs or leanings the readers bring without evidence, which may make them accept or reject an argument too quickly. Anticipating a bias does not mean flattering it; it means naming it and giving the evidence that tests it, as the model essay does when it notes that people who conform underestimate how often they do.
What does "the norms and conventions of the discipline" mean in an English class?
In literary analysis it usually means naming the author and title correctly, using the present tense for what a text says, fitting quotations into your own sentences and citing them, and keeping your own opinions tied to evidence. In history or science the conventions differ, which is why W.11-12.1 has a parallel standard for those subjects, WHST.11-12.1.
Can students use outside research in an argument about a text?
Yes, when it is relevant and named. The model essay uses Solomon Asch's conformity experiments because Twain's claim is partly about human behavior, which research can test. The research has to answer the argument's actual question, and its limits should be stated.
Is it all right to use "I" in a formal argument?
Many teachers allow it sparingly, for example to state the claim, and some ask students to avoid it; follow your course's convention. Part (d) asks for a formal style and objective tone, which depends more on measured claims and fair treatment of the other side than on whether the pronoun appears.
How is W.11-12.1 assessed?
Usually through a timed or extended argument essay scored with a rubric for claim, evidence, organization, language and conventions. In class, the clearest evidence is a full draft in which each part of the standard can be pointed to: the claim and its significance, a fairly developed counterclaim, audience moves, labeled links and a conclusion that follows.
07
Related Standards
5 standards
These standards connect to W.11-12.1: prerequisites to review first, parallel standards at the same level, and next steps that build on it.
Before this lesson
W.9-10.1Prerequisite
Write arguments with precise claims, fair counterclaims and relevant, sufficient evidence
