Sumários

Video screening of the TED Talk "My Wish: Protect our Oceans"

11 Março 2019, 12:00 • Paula Alexandra Carvalho Alves Rodrigues Horta

Discussion of the concerns raised in the TED Talk by Sylvia Earle.

Comparing the facts presented in the TED Talk with those in the documentary Years of Living Dangerously.

Homework:
Read "The Horse Latitudes" (pp. 59-65) and answer the Before Reading questions

Introducing Persuasive Writing

11 Março 2019, 10:00 • Hilda Alexandra Prazeres Eusebio


Today, students learned about the many different uses of persuasive writing and its different techniques.
Persuasive writing/speaking is all about getting someone to do something that you want them to do.

Situations where we use Persuasive Writing:

  • courtrooms (Agree with me!  Choose my side!)
  • academic/political debates (Agree with me!  Choose my side!)
  • religious sermons (Join my Church! Follow its rules!)
  • political speeches (Give us your money/your vote!)
  • charities (Give us your money!)
  • advertising (Buy our product! Give us your money!)
  • job intervies/personal statements  (Give me the job!)
  • the military (Join!  Give us your lives!)
  • online dating profiles (Choose me!  Love me!)
  • etc.
We then learned about 20 different persuasive writing/speaking techniques (there are more, but twenty is a nice round number):
  1. Personal Pronouns
  2. Cause and effect
  3. Verb tenses
  4. Repetition
  5. Alliteration
  6. The Power of Three
  7. Emotive language
  8. Facts and statistics
  9. Hyperbole
  10. Exaggeration
  11. Technical Language
  12. Rhetorical Questions
  13. Dare the reader to disagree
  14. Powerful verbs and strong adjectives
  15. Listing.
  16. Address objections.
  17. Go tribal.
  18. Story telling/anecdotes
  19. Humour.
  20. Reasons why.
We then listened to Winston Churchill's We Shall Fight on the Beaches speech and analyzed it, identifying the techniques within the text.  Please note that sometimes up to three (or even four) techniques might be used at the same time in a single sentence.  If you missed class, you should listen to it at home and follow along with the text in the course book (as Winston's accent is really hard to understand).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y4FdMTdR40w

Video screening of the TED Talk "My Wish: Protect our Oceans"

11 Março 2019, 08:00 • Paula Alexandra Carvalho Alves Rodrigues Horta

Discussion of the concerns raised in the TED Talk by Sylvia Earle.

Comparing the facts presented in the TED Talk with those in the documentary Years of Living Dangerously.

Homework:
Read "The Horse Latitudes" (pp. 59-65) and answer the Before Reading questions

1st Written essay test

7 Março 2019, 14:00 • Thomas Joe Grigg

5-paragraph written essay test.

Carnival Holidays

6 Março 2019, 12:00 • Paula Alexandra Carvalho Alves Rodrigues Horta

--