How to Teach Rhetorical Analysis in Middle School

When I say rhetorical analysis, do you cringe a little or show some excitement? I think most teachers cringe at the word, and I totally get it. Middle school students often enter the classroom behind on essential skills like reading fluency and comprehension, so rhetorical analysis feels like an impossible feat. However, it is possible to teach rhetorical analysis in middle school.

What is Rhetorical Analysis?

Simply put, rhetorical analysis is the exploration or study of how an author uses words to persuade the reader. This analysis often examines how speakers use words to persuade a listening audience.

Rhetorical analysis involves looking at the rhetorical situation: the audience, purpose, medium, and context. It does more than just analyze the text. It also evaluates why the author chooses certain diction or persuasion techniques and the impact of the text on the audience.

Being able to analyze the rhetorical devices an author is using will make our students more critical of the content they consume, which is a very important life skill.

What Should Be Included in a Rhetorical Analysis Unit?

It’s one thing to tell students what rhetorical analysis is and a whole other thing to actually implement it. If teaching rhetorical analysis makes you want to call in a sick day, don’t worry. I’m going to break it down for you.

#1 Elements of Rhetorical Analysis

First things first, we want students to understand what exactly rhetorical analysis is. That starts with basic definitions. You can teach rhetorical elements with simple note-taking and mini-lessons or use mentor texts to identity the devices in action.

Rhetorical devices include things like imagery, irony, parallelism, antithesis, metaphor, and more. I highly recommend creating a reference guide for students with the different rhetorical devices because it’s a lot of new information. Inside my rhetorical analysis unit, I include a mini-book with reference pages over all the essential elements.

The reference guide also includes examples of rhetorical appeals like ethos, logos, and pathos. Once students have these reference sheets, they can refer to them when reading, writing, or reviewing.

#2 Nonfiction texts

A great way to practice rhetorical analysis is using speeches. The good news is that most speeches use rhetorical devices, so it’s not hard to find texts. I recommend choosing speeches by famous advocates or presidents, like President Barack Obama’s Address to the Nation on Syria or President George W. Bush’s 9/11 Address to the Nation.

For your sports lovers, you could even choose Lou Gherig’s Farewell to Baseball. All three of these speeches (as well as eight others) are included in my rhetorical analysis unit.

#3 Rhetorical response

This might be the most dreaded part for teachers! The rhetorical analysis writing. We know that writing is an important way to solidify the critical thinking our students are doing, but that doesn’t mean you need to start with full-length essays.

Start small by having students write short responses and build your way up to full essays. A great way to model rhetorical analysis writing is through the use of mentor texts. Sharing with students what this type of writing looks like will make the process smoother and help them produce better writing samples. After all, it’s hard to write when you have no idea what it’s supposed to look like.

Another thing that I found helpful is having one-on-one conferences with students. Discussing writing during individual conferences allows you to dig deeper with students and support them on a more personal level.

Grading rhetorical analysis doesn’t have to be a pain either. Use rubrics to make expectations clear for students (and grading simple for you). If the thought of creating your own rhetorical analysis unit is overwhelming, you can find mentor texts, essay examples, rubrics, and more in my rhetorical analysis unit.

Ways to Practice Rhetorical Analysis

Rhetorical devices are everywhere, and you can use various types of media to practice analyzing them with your students! One of my favorites to use was always advertisements. Before watching the ads, have students review the different rhetorical elements and devices in their reference pages.

Then, have students watch ads and analyze them for rhetorical devices within them. My students always loved doing this. First of all – who doesn’t love a funny ad? Second, they quickly saw the persuasive devices after just a few examples. After watching an ad, have students write a short response explaining the persuasive devices they saw and why it’s effective.

Another engaging way to practice is to pair students up to watch and/or listen to a speech. Then, have them discuss the rhetorical devices they saw at play. Have students share in a class discussion. You can also choose one speech and model the written response process with students.

Lastly, have students create their own ads. For instance, they might try to convince you to skip next week’s exam or throw a pizza party. This would be motivating and meaningful as they practice writing their own rhetorical devices. Take it a step further by having the other classmates analyze their ad and notice the rhetorical devices each group used.

rhetorical analysis reading and writing unit

Rhetorical Analysis Unit

If you want to introduce rhetorical analysis, but need some help compiling resources, check out my rhetorical analysis unit. Within this unit, I break down exactly how to get started and provide 23 done-for-you lesson plans with step-by-step instructions that make teaching simple.

The unit also includes differentiated examples of reading responses, over sixty exemplar display slides to help students know what to expect, and multiple editable rubrics to use for grading. There are reference pages to support your students, and writing conference forms.

These resources take the guesswork out of rhetorical analysis. No worrying whether students are getting all the information they need or how to best present the information. You have everything you need to teach your unit, from top to bottom.