1. Introduction

• In (his/her) [genre of work] “title of work” (date), [name of author], [phrase describing author], (asserts/argues/suggests/implies/claims that) [author’s major assertion/argument/thesis].
• [Author] (develops/supports) (his/her) (argument/message) through the use of [rhetorical choice #1, #2, and #3 in chronological order]
• (he/she/author last name) writes to [author’s purpose] in order to [what purpose aims to achieve]
• [Author] writes for an audience of [state author’s intended audience] as shown with (his/her) [what makes this the intended audience], and [author] ultimately moves this audience to [what is the audience supposed to do/act like after experiencing the text]

2. Body Paragraphs

• Topic sentence
  • BP1: [Author] begins (with/by) [rhetorical choice 1], highlighting [purpose/effect of rhetorical choice in relation to your thesis/what prompt asks/author’s message]
  • BP2: Building off the strategy, [author last name] used to begin with, (he/she) [connect last sentence of previous paragraph to first paragraph of this paragraph and show how strategies build upon each other]
  • BP3: Concluding the argument, [author] [connect last sentence of previous paragraph to first paragraph of this paragraph and show how strategies build upon each other]
• Evidence #1
  • Introduce evidence using context
  • Quote example
  • Your claim about the evidence (What the evidence does related to the passage)
• Commentary
  • Explain the effect of evidence #1 in relation to either credibility (ethos), passion or emotion (pathos), or logic (logos)
    • While doing this, tie the specific use of the strategy in to your claim and the theme/main idea of the work
• Evidence #2
  • Advance your idea by providing more evidence
  • Format: [Tie in previous evidence and its effect] [start talking about second piece of evidence, continuing your claim about the strategy named in the topic sentence] [textual evidence]
• Commentary #2
  • Explain the effect of evidence #2 (should be the same strategy as evidence #1) in relation to either credibility (ethos), passion or emotion (pathos), or logic (logos)
    • While doing this, tie the specific use of the strategy in to your claim and the theme/main idea of the work
• Closing Sentence
  • Explain how your examples of the specific rhetorical device connect and are effective in conveying your thesis and the theme of the work
    • For sophistication, try to tie in audience. Say how rhetorical device coveys thesis/theme to “x audience” and/or why this device is good for x purpose for x audience

3. Conclusion

• Rephrase thesis statement
  • Comes first in conclusion
  • Briefly analyze how author has achieved their purpose (through using certain rhetorical strategies)
  • Add sophistication and dig deeper than your thesis you used in your intro
• Highlight main ideas made during your analysis
  • Short explanation of the main points discussed
    • Why main points are important
    • How they link to your thesis
    • Importance of the rhetorical strategies used
      • If strategies were effective in conveying author’s message
  • Closing thought
    • Close out the main purpose of the text being analyzed
      • Be thoughtful and use powerful clencher

Example essay I wrote using this template: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1oRd6Ye8C0W8LuCbElHu-dfb5zNx38C-MimRZZeeOZsQ/edit?usp=sharing