Aristotle’s three appeals make up the main ways that students can use evidence and reasons to prove their claims. The most trustworthy and solid appeal is ethos, which establishes credibility. Students who use the appeal of ethos establish that they are knowledgeable as speakers who consider all sides of an argument. They have done their research and use information that is just, fair and rational. Students need to establish their credibility as a speaker in order for their audience to accept their message, even when the student may not be an expert on their topic (Carscallen & Serna, 2017). An important way for students to do this is to properly use all parts of an argument, and to write without spelling or grammar mistakes in a professional tone that shows their audience they are trustworthy and scholarly.
The second appeal, logos, involves the specific facts that students will either know or present through research (Carscallen & Serna, 2017). Facts must be clear and relevant, and used in an appropriate way. It is easy for students to simply pick and choose the information that they can use to support their claim, but a strong appeal to logos considers all information from a given source to show that the student understands both the outside source and the argument topic in order to bring that outside information into their work in a way that is logical and relevant.
According to Carscallen & Serna, there are two types of reasoning that students can use – inductive and deductive. Inductive reasoning is stronger, since it includes the progression of basic facts building upon each other in order to reach a conclusion. Deductive reasoning includes a warrant – that is, a preconceived notion that both the speaker and audience have in order to make a claim. Deductive reasoning includes syllogism, or the concept of applying an already-established truth into a different, but related situation (2017). Students who are familiar with the scientific method will recognize that deductive reasoning is a way of applying the ideas of the scientific method to argument writing.
The third appeal is pathos, or emotion. This is the appeal used most often by students, but is also the appeal that realistically should be used the least. It is also the appeal that depends the most greatly upon the audience. In a pathos-based argument, the speaker relies on warrants and pre-established beliefs and values that their audience has in order to prove a point (Carscallen & Serna, 2017). While emotion, especially in certain situations, can be very effective, an argument that uses only emotional appeals without logical proof is not a solid one. Since emotions are subjective and facts are objective, facts are always going to provide a more solid argument.
Activity #1: You Need It Source: Carscallen & Serna
Teachers will partner students up and assign them an object. The more random and ordinary, the better. One student will then attempt to convince the second student that he or she needs that object in whatever way they think feasible. The other student will write down the reasons that their partner gives. They will then be assigned another object, and the student that was arguing is now the observer, so that each student does the convincing one time. Once both partners have gone, the students will go through their lists of reasons as a pair and determine whether the reason falls under ethos, pathos or logos. While there might be a few ambiguous claims, most, if not all reasons, should be able to be categorized into one of the three appeals. The goal here is to help students realize that they already use these appeals in everyday situations, but once they are able to identify them, they will be able to use them more effectively in their writing.
Activity #2: Change the Appeal Source: My Brain
Students will work with an advertisement, similar to the one used in the rhetorical triangle activities. If the teacher chooses, it can also be the same advertisement, or the students can take the advertisements they created and swap with each other to look at something new. They will identify the main appeal that is used in the ad. Many may use multiple, but ask students to pick out the one that is either the most prominent or provides the strongest argument. They will then either design or explain what the advertisement would look like if it used a different appeal from the one it already does. For example, a Coca-Cola ad that probably uses pathos as its main appeal could be reimagined with statistics about dopamine levels in a person's body before and after they drink Coke, which would cause it to change to primarily logos. The students could then discuss whether they think the ads were more or less effective after the change. This will most likely lead to a discussion about how pathos is the most-used appeal in advertisements. The students like to talk about things they are familiar with, so this should turn into a lively discussion about what they've seen and experienced.
Activity #3: The Cookie Source:Halaberda & Boreen Students can demonstrate the process of establishing their credibility as a speaker by logically proving the definition of something simple, such as a cookie. The teacher can give each student a cookie, and the students will use their five senses to determine that the object in front of them is indeed a cookie. They can make a list of the characteristics they know make something a cookie, and then match them with the evidence they collect. While this may be a simplistic example, it helps students practice and understand the process to use with text. If students were writing a paper in order to convince an audience that the object they possess is a cookie, they establish credibility by using the warrants of what is widely accepted as a cookie, combined with their use of observations, to convince the reader.