Home Teaching Resources Composition Archive CO150 2009-2010 Syllabus Wednesday, September 16

Wednesday, September 16

Day 10 (Wednesday, September 16th)

Day 10 (Wednesday, September 16)

Lesson Objectives

Students will

• Be able to discuss the rhetorical situation of a film,
• be introduced to Assignment 2: Blog Writing: Opening the Conversation
• Continue learning about frames of reference

Prep

Because today’s class will focus on a rhetorical viewing of Leonard’s film, your preparation should include re-viewing and annotating the film. Read “A Cautionary Video of America’s Stuff,” and otherwise learn as much as you can about the context of the film.

Materials

Your annotated copy of “A Cautionary Video of America’s Stuff,”
Notes from the movie, talking points and discussion questions
Copies of Assignment 2 (unless you had students print this out for homework)

Activities

Attendance and Lead-in (3-5 minutes)

Take attendance your usual way and introduce class, focusing on how today’s activities will help students understand the rhetorical situation of their upcoming assignment.

WTL Movie Review (5-10 Minutes)

With blogging growing in popularity, these days anyone can go out to the movies, come home, and become and “influential” critic on Twitter, Facebook, etc. Let’s write a movie review keeping in mind a specific rhetorical situation. In this case, you are the reviewer and you are writing to an audience of educators who are thinking of using the movie in their lesson plans.

Prompt: Educators should/shouldn’t use Annie Leonard’s movie, “The Story of Stuff,” because…

Ask students to provide specific reasons and details from the movie so you can collect the WTL and hold them accountable for the homework.

Introduce Assignment 2 (10-15 minutes)

As you introduce Assignment Two, consider what worked and didn’t work when you introduced the first assignment. You might revisit the comfort circle metaphor to generate new terms and assess terms they should be more comfortable with at this point.

An example of a potential three-columned list that your class might generate for Assignment 2:

Small group discussions (15-18 minutes)

In five or six small groups, ask students to consider “The Story of Stuff,” and the New York Times article, “A Cautionary Video…” Ask them to finish their discussion by finding aspects of these texts that connect in some way to earlier readings from the semester (Quinn, Hawken, the Seed Panel, etc.) For example, is a rhetoric of doom emerging within the rhetoric of green? How about a rhetoric of hope? Which is louder?

The Rhetoric of Green…for children?

• The movie and the article bring up the question of how the rhetoric of green is being framed for children.
• How is this specific rhetorical situation overlooked, like the article suggests? How were environmental problems framed for you growing up?
• Kaufman’s article identifies a gap between science and what our textbooks teach kids. Do you think this is a gap? What is the role of teachers when it comes to filling this gap?

Frame of Reference

• Kaufman’s article presented much information about the context that Annie Leonard is writing in, including her background and expertise, or what we might call her frame of reference
• How does Leonard’s background affect how she views her subject?
• How does her frame of reference affect her choice of audience, context, and genre?
• What conclusions can you draw about the rhetorical choices structuring the movie, given what you know about the author and her frame of reference?

 Continuing the Conversation

• One of the goals for assignment 2 is to keep the conversation surrounding the rhetoric of green alive and moving. This happens by finding concrete places for discussion.
• Can showing a video threaten academic freedom?
• Is an anti-capitalist message a threat? Should every reading given to students have a positive capitalism element for it to be worth reading?
• Do you think the school board voting to remove the movie shuts down the conversation of how to frame the rhetoric of green for students, or will there act only feed the conversation fire? 

 Synthesizing Rhetoric

At this point we’ve read enough texts to begin identifying certain common themes within the rhetoric of green. Consider all of the reading we’ve done so far. Can you begin making concrete connections between ideas in the different texts?

Give students about 10 minutes to discuss and jot down answers to the questions, and then ask each group to present their findings, or have a whole class discussion to which each group contributes

Assign homework for Friday (2-3 minutes)

Homework for Friday

• Attend the campus viewing of The 11th Hour
• Print out a copy of the Rhetorical Situation Movie Guide (Materials or File Folder) and bring this with you to help you take notes during the movie.
• Please type the answers to your Rhetorical Situation Movie Guide prompts. Answer thoughtfully, thoroughly, with informed details (this means you’ve visited the movie’s website http://wip.warnerbros.com/11thhour/ and done some other necessary internet research.)