When you think of Mister Rogers, what words come to mind?
Kind? Yes.
Nurturing? Of course.
Master of debate? Wait…what?
You gotta pity the Class of 2017. This spring, juniors will be hit with a triple-whammy – the timed essay of the EAP (it’s a California thing), Common Core SBAC testing, and the premiere of the new SAT in March. Yeah, these kids will be at the forefront of some high-stakes testing and you know what they say about life on the cutting edge – it often makes you bleed. Continue reading
We all know that teens love to argue. Give ‘em the right topic and the room’s temperature will rise as the debate quickly gets heated. The trick, though, is to help them clarify their thinking, move beyond emotion, and spot the difference between logical and illogical reasoning. In the world of rhetoric, speakers and writers […]
Good ol’ Aristotle was right. If students use all three of the tools of rhetoric he identified – ethos, pathos, and logos – they’ll win any argument. Lecturing about these rhetorical tools is fine, but it’s even better for students to see how these same tools are used today by writers and speakers.
Take, for instance, Steve Jobs. No matter whether you view Jobs as a hero or villain, Continue reading
