Rhetorical Strategies for Focused Writing

Lesson Plan - Get It!

Audio:

Rhetorical strategies are ways of approaching the presentation of information to your audience.

It signals to the reader how to engage with the information, as well as providing structure to the writing and providing a logical means of connecting ideas together.

These are the rhetorical strategy key terms:

• cause and effect
• compare and contrast
• classify
• describe, define, exemplify
• explain
• narrate

Do some research on your own to find explanations for each of these rhetorical strategies. You might see them referred to as rhetorical patterns, styles, or modes.

If you need help, check out these resources:

• Rhetorical Styles, from Excelsior Online Writing Lab
• Rhetorical Strategies, from W.W. Norton & Company
• Rhetorical Patterns, from Lincoln University

Write a summary of each strategy in a notebook or document file, somewhere that you can refer back to in the future.

Matching Activity

Now, close your notebook and match each term with its description to see if you can identify each technique:

• Do you feel comfortable with your understanding of these techniques?

If so, click through to the Got It? section to look at example passages to determine which technique is being employed.