Rhetorical Strategies for Composition Cracking an Academic Code

Cracking an Academic Code: Rhetorical Strategies for Composition is a worktext designed for composition students to apply rhetorical theory in their writing. The exercises interconnect rhetorical skill work for students to practice "thinking on paper" in style, language, and conventions. Several innovations and competitive advantages of the text include: (1) providing continuity from AP Language courses (of which many students take in high school), which is not evident in current texts; (2) exhibiting a high level of student engagement vis-a-vis content of sentences, paