English K–12

Kenneth – Hello, and welcome to cooking with Kenneth!

Mahdi – [pointing to raspberries] Raspberry should go in the muffin mix.

Erin – No way

Mahdi – Yes way!

Erin – No!

Mahdi – Yes!

Erin – Ugh!

Kenneth – Stop arguing! [freeze on Erin and Mahdi fighting]

Kenneth – I hate arguments don't you? They're always so angry and never really get anywhere. [paper plane flies in, to land in front of Kenneth]

Audience – Ooh!

Kenneth – Ah! [reads the message on the paper plane] They do get somewhere if you present your views in a sensible, and persuasive manner.

Audience – Aah! Ah! [another paper plane flies in]

Kenneth – [reads the message on the paper plane] Arguments can use lots of ways to get someone to accept your idea or opinion.

Audience – Ooh!

Kenneth – Hmm. Let's see if we can turn Erin and Marty's disagreement into this kind of argument.

Erin – I'll show you where you can put your raspberries.

Kenneth – Marty, why do you think raspberries belong in the muffin mix?

Mahdi – Because everyone knows they're juicy, they explode on the tongue, and they go into muffins.

Kenneth – Marty has started his argument by making a claim.

Audience – Ooh!

Erin – Everyone does not know that. That's just your opinion and you're exaggerating.

Audience – Aah!

Mahdi – Oh yeah, well I've just surveyed my whole family via text and they all say raspberries should definitely go into the muffin mix.

Audience – Ooh!

Kenneth – Now, Marty's trying to persuade Erin by using statistics.

Erin – Your whole family. Does that include your dog?

Kenneth – Boom, what a burn!

Erin – Well, I've done some research online, and found Australia's largest bakery sells three times more chocolate muffins as raspberry muffins.

Audience – Ooh!

Kenneth – Erin's got research to support her argument.

Research smesearch, I don't care. raspberry muffins are better.

Erin – It's not really about if they're better, we're making them for our cooking show audience.

Erin – So it's about if raspberry muffins are more popular, which they're not. And that's my argument.

Mahdi – Fine, only one way to settle this. Let's both make raspberry muffins, and chocolate muffins. And see which ones the audience like the most.

Erin – Game on.

[Fast forward as Erin and Mahdi make muffins, then reveal muffins from beneath the table. Hands appear. No-one takes either of the muffins offered]

Kenneth – Oh, doesn't look like anyone won the argument. Arguments don't always have to have a winner. They're a way of debating and testing the strength of ideas. Arguments are powerful things! [ A paper plane flies in to land in front of Kenneth] Wah! What now, plane thrower?

Audience – laughter

Kenneth – Arguments are powerful things when structured properly and they can take different forms. They may be a review, a poem, a story, a documentary, poster, speech, or an image! Hmm, interesting. Maybe I should structure an argument now to persuade this plane thrower to stop throwing planes at me. The reason for this, is it's annoying, and it's damaging my delicate epidermis.

End of transcript