Check your own K and C
Your marked draft. Go through and check every comma against its ordering, and every conditional against the type of the chain it belongs to.
Count the disagreements. Written work usually has far fewer than speech — that is the number to remember.
Six things from your four minutes. Match each to what happens to it on the page.
A finished piece
If I Could Change One Law · 232 words
I would make it illegal to advertise gambling. Not restrict it — ban it, the way tobacco advertising was banned, and for the same reason.
Around a hundred thousand people in this country are problem gamblers, and the number under twenty-five has doubled in a decade. If the advertising had no effect, the industry would not spend nine hundred million a year on it.
The obvious objection is that people would gamble anyway, and that is fair up to a point. What it misses is that the question was never whether, but how much and how young. Even if the total number of gamblers stayed exactly the same, I would count it a success if the average age went up by five years.
The cost is real. If the ban went through, about a third of lower-league clubs would lose their main sponsor, and some would not replace it. In two seasons a handful would drop a division. I am not going to pretend otherwise, and I would still do it.
As long as the ban covers apps and streams and not only billboards, it works. Otherwise you have simply moved the same money onto a smaller screen, where it is harder to see and easier to click.
Either way we would learn something we do not currently know, which is whether the advertising was ever doing what the industry says it does.
Four questions about the construction of the piece.
1. Paragraph two gives a number before any argument. Why there?
2. Paragraph four names a real cost and then refuses to change position. What does that buy?
3. Count the conditionals in the piece. Are they all the same type?
4. The last paragraph does not claim the change would work. What does it claim?
Six paragraphs, six jobs
The shape
| Paragraph | Job | Words |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | The change, in one sentence, plus what it is not | 20–30 |
| 2 | The scale, with a number, plus one conditional that uses it | 35–45 |
| 3 | The objection, conceded in full, then answered with even if | 55–70 |
| 4 | The real cost, named, and the refusal to change position | 45–55 |
| 5 | The requirement, with as long as and otherwise | 35–45 |
| 6 | Close both branches with either way | 20–30 |
Six sentences from a different piece, out of order. Put them into the shape.
- As long as the definition of habitable is written by somebody other than the owner, it works.
- There are more empty homes in this city than there are households on the waiting list, which is not a housing shortage, it is a distribution problem.
- Either way we would find out how many of those empty houses are empty by accident and how many are empty on purpose.
- I would make it illegal for a landlord to leave a habitable property empty for more than a year.
- Even if a fifth of those owners sold up and left the market entirely, the stock would still be occupied by somebody.
- The obvious objection is that people should be able to do what they like with what they own, and that is not a stupid position.
Two rules the model obeys.
The longest paragraph is the objection. If the strongest thing against your position gets three lines and your own case gets fifteen, the reader knows you have not taken it seriously.
Every chain stays in one type. The piece moves between types across paragraphs and never inside one, which is exactly the discipline that speech loses at the third link.
Before you write it
The paragraph the whole piece turns on. One to four words per gap.
The obvious objection is that people find another way, and that is fair up to a point. What it misses is that the question never whether, but how many and how easily. the total stayed exactly where it is, I count it a success if the average age went up by five years. And the figures went the other way, I would want to know that too, because at the moment nobody knows.
Six sentences from first drafts. Fix each now.
1. If they would ban it, the industry would collapse.
2. I would move, if the law changed.
3. Even if it would be expensive, it is worth doing.
4. Unless they don’t enforce it, nothing changes.
5. About seventy per cent of people agree with me. — invented figure
6. If the law changed, everything will be better.
Write it
Task card · Writing · Individual · 16 minutes
Your law, as an opinion piece. This is what goes into your portfolio.
Six paragraphs, about 230 words.
- Paragraph 1: the change, in one sentence, and what it is not.
- Paragraph 2: the scale. Use a number you can cite, or say you cannot.
- Paragraph 3: the objection in full, then even if. This is the longest paragraph.
- Paragraph 4: a real cost, named, and your refusal to change position.
- Paragraph 5: as long as and otherwise. Paragraph 6: either way.
- Every chain in one type. Commas only where the if-clause comes first. Word count at the bottom.
Write straight through, then audit. Twelve minutes writing, four minutes checking two things only: every comma against its ordering, and every chain against its type.
Task card · Audit · Pairs · 7 minutes
Swap. You are a reader who disagrees with this position.
Hand back a marked page and one spoken sentence: the objection they did not answer.
- Mark every conditional 0, 1 or 2. Circle any place the type changes inside a chain.
- Check every comma against its ordering.
- Underline any number. Ask whether the writer could cite it.
- Count the lines given to the objection against the lines given to their own case.
What the drafts did
Five sentences from drafts. Fix each, then check your own page.
1. If the government would act, this would be solved.
2. If they raised the tax, revenue will go up.
3. Prices would fall, if supply increased.
4. Even if it would take years, I would support it.
5. Everyone knows this is the right thing to do.
What goes home
Two questions about your own draft.
1. Your objection paragraph is three lines and your own case is fifteen. What does a reader conclude?
2. You used a number you cannot cite. What is the risk?
Before next lesson. Rewrite it once from the marked page and bring the clean version on paper.
Next lesson you hand it in and defend the position out loud against somebody who has been told to disagree with you.