Blog #8: Claim, Evidence, and Warrant

Due: Bring a rough draft to class on Friday, March 15
Post your final blog by Monday, March 18
Minimum words: 500
Minimum links or evidence: 3

Note: This blog entry is worth more than the traditional 25 point blog entry. You will be evaluated by more than one person, including members of the Journalism 2 class at Buffalo High School.

For the past few weeks, we've been talking about Claim, Evidence, and Warrant as a way of presenting an argument. If you're totally baffled by this, check out this helpful site that will walk you through it. Also, this page may be even more helpful with examples.

We're pretty awesome at creating arguable claims, and we're starting to get great at Evidence. Warrant is giving us a headache.

Warrant is the "So what?" It explains why your evidence is important and how your evidence connects to your claim. It makes a claim convincing.

Your task? It's easy.

Choose a topic. It could be the same as your Satire topic, something that can help you with your nonfiction project, or just something you're interested in. Then, you get to engage it with informational writing using Claim - Evidence - Warrant.

1. In the first paragraph, make a clear, strong, and arguable claim that you actually believe. Preview a couple of things you'll argue or support. 
1. Claims of policy or solution.
2. Claims of fact or definition.
3. Claims of value or worth.
4. Claims of cause and effect. 


2. Provide valid evidence for your claim from authoritative sources and link to that evidence. Try to make a paragraph for each piece of evidence or pillar for your support. If you are bringing in evidence that can be linked to, turn your text into a link. Use signaling phrases for bringing in evidence like
1. According to _________, 
2. In a study done by _________,
3. Jenna Smith, a researcher at the University of Minnesota, discovered that _________
4. A 2019 survey of over 80,000 American teenagers by the Pew Internet and American Life Project revealed that ______________.


3. Provide warrant with each piece of evidence that explains for your reader why the evidence you're using is valid and how it connects to your claim. 


4. Anticipate a counter-claim and briefly argue against it, explaining how your argument is better through evidence and warrant.
5. Provide a strong conclusion that reiterates your claim and leaves the reader with a path to follow. 

I ask that you make a claim that you actually believe in or one that you actually can support. Remember that an arguable claim is one that can be debated, so go ahead and pick something that not everyone agrees with you about.

Your writing should be polished and your evidence should be sound. You should put emphasis on proofreading your entry and work toward having a clear and audience-friendly final draft.

Need help? Try it first!