Name: Matthew Chaney Lesson Topic/Lesson Length: Ethos and

Pathos/Personal Consumption Brainstorm/85

minutes

Content Area: English Grade Level(s): 11th Grade

Class Context:

This is for two 11th Grade AP Language and Composition classes at Albemarle High School.
One class has 28 students and the other class has 24 students, including one student who
has IEP accommodations based on struggles with reading and writing in a timed setting, and
one student who has an IEP concern related to his being identified as being on the autism-
spectrum. These classes are otherwise not particularly racially diverse, with the majority of
students being white with a few Asian and African American students.

Lesson Content

Background Information/ Relevance/ Context/ Rationale (Purpose) – Please be clear

about how this particular lesson is situated within the current instructional sequence (i.e., unit),
why this content important for students to learn, and how you will convey the relevance and
significance of this lesson to students.

This is the fourth class in the unit on persuasive writing/man’s relationship with nature.
Students have already read the majority of Into the Wild and considered questions about
whether man can live in isolation from nature, learned about the types of relationships man
can have with nature, and have begun to reflect on their own relationships with nature (In the
last class, we did a mini-lesson on different ways that humans consume natural resources,
students took a carbon footprint calculator quiz, and students began working on keeping a
daily journal of how they use natural resources in their daily lives).

For this class, students are asked to continue considering their own consumption and to begin
the process of learning about persuasive writing--the impact it can have on people, including
the power of personal, emotional appeals (pathos), and the importance of citing evidence from
personal experience to this end.
Students will then use this information to begin brainstorming ideas for a blog post formative
assessment in which they write about their current relationship with nature and changes they
would consider making in how they consume natural resources.
This is just the first step in the writing process. Students will eventually write and publish a
blog post. This is a multi-step process that will take place over the next three class periods.
We will also spend time drafting, doing peer review, revising, and publishing.

To teach the drafting process, I will model writing my own rough draft in front of the class,
using my brainstorming/prewriting and maybe provide a model of a past student rough draft to
get students going. I’ll then use the same student model and my own rough draft to teach
peer review by talking aloud to make suggestions, marking up the paper. I will then model the
revision process as a group using the suggested edits--making sure to make it clear that it is
up to the writer to accept a correction or not--before teaching the basics of self-publishing
online.

Relevant VSOLs/CCSSs – Include only the standards addressed by this particular lesson
CCS Writing Standard 4: Produce clear and coherent writing in which the development,
organization and style are appropriate to task, purpose, and audience
CCS Writing Standard 10: Write routinely over extended time frames (time for research,
reflection, and revision) and shorter time frames (a single sitting or a day or two) for a range of
tasks, purposes, and audiences.
SOL 11.6 The student will write in a variety of forms, to include persuasive/argumentative,
reflective, interpretive, and analytic with an emphasis on persuasion/argumentation. A) Apply
components of a recursive writing process for multiple purposes to create a focused,
organized, and coherent piece of writing to address a specific audience and purpose.

Learning Targets -- Please reference these learning targets throughout your lesson plan.
As a result of this lesson, students will…

U1: Man does not exist in isolation from nature

U2: Students will understand that when we reflect on our own relationship with nature, we are
better able to be considerate of our own consumption
U3: Persuasive writing can have a powerful impact on readers

K1: Students will know the definition of the rhetorical appeals ethos and pathos
K2: Students will know that personal experience can be a relevant part of an appeal to ethos
and pathos

D1: Students will be able to appeal to ethos and pathos, citing evidence from personal
experience in support of an argument

