I created a Kahoot to pre-assess student knowledge before teaching standard 9.RI.06. The pre-assessment is meant to show me if students can identify persuasive techniques and if they know the meaning of pathos, ethos, and logos. The pre-assessment is meant to show me 1.) were students taught this before 2.) if they retained what they were taught 3.) if I need to start from the basics or if I can skip some if the rudimentary and move into the higher level analysis.
https://play.kahoot.it/#/k/0c8a8abc-9de7-43a6-ae73-70a70d6ab8e2
For the students who didn’t have a good understanding based on the pre-assessment, I would have a presentation for the class of rhetoric and how it is used. I would have the students with the lower scores in a group with a couple speeches and advertisements. These students would start with lower level questions like, “Identify the type of rhetoric used” and “Explain why the author used that technique”. Then the questions would move to higher level thinking like “Produce an advertisement with a partner that uses a form of rhetoric”.
For the students that scored in the middle, their group would have the same sample of speeches and advertisements but their questions would start at a higher level. Questions that ask, “Compare and contrast the different types of rhetoric used” and “Create a diagram that identifies the persuasion techniques and examples”. Finally they’d have a question like, “Rewrite the advertisement so that it uses a different rhetorical style”.
The students who had the best performance on the pre-assessment would be grouped together and would start with the higher level questions. An example of the questions would be, “Categorize the articles and advertisements into separate rhetorical styles and evaluate if different styles are more effective in certain situations” and “Create and advertisement using a rhetorical style and assess its effectiveness on your peers”.
I will use their advertisements and the questions to assess their progress. At the end I will hold discussions with the groups to hear how well they grasp the concepts and use their advertisements to see if they can apply the concepts. The standard states that the student should be able to analyze the effectiveness of rhetoric and point of view. Through these questions and activities I can assess if a student can identify the rhetorical styles and determine its effectiveness or how to make it effective.
Cristal Cassel 