This in-depth study explores problem areas of Hong Kong secondary and university students in writing narrative and argumentative compositions on two different themes. Subjects were 40 university English majors, 40 form four and 40 form six secondary students. The research indicates that the students at these grade levels experienced difficulty in handling the argumentative mode at the syntactic and rhetorical levels. The investigation concludes that students of English as a foreign language have not been taught the necessary rhetorical skills to write argumentative compositions and suggests that this useful academic skill be consciously taught in the classroom. A description of the procedures, tasks, and results of the study as well as statistical tables and figures are included. (TR)