Assessments: – How will you know if students have met/made progress towards the learning
targets? Be sure these assessments are integrated throughout the procedures and steps in
the lesson outlined below.
 Formative
Method of assessment:
Class discussion
Description of assessment:
Students will answer the
following question in a chat
as they enter the classroom
with a neighbor before
addressing the whole class:
Can man live in isolation from
nature? This is a return to the
question we discussed on the
first day.
Aligned with which
Learning Target(s): U1
Criteria for assessment:
Students will talk to one
another, as I walk around the
room and listen to their
responses, before opening
the question up to the class
for a response. Students will
talk reflectively, and hopefully
be able to collectively answer
that man does not live in
isolation from nature, that we
all depend on nature, no
matter how modern and
urban we may be.
How data will be used: This
will be noted and used for
reference in future
conversations of Into the
Wild.
Formative Formative
Method of assessment: Method of assessment:
Ethos Graphic Organizer Journal entry/brainstorm
about possible experiences
Description of assessment: with nature/consumption of
After students learn about natural resources and things
ethos and pathos, they will that students would consider
look up their own examples of changing.
these in blog posts of their
choice and respond to Description of assessment:
questions about how their Students will brainstorm ideas
chosen ad uses the appeals. from their own experiences,
This will be turned in and using the journal they’ve been
reviewed for feedback. keeping about personal
consumption, and the quiz
Aligned with which they took on their personal
Learning Target(s): U3, K1 carbon footprint, and based
on what I’m brainstorming on
Criteria for assessment: the board to begin working on
Students will correctly explain writing a blogpost about 1)
how the chosen blog post How they currently interact
uses ethos and pathos, what with nature and 2) changes
emotion it appeals to, how it they will consider making.
appeals to ethos, and explain
whether or not they believe Aligned with which
the ad is effective. Learning Target(s): U2, U3,
K2, D1
How data will be used:
Depending on how well Criteria for assessment:
students grasp the concept, I Students will turn in journal at
may have to reteach. If they the end of class (but I’m
get it, I can skip reviewing giving them the option to
ethos and pathos for long continue working at home if
when we talk about logos they didn’t complete this...I’ll
later on. have to look over it early
during the next class if they
didn’t turn it in...but I’ve
otherwise looked at all of
them during my walks around
the room. I’ll use the
information to see how well
students grasp the concept of
 brainstorming/using personal
anecdotes and reflections to
make a point about how they
consume nature.

How data will be used: I

mostly want to see how far
along students have gotten, if
they used their time wisely. If
not, we might have to spend
more time brainstorming,
backing up the next lesson a
bit/necessitating that I adapt
other lessons in the unit.

Materials/ Supplies/ Sources/ Digital and Interactive Instructional Technology (if

appropriate): – Please list all necessary instructional supplies, materials, and sources. Make
sure that these are clearly labeled and referenced throughout the lesson plan to enhance
clarity.

PowerPoint:
https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1S6th9GgOL3LdJ5LF3OTqA6gAhz3uTaEnPUIWC5X
7xFk/edit#slide=id.g6b5f647149_1_22

Pathos Graphic Organizer: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1K5LRO7_tLuiUPrr-

gwHYfMlDKuvB5bUjN0j74O7uJRw/edit

Personal Consumption Blog Post: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1F4RA0Wn-

2LYFMhzuUX0q76TvdUSAIIbIB5sMKOj3QmQ/edit

Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer (class copies have already been distributed to students)

“To Build a Fire”: https://americanenglish.state.gov/files/ae/resource_files/to-build-a-fire.pdf

Overhead projector, hooked up to computer

Black/whiteboard with chalk/markers

Students can refer back to the last lesson when they took this Carbon Footprint quiz:
https://www.footprintcalculator.org/signup and their journal that they’ve been keeping about
their own personal consumption of natural resources/interactions with nature.

Students need their computers for this lesson

Beginning Room Set Up: -How is the room set up when the students enter? Is there
anything written on the board or projected on the screen? Are their handouts, books, etc. that
are laid out for students to pick up as they enter?

Desks are set up as they normally are, with evenly spaced, 2-person low tables scattered
throughout the room, two groups of taller desks in the back corners of the room (1 2-desk
group, 1 3-desk group), and a large, high 8-person table in the rear center. There are also two
comfortable armchairs located next to the teacher’s desk on the front right of the room,
opposite the door.

