Powerful orators make their messages compelling with a combination of factors. Learn how to be an inspirational speaker with a reading assessment activity that presents a list of persuasive speaking techniques, as well as two...

Young orators demonstrate what they have learned about persuasion and persuasive devices throughout the unit by analyzing a persuasive speech and then crafting their persuasive essays. Class members engage in a role-play exercise, use...

A speaker, a message, an audience. After analyzing these elements in Queen Elizabeth's speech to the troops at Tilbury, groups analyze how other speakers use an awareness of events, and their audience to craft their arguments....

Discuss classical appeals of rhetoric through the speeches of Winston Churchill and FDR. Learners read, annotate, and analyze the speeches by the men before using a graphic organizer to track the use of ethos, pathos, and logos. 

High schoolers examine the four major types of speeches: informative, demonstrative, persuasive, and extemporaneous. Groups then select one type and craft and share a presentation highlighting this format's characteristics. Finally,...

How do you assess whether pupils have mastered certain concepts and skills? Designing a performance task that asks learners to demonstrate their skills and providing writers with a rubric that identifies these skills and provides...

What's the difference between a position speech and a position paper? Scholars use a rubric to analyze a model essay about Michael Pollan's food chains to understand what makes them unique. Additionally, pupils create anchor charts...

What rights are guaranteed to students? Do they align with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which was approved by the United Nations in 1948? Middle and high schoolers present persuasive arguments about the rights they believe...

Feeling high is not the only side effect of abusing prescription opioids. Middle and high schoolers learn more about specific painkillers, including Fentanyl, Oxycodone, and Clonazepam, as well as their common brand names and extensive...

Introduce your classes to the Art of Rhetoric with a lesson that focuses on Aristotle's persuasive appeals and how they have been used, both ethically and unethically, to influence opinion.

A reading of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech launches a study of rhetorical devices such as hyperbole, allusion, metaphor, simile, personification, connotative language and parallel structure. Class members then...

With the focus on 21st century skills it is even more important that all teachers incorporate listening and speaking activities into their curriculum. Here's a packet of practical ideas appropriate for any classroom.

"Advertising has no impact on whether people buy something." "Looting is morally permissible during national disasters and emergencies." "Gay teenagers should be allowed to take dates to the prom." Considering a class debate? Check out...

Class members choose a current social, political, environmental, or economic problem presented in Tyson Miller's Dream of a Nation: Inspiring Ideas for a Better America, research this problem and a variety of suggested solutions, before...

Celebrate April's National Poetry Month or enrich a poetry unit with a wealth of language arts material. Class members develop an oral interpretation of a poem and/or develop a podcast interview with a poet. 

Twelfth graders identify and analyze examples of rhetorical devices as valid or invalid inferences. In this text analysis lesson, 12th graders research a controversial topic in teams and identify rhetorical devices for the topic....

In a mock senate hearing regarding the development of ethanol as a fuel source, each person in the class is assigned a role to play and must uphold the stance of their character. Once the senate hearing is complete, each person writes a...

Young scholars present genres to the class.

Eleventh graders determine, evaluate, and use resources that are most appropriate and readily available for investigating a particular question or topic. Examples include knowledgeable people, field trips, prefaces, appendices,...