I provided Emma with a thorough review on her rhetorical terms by allowing her first to review their respective definitions and then by having her read an article and identify 10 of the terms in context. Emma knows the denotative definition of each of her rhetorical terms, but she has trouble identifying them in her readings. This exercise will strengthen her ability and application of rhetorical devices to real life situations and speeches. She successfully identified and explained the use of several rhet. terms in class, and she was assigned the rest for homework.
Emma was given the results of her take home multiple choice essay today. Her practice test indicates that she struggles discerning the meaning of works that are written in very formal, archaic language, so today we practiced how she can take a work's sentences and "trim the fat" to get the "meat" of the content and work on its meaning. I supported her judgements, but most of the commentary of today's practice came from Emma herself, and she did a good job applying her previous knowledge to the task at hand. Emma was assigned the rest of the test for homework, and we began doing further research on her prospective college choices.
Emma is getting stronger in her awareness of rhetorical devices and applying those devices to her reading. To further this progress, Emma has partaken of various assignments that cause her to recall the list of 50+ terms that we have studied and exam them in context. Today, she was given a 2012 AP Rhetorical essay topic and asked to apply at least three of her rhetorical terms to the article. She chose to write about the rhetorical mode argumentation and intermixed juxtaposition into her analysis of that term, she also wrote about logos, and example. Her essay writing skills are coming along nicely, and I am very proud of the progress Emma has made this year.