Overhead projector is on, with the following PowerPoint being projected:

https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1S6th9GgOL3LdJ5LF3OTqA6gAhz3uTaEnPUIWC5X
7xFk/edit#slide=id.g6b5f647149_1_22

Proactive Planning for Learning Differences: – What planned supports have you included
to make the content accessible for all learners (i.e., groups of students and/or specific
students) and to build upon learners’ diversity? Be sure any modifications are explicitly
explained in the procedures/steps outlined below.

Lots of message abundancy here as I read out directions, give handouts, and have
instructions written on the board and in my PowerPoint.

I also model how to brainstorm, and what Pathos looks like (explaining what it is and giving an
example).

Also, there is a variety of types of activity: students turn and talk to a partner, we have a whole
class discussion, I give some direct instruction, and independent solo work.

There is also variation in the cognitive level that students are asked to work at: students are
asked to recall facts at times, but at other times they are asked to apply what they already
know, and at other times they are asked to think creatively.

Procedures/Steps in the Lesson: -- May follow a specific model (i.e., Direct Instruction,
Jigsaw) or be more open-ended. Be sure to think about what students will be doing during
each step, in addition to what you are doing. Scripting and/or estimated time frames may or
may not be included, but the plan should be clear and explicit enough that another person
would be able to teach from it.

1. Do Now/ITW Discussion: (10 minutes)

-[Slide 1]: Read the overhead as you come in and start talking to your neighbors about the
question you see up on the board. We’ll give it just a few minutes and then we’ll discuss as a
class. Students turn and talk about what they’ve read so far in Into the Wild, specifically
answering the question “Considering what we know about McCandless so far, do you believe
man can exist in isolation from nature?” (5 minutes)
-After 5 minutes of paired discussion, open the question up to the classroom for discussion (5
minutes): So, what do we think. Can man live in isolation from nature? What does this mean?
What do we think?

2. Directions/Giving Meaning to the lesson: (5 minutes)

-Today we’re going to begin the process of working on a blog post assignment which requires
us to consider all the ways we interact with nature. As part of this, we’re going to learn about a
rhetorical appeal called Pathos, which is used by a writer to persuade others. We ultimately
(by the end of this unit) will use the work we do on the blogpost to write a persuasive
argument about how natural resources should best be used. But before we do that we need to
begin the process of brainstorming ideas about how we currently use resources, and begin
thinking about how we can use these experiences to make an emotional appeal.

