Rhetoric Analysis
For the public argument I proposed a poster that would be directed towards my target audience which is teachers. The posters would most likely be hung up inside of schools because this is where they would have the most impact on teachers because teachers would see them every day. This poster is what I hope to use to help shift attitudes concerning allowing smart phones in the classroom. On this page I will discuss the different choices made to make this poster an effective and easy way to help convince teachers of my issue.
The poster is composed of two separate pictures and text on the top and bottom borders. The text on the top says “Why ask your students to carry all of this…” and the bottom of the poster finishes the sentence with “when all they NEED is this?” Underneath the first phrase is a black and white picture of four notebooks, a stack of books with a pen and pencil on top of them, and a folder with a flash drive, iClicker, and a calculator on top of it. The bottom picture that sits above the second phrase is a colored picture of a smart phone with its screen on. There is a black boarder surrounding the whole picture to make it seem like one solid picture and it ties the whole poster together.
For the first picture I chose to make it black and white to make it blend in and almost seem boring. This is also intended to make to the audience feel like the picture is dated. This implies that the current way of teaching is “old fashioned”. I chose to lay out all of the supplies as wide and spread out as possible to make it seem like there was a lot of supplies that students were responsible for. This allows for teachers to see everything that a single student is responsible for. This is supposed to make the teachers understand how easy it may be for students to forget something.
The second picture is the turned on smart phone. I chose to leave color in this picture for a few different reasons. First, leaving color in the picture allows it to stand out in the poster and draws the audience’s attention to it. Leaving it colored also makes it appear more modern than the previous the picture. I had the phone screen turned on so it also added additional color to the poster. The background of the phone was changed to look like a school blackboard. This was done to make the audience think about the smart phone being like a modern blackboard for students. This hopefully would infer ideas of the phone being used for class.
These two images are pretty subtle and unconvincing separated but when put together they become much more convincing. The contrast between the two images makes for a powerful statement for the ease, convenience, and utility of smart phones. When seeing the black and white picture and the colored picture your attention is brought away from the black and white “school supplies” picture to the “smart phone” picture. The more powerful contrast between these pictures is the number of items in the first picture as compared to the second picture. In the first picture you have 12 visible items and the second picture you have one smart phone that is supposed to represent all of the above items. This is because a smart phone has numerous capabilities that make it the ultimate learning tool.
This is where the text of the poster comes to play. This also has a huge impact on the meaning of the poster and influences how convincing it is. The first phrase is used to get the teachers both intrigued and it gets them into a state of mind where they ask themselves the question. It immediately reaches out to teachers, which is the desired audience, by saying “your students.” These two words make it very apparent that the poster was designed for educators. Other important word choice that was used to make this a successful poster were the words “all this” which make the implication that there are an unreasonable amount of supplies that students need for class. I chose to separate the phrase so that the audience would continue to read the poster. The second half of the phrase was used to drive home the argument that smart phones are much more useful for students and a lot less to worry about. I put the word “NEED” in all capitals to emphasize that smart phones are an extremely efficient and effective learning tool. I also played with the font between the two halves. I used a cursive font for the first half to complement the inferred feeling of old-fashioned for the first picture. For the second picture I used a modern looking font to complement the smart phone.
I intended this poster to be designated for teachers because that is the audience who has the most influence and changing the policies in today classrooms. I want the teachers to see that there are new learning tools available for the classroom that can make both the student’s lives and their own life easier. I also hope that they understand that smart phones have many capabilities that make them effective learning tools for the classroom. I hope that all of the decisions that went into making this poster lead it to be an effective and convincing poster to help convey the point that I am trying to make.
The poster is composed of two separate pictures and text on the top and bottom borders. The text on the top says “Why ask your students to carry all of this…” and the bottom of the poster finishes the sentence with “when all they NEED is this?” Underneath the first phrase is a black and white picture of four notebooks, a stack of books with a pen and pencil on top of them, and a folder with a flash drive, iClicker, and a calculator on top of it. The bottom picture that sits above the second phrase is a colored picture of a smart phone with its screen on. There is a black boarder surrounding the whole picture to make it seem like one solid picture and it ties the whole poster together.
For the first picture I chose to make it black and white to make it blend in and almost seem boring. This is also intended to make to the audience feel like the picture is dated. This implies that the current way of teaching is “old fashioned”. I chose to lay out all of the supplies as wide and spread out as possible to make it seem like there was a lot of supplies that students were responsible for. This allows for teachers to see everything that a single student is responsible for. This is supposed to make the teachers understand how easy it may be for students to forget something.
The second picture is the turned on smart phone. I chose to leave color in this picture for a few different reasons. First, leaving color in the picture allows it to stand out in the poster and draws the audience’s attention to it. Leaving it colored also makes it appear more modern than the previous the picture. I had the phone screen turned on so it also added additional color to the poster. The background of the phone was changed to look like a school blackboard. This was done to make the audience think about the smart phone being like a modern blackboard for students. This hopefully would infer ideas of the phone being used for class.
These two images are pretty subtle and unconvincing separated but when put together they become much more convincing. The contrast between the two images makes for a powerful statement for the ease, convenience, and utility of smart phones. When seeing the black and white picture and the colored picture your attention is brought away from the black and white “school supplies” picture to the “smart phone” picture. The more powerful contrast between these pictures is the number of items in the first picture as compared to the second picture. In the first picture you have 12 visible items and the second picture you have one smart phone that is supposed to represent all of the above items. This is because a smart phone has numerous capabilities that make it the ultimate learning tool.
This is where the text of the poster comes to play. This also has a huge impact on the meaning of the poster and influences how convincing it is. The first phrase is used to get the teachers both intrigued and it gets them into a state of mind where they ask themselves the question. It immediately reaches out to teachers, which is the desired audience, by saying “your students.” These two words make it very apparent that the poster was designed for educators. Other important word choice that was used to make this a successful poster were the words “all this” which make the implication that there are an unreasonable amount of supplies that students need for class. I chose to separate the phrase so that the audience would continue to read the poster. The second half of the phrase was used to drive home the argument that smart phones are much more useful for students and a lot less to worry about. I put the word “NEED” in all capitals to emphasize that smart phones are an extremely efficient and effective learning tool. I also played with the font between the two halves. I used a cursive font for the first half to complement the inferred feeling of old-fashioned for the first picture. For the second picture I used a modern looking font to complement the smart phone.
I intended this poster to be designated for teachers because that is the audience who has the most influence and changing the policies in today classrooms. I want the teachers to see that there are new learning tools available for the classroom that can make both the student’s lives and their own life easier. I also hope that they understand that smart phones have many capabilities that make them effective learning tools for the classroom. I hope that all of the decisions that went into making this poster lead it to be an effective and convincing poster to help convey the point that I am trying to make.