Writing Workshop 1
C2 · Writing · Rhetoric and Persuasion
Model answer · Task 1
✍️ ━━━━ MODEL ANSWER ━━━━ ✍️
Frame 1 — progress: The city’s new congestion charge has begun to reclaim the centre for people. In its first six months, traffic has fallen by a fifth, buses run on time and the air on the main shopping street is measurably cleaner. Cafés have spread onto pavements that were once lanes of idling cars.
Frame 2 — burden: The city’s new congestion charge has placed another cost on working families. In its first six months, traffic has fallen by a fifth, but many shift workers, carers and small traders now pay a daily fee simply to do their jobs, while those who can afford it drive on.
⋯ (the complete model answer is in the teacher’s guide)
Model answer · Task 2
✍️ ━━━━ MODEL ESSAY · OPENING ━━━━ ✍️
The mayor’s speech on the harbour redevelopment was, by any standard, an accomplished piece of rhetoric. Its opening, which linked three generations of the town’s families to the harbour’s history, created a powerful sense of shared ownership, and her closing line — delivered slowly, with a deliberate pause before “together” — left the audience in no doubt about what she was asking of them.
Rhetorical skill, however, is not the same as a sound argument. The speech’s central claim rested on a false dilemma: either we accept this plan, or the harbour falls into ruin. This framing tacitly presupposes that no alternative proposal exists, yet at least two community groups have submitted plans of their own. One might reasonably construe “There is no third way” less as a description of reality than as an attempt to close a debate that has barely begun.
⋯ (the complete model answer is in the teacher’s guide)
Sample questions (2 questions)
- Your turn: choose a current issue and write two short paragraphs (80–110 words each) describing it with two different frames. Then write a third paragraph (60–90 words) analysing what each frame includes and excludes.
- Your turn: write a critical analysis (250–320 words) of the mayor’s speech for a local newspaper. Acknowledge its strengths, expose its weaknesses and suggest what an honest version would need.
Answers and hints from Migo appear when you do it online.