Amy Crane

R546
Dr. John Arthos
4 July, 2019

Module 6
Weekly Lesson Plan

Title​: ​Clarification and Justification of a Claim

Estimated Time:​ ​Two ​45-minute class periods
Subject Area​: P155
Grade Level​: ​11th and ​12​th
Materials Needed​:
● iPads
● List of sensational news headlines
● access to Noteability App

Prerequisite Work​: ​Create list of sensational news headlines. Students should have chosen 3
topics they are considering for the Sympathetic Perspectives speech.

Rationale: ​Students often have difficulty choosing topics. Either they choose something they
feel they can impress the teacher with, or they go with something cliche because they can’t
think of anything better, or they go with something they’ve written about before to save
themself time. I am always trying to get them to not only choose a topic they care about, but
that their fellow classmates will be affected by as well. Sometimes they are passionate about
the topic, but their research and support is dry. After reading “Rhetoric of Reason: Writing the
Attractions of Argument” by Crosswhite and “Pathos” by Kasteley, I was inspired by some new
ideas. ​I believe this lesson will work directly with choosing topics for their Sympathetic
Perspectives speeches. I want them to learn a better technique right off the bat.

Lesson Goal​(s)​:
Students choose topics that are not only relevant, but that move them.
Students will learn more effective ways to research their topics.
Students will learn to affect their audience with their claim and support.

Specific Outcome​: I want students to learn to think outside of the box with their topics and not
just consider the bare bones of an issue. As Crosswhite states, “support for a claim doesn’t just
emerge from nowhere; it is elicited by another speech act...a justification of a claim is a
response to some calling for the claim into question.” I want students to learn to ask the right
questions. I also want students to not be so hung up on the fact that they are presenting in the
 four walls of a classroom, but to consider that their topics are affecting people within and
possibly even without those walls. As Kasteley said, “the members of that audience may have
different feelings or conflicting feelings, or confused feelings about a particular proposed
action...the rhetor can enable an audience to share a common feeling and achieve, at least
temporarily, an effective identity.” I also want students to feel they can be more passionate
about their topics and not concentrate only on the logos surrounding an issue because it is for a
grade. I want them to break through the academic barrier and learn that information can
contain emotions too. As Kasteley pointed out, “emotions are neither obstacles to an
uncorrupted reasoning nor instances of irrationality that need to be brought under the control
of reason. Rather, they form part of a complex liminal mode of human response that plays a
crucial role in how we understand and act in the world.”

Activity Instructions​:
DAY ONE
● BELL RINGER: Project the sensational headlines on the board (or post them in Google
Classroom, or have a handout, whichever works best for you). Just tell the students to read them,
nothing more.
● Break students into groups and have each group choose 2-3 headlines that stood out to them the
most. Have them write down questions and comments that they automatically had as a reaction
to the headline. It is key that they not do any research on the headline, just write down initial
responses.
● Come back as a class and discuss.
● Assign writing sensational headlines for each of their topic ideas to use in class tomorrow.
DAY TWO
● BELL RINGER: Share a new Google Doc with students and project it on the board (or just have
them have it open on their iPads if you can’t project). Have students type in their topic specific
sensational headlines.
● Break students into groups, again, and have each group discuss headlines that stand out. Just like
yesterday have them write down immediate reaction questions and comments. If the group
chooses one of your topics you can share questions you still have to research or just be a silent
observer for that one.
● Come back as a class an discuss. Make a note that if no groups in the class mentioned a headline
or two, those might not be great topics to continue on with. If they’re not interesting as a
sensational headline, maybe they need work. Also point out that the questions that were asked
and the comments that were made are the sort of things the audience is interested in about the
topic, therefore should be used in their research.
● Assign writing a claim as homework (they can write one for each topic they are still considering
or, hopefully, they’ve been able to narrow down which was most successful with their audience
based on interest). Tell them they are to base it off of the questions and ideas brought forth from
this exercise.

Student Assessment​: Discussions generated from the bell ringers should be good indicators
that the students are engaged and on the right track. Collecting the sensational headlines the
students wrote on their topics can be assessed as well as their claim(s). Teacher can also ask
for groups to turn in a shared Google doc of their group work containing questions and
comments.

Follow-up: ​Going forward working on research and support, the teacher should be able to
assess if the student is applying the principles discussed in class in their speech preparation.

Resources:
Crosswhite, James, Rhetoric of Reason: Writing & the Attractions of ArgumentPreview the
document(Madison: U of Wisconsin, 1996).

Henneke, (2016). 47 Headline Examples: Steal These Nifty Formulas From Popular Blogs.
​ ccessed July 10, 2019 at:
Enchanting Marketing. A
https://www.enchantingmarketing.com/headline-formulas/

Kasteley, James, “PathosPreview the document,” A Companion to Rhetoric and Rhetorical

Criticism, eds. Walter Jost and Wendy Olmsted (Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2004), 221-37.

Kilgo, Danielle K., and Santa, Vinicio (2016). Six things you didn’t know about headline writing:
Sensationalistic form in viral news content from traditional and digitally native news
organizations. ​The Official Journal of the International Symposium on Online Journalism.​ Vol. 6:
Is. 1. Accessed July 10, 2019 at:
https://isojjournal.wordpress.com/2016/04/14/six-things-you-didnt-know-about-headline-writi
ng-sensational-form-in-viral-news-of-traditional-and-digitally-native-news-organizations/

Ludlow, Lynn. (Fall 1988). Headlines: the unappreciated art. ​ETC: a Review of General
Semantics.​ Voc 45. No. 3. p 236-245.

Warner, Andrew (May 2019). 36 outrageous headlines you can’t help but click. ​Smart Blogger​.
Accessed July 10, 2019 at: ​https://smartblogger.com/outrageous-headlines/