Rhetorical Appeals: Tourism's Carbon Footprint

Positives

• This lesson aligns with Hawai’i’s Nā Hopena A'o HĀ-BREATH Framework.

• This lesson gives students a voice and empowers students to have a say in how tourism affects their lives.
• This lesson gives students a method for convincing others of the impact of climate change in a powerful way.

Additional Prerequisites

• Students should know that fossil fuels cause climate change. If they need to review the topic, they can watch the video What Are Fossil Fuels?

• Teacher should preview the advertisements and articles, as well as the Teacher Answer Key, before the lesson.

Differentiation

• This lesson can be paired with a rhetorical analysis lesson, like the lesson Logical Fallacies in Reef-Safe Sunscreen.

• The lesson can be extended to become an entire language arts or science unit on carbon footprints. Students can calculate their carbon footprint using the Nature Conservancy Footprint Calculator.
• If time permits, students can write a first draft of their postcards and complete peer reviews before creating their finished product.
• Students can read the articles for homework and then discuss them the following day in class.

Tourism and climate change are directly related, and this lesson teaches students to spot rhetorical assertions in articles or other written content. They can then use these techniques to craft persuasive arguments about how air travel contributes to climate change and how to reduce Hawaii's tourism industry's carbon footprint while still protecting the environment. After carefully fact-checking all the instructional materials, this lesson has passed our science review process.

This resource addresses the listed standards. To fully meet standards, search for more related resources.

Supporting Standards

• Science
  • ESS3: Earth and Human Activity
    • HS-ESS3-1. Construct an explanation based on evidence for how the availability of natural resources, occurrence of natural hazards, and changes in climate have influenced human activity.
• English Language Arts
  • Reading: Informational Text (K-12)
    • RI.PP.11–12.5 Analyze an author’s purpose in a text distinguishing what is directly stated in a text or through rhetoric, analyzing how style and content convey information and advance a point of view.
  • Speaking & Listening (K-12)
    • SL.ES.11-12.3 Evaluate a speaker's point of view, reasoning, and use of evidence and rhetoric, assessing the stance, premises, links among ideas, word choice, points of emphasis, and tone used.

Note On Standards:

This lesson is aligned to SubjectToClimate standards. Review the aligned standards directly in the lesson plan document and teacher slideshow.