3. Ethos/pathos mini lesson: (20 minutes)

-Refer to Intro to Persuasive Writing/ethos and pathos Powerpoint and tell students to have
laptops out and open to the internet, but with the screen closed (for easy access when we
need them) and to have pencil and paper out, ready to take some notes.
-Slide 3: For starters, let’s talk about why we write persuasively. In my opinion, the ability to
persuade is one of the most powerful skills that a person can develop. Can anyone explain
why this might be? [student responds something like: “People who are good at persuading
others can make them do things--like buy things, volunteer their time, or vote for a certain
politician. People who are good at persuading have the power to do a lot of things that are
valuable in society” or something else relevant. If students don’t respond this way, I will ask
the question: “What about advertising? Why might it be useful to be able to persuade people if
your job was to write advertisements?...] One of the most common forms of persuasion is
persuasive writing. By a show of hands, who in the class has done this kind of writing before
[in 11th grade, it seems likely that most students would have experience with this, but it’d still
be good to see who has and who hasn’t]. As part of our unit on nature, we’re going to go even
deeper into how writers can most effectively write persuasively.
-Slide 4: So, how do we write persuasively? For starters, it is essential that a persuasive writer
begin by appealing directly to the audience that they want to persuade. Why is this important?
[If the writer doesn’t know who they are appealing to, they won’t know how to reach them/what
to say to convince them.] To appeal to their audience, persuasive writers must 1) show they
are worthy of the reader’s trust (Ethos), 2) appeal to logic to prove their argument (Logos),
and 3) appeal to the emotions of their audience (Pathos).
-Slide 5: We’re going to focus our studies right now on ethos and pathos, and connect these
to a larger writing assignment that we’ll be doing in class in the next week or so about our own
personal consumption, and what ideas that we have for changing. But first, let’s take a
moment to go a little more in depth to learn about the meaning of ethos and pathos.
Ethos is defined as an argument to establish the high moral character, trustworthiness, or
credibility of the writer. Examples include: “4 out of 5 dentists recommend it.” “When I was in
Vietnam, I saw firsthand what our soldiers were going through.” “If famous, beautiful people use this
product, then maybe it can make me famous and beautiful too.”
Slide 6: Can anyone tell me why ethos is so important? [answer: If the reader/audience doesn’t
trust the writer/speaker, then they won’t even read/listen to the message, must less consider be
persuaded by it.] Ethos can rise and fall within the same argument (what a writer says can make them
seem more or less credible). One way to make yourself seem more credible is to share personal stories
about experiences you’ve had with the subject you’re writing about. Readers are more likely to take
your perspective seriously if they know you’ve been there, and done it before.
Slide 7: Pathos is defined as an appeal to emotion/the emotional reactions or feelings we
have in the process of or as a result of an argument. It refers to emotions like joy, sadness,
but also dispositions and moods like depression, sympathy, indignation, and irritation.
Examples include a politician saying “I’m not just invested in this community, I love every
building, business, and hard-working member of this town.” or a concerned citizen saying to a
city council “You’ll make the right decision because you have something that other city
council’s lack: a heart.”
Slide 8: One really effective way to use pathos is to reference personal experience to make
the reader relate to you and your own past experiences and feelings. A convincing storyteller
has the power to transport a reader and make them feel the same emotions that he or she felt
in that moment. Now open up your computers and check out the following travel blog post:
Dan Flying Solo. The link is available in your email inbox.
-Slide 9: Ask the following: What is this blog post doing? What is its purpose? [It’s trying to get
viewers to travel to all the places that the author describes in the United Kingdom]; What
specific emotion or mood is it appealing to? [Excitement, curiosity, wanderlust]; Does the blog
post appeal to ethos/If so how? [The writer is from England and works for the famous travel
guide service Lonely Planet and is very well traveled himself]. Is it working/Is it effective and
why? [Yes or No, but supported by details about what worked or didn’t work in the blog
post...it was effective because it made me want to travel to those cities which I had never
previously heard of or that I used to think were industrial and ugly, but the author made them
sound lovely. There’s obviously a variety of possible answers...]. (Slides 1-8 should take a
maximum of 13 minutes to go over)
-Slide 10: Pass out graphic organizer with the same questions we just discussed. O.k. now
you take a moment to use your computer and the graphic organizer that I’m passing out to
look up your own example of a blog post which utilizes ethos and pathos. The goal is to pick
one that uses an emotion to try to convince its audience to do something and which explains
why what the author is saying is worth reading. Make sure to write down the link to the
webpage where you find it so that I can access it later to assess your work, and then answer
the same questions that we just answered for the travel blog, making it apply to the blog post
you choose. (5-7 minutes)

4. Break (5 minutes) [Slide 11]

5. Blog Post instructions/Connecting Pathos to personal reflection (10 minutes)

-[Slide 12]: Pass out the Blogpost Assignment sheet.
Hey guys, so here before you, you see the blog post assignment that I referenced earlier in
the class period. This is an assignment that we will work on over the next couple of class
periods.

Before we read about the assignment, I want to make the connection between ethos and
pathos and the blog post assignment that we’re about to begin explicit. Going back to what we
learned before about ethos, one way to persuade a reader that you are a credible author is to
describe your own personal experiences with a subject. This means telling stories or
anecdotes about a time when you did a thing, and then explaining why it is relevant. This
same technique can be used to appeal to someone’s emotions. Again, personal stories can
make a reader relate to you and your own past experiences and the emotions you felt during
those experiences. Again, a convincing storyteller has the power to transport his or her reader
into their shoes and make them feel the same emotions he or she felt in that moment. As we
begin to look at the following assignment/thinking about ideas, lean into the emotional part of
the stories/your past reflections, as they will help you convince your readers to join your
cause.

