Persuasion versus deliberation: discourse patterns in children’s argumentative dialogues

This study investigated the effects of discourse goals on argumentative dialogues among Chinese fourth-grade elementary students, focusing on four controversial topics in the Morality and Law subject. Following a quasi-experimental design, five classes (n = 168) were assigned to one of two discourse goal conditions: Persuasion Dialogue (PD) or Deliberation Dialogue (DD). For each intervention topic, PD and DD condition students participated in two sessions of dyadic dialogues. The findings revealed distinct advantages associated with each discourse goal: while DD condition dialogues incorporated both competitive and collaborative talk, PD condition dialogues remained primarily competitive. However, PD condition dyads demonstrated enhanced competence in making direct counterarguments and in using evidence to bear on claims, and these argumentation skills were effectively transferred to postdialogue individual expository writing. Persuasion—a goal more familiar to children—may thus serve as a productive starting point for developing foundational argumentation skills. Over time, teachers could introduce the deliberation goal or alternate between the two goals, enabling students to benefit from the distinctive strengths of different discourse goals.