[Slide 13]: Now, read over the sheet aloud with students (just the first page, skipping the rubric
for now). Again I want to emphasize that this is an assignment that we will work on over the
next three classes, in chunks. Are there any questions? For the first chunk, we’re going to
work on brainstorming ideas based on the prompt. Everyone please get your writer’s
notebooks and let’s begin the process of responding.

6. Brainstorming/Writer’s Notebook (30 minutes)

[Slide 14] Go to white board with the prompt in hand and write the following questions on the
board: 1. What experiences do you have with nature/how do you use natural resources? 2.
What changes would you consider making in how you consume natural resources or
experience nature? Please copy the following questions down at the top of two separate
pages in your notebook, so that you have space to write down your ideas below. Before you
start working on writing your own ideas down, I’m going to model what you might do by
working on my own brainstorm right now, explaining what I’m thinking as I go. Also, feel free
to refer back to your personal consumption journal or your carbon footprint quiz results from
last class as we go.

Begin by focusing on the first question (5-10 minutes), writing and explaining your
rationale/thinking as you go:
So, what experiences do I have with nature in my life? I’m going to start thinking about
memories from my past, like the time I spent 5 months hiking up the East Coast from Georgia
to Maine, sleeping in a tent and hitchhiking. What’s something from that time that was
particularly emotional? Let me see, hmm...there was this one morning where I woke up way
too early (at 4 a.m.) because there was a mouse in my pack that had crawled in looking for
food, and I couldn’t go back to sleep so I started hiking. I was cold and sleepy, and I promptly
lost the trail because I missed a switchback and it was hard to see in the dark. I eventually
found my way back, after panicking and stressing and continued along the trail until I came to
an overlook, looking down on a valley, just as the sun was rising. When I looked down, I could
see a field of fog below as the sun emerged from behind a steep cliff in the distance. Maybe it
was the lack of sleep, but I teared up looking at it, and was overwhelmed at the thought of
how fortunate I was to be there in that moment, getting to do what I was doing. Nobody else
got to see that sunrise quite the same way that I got to see it that day. It was one of the most
beautiful things I’ve ever experienced.

What other thoughts come to my mind? I think about my bike rides around town, and walking
with my dog down by the river. I think about going hunting with my dad as a teenager, even
though we never really shot at anything, and walks with my older sister when we were small
up in the hollow near my grandmother’s house. I think about working at summer camp, and
the fun experiences I had working with kids and being really uncomfortable because we didn’t
have access to air conditioning.

I also think about driving my car, which runs on diesel fuel, and how when I was a teenager,
my dad, who was a mechanic, and I experimented with making our own biodiesel made out of
used vegetable oil that we got from a local restaurant. I smelled like frenchfries everywhere I
went, but I stopped because it kept clogging up the filters in my car.

I think about the flights I’ve taken over the years, and the electricity that I use, the meat that I
regularly eat, the times that I chose to drive my car instead of taking public transportation, the
times that I ate at fast food restaurants, and the plastic that I consume.

So, considering all of this, I now want to think about how this relates to the prompt. The
prompt wants me to identify what type of consumer of nature I am. Can anyone remind me
what types of consumers we have learned about in this class? [Looking for: explorer,
challenger, pleasure seeker, user, passive consumer]. I might be an explorer because I like to
wander around outside in far away, new, or unique places, but then I also might be a
challenger because I like to rock climb and see if I can overcome a challenging problem...I
might also be a pleasure seeker because I get emotional nourishment from spending time
outside. I could be a user because I used vegetable oil to make biofuel to power my vehicle,
or I might be a passive consumer because I’m not always as mindful of the consequences of
all of my actions when it comes to energy consumption/consumption of meat.

All that said, I think I’m mostly a pleasure seeker, because I relate most to this idea.
Now I’m going to think about the possible changes I could make, and think about the reasons
why I might consider making them. Move on to the other question, and don’t skimp on
explaining/writing as you go.

-Check in with the class/workshop time [20 minutes]: O.k. guys, I’m going to take a break
from brainstorming to go around the room and check in with you to see how it’s going.
Everyone in the class should start jotting down ideas. If you don’t have any yet, please make
sure that you jot something down now. Remember, it doesn’t have to be a complete idea. Just
jot down anything that comes to mind. If it helps at all, start by copying something that you see
up on the board if it relates to you, and use it to come up with your own ideas. If you can’t
come up with anything, that’s part of why I’m coming around, to help you come up with ideas.

-After checking in with the room/walking around, and if time allows, I could go back to the
board and work on the 2nd question: What are some possible changes I could make? Well, I
guess I could cut meat out of my diet. Scientists say that consumption of animal products like
beef are a leading cause of carbon emissions (they require the burning of fossil fuels to
transport them, cows produce methane which contributes to climate change, and they require
a lot of space to produce).

I could also consider taking the bus more often instead of driving, but that would require that I
plan my day better, or I could ride my bike, which would take even longer, and make it more
difficult to get places/make me sweaty/soaking wet when it’s raining. Or I could walk.

I could take more advantage of my free time to go hiking/trail running/mountain biking/rock

climbing outside so that I can have more of the positive outside experiences that I love so
much, making me want to be a better advocate for the environment.

I could take up bird watching/plant/animal/fungi identification as a new hobby as an excuse to

get outside more often.

I could start growing my own garden or shop at the farmer’s market as a way to contribute
less to global warming, by not supporting businesses that ship products far away, while also
feeding myself. Or I could produce my own meat by raising chickens or farming tilapia for the
same reasons.
Keep an eye on time. Class should be coming close to the end. Reserve 5 minutes at the
end to walk around the room again and check in/wrap up:
O.k. guys, I can see you’ve all been hard at work coming up with ideas. Great work. We’re
going to finish up with our notes, and I’ll come around and collect the notebooks for review
before next class. Before you go, I just want to mention that this is just the first stage in the
Commented [MC1]: Here is an example of writing
instruction which focuses on the process of
brainstorming as part of a larger writing assignment
that will be workshopped over a long period of time.
Instead of directly following this script when I model my
own brainstorming, I would probably improvise what I
say in the moment so that students could see that I
sometimes make mistakes. This, hopefully, will make
writing seem less daunting.

process of working on this blog post assignment. Next class we’re going to work on writing our
first drafts, so if you don’t think you got enough down, I’ll allow you to take your notebooks
home to jot down the rest of your ideas before next class, but please make sure to bring them
back. Otherwise, have a great rest of your day and I will see you next class.

7. Homework (5 minutes)
[Slide 14]: For homework, please read the last chapter of Into the Wild and the epilogue, along
with the short story I’m passing out now, and come to class ready to discuss. Pass out “To
Build a Fire” before the class is dismissed.
Materials Appendix (if appropriate):-Please include the slides, images, links to texts,
handouts, etc. that are used in this lesson. They should be “Student Ready”

PowerPoint:
https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1S6th9GgOL3LdJ5LF3OTqA6gAhz3uTaEnPUIWC5X
7xFk/edit#slide=id.g6b5f647149_1_22

Pathos Graphic Organizer: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1K5LRO7_tLuiUPrr-

gwHYfMlDKuvB5bUjN0j74O7uJRw/edit

Personal Consumption Blog Post Explanation:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1F4RA0Wn-
2LYFMhzuUX0q76TvdUSAIIbIB5sMKOj3QmQ/edit

“To Build a Fire”: https://americanenglish.state.gov/files/ae/resource_files/to-build-a-fire.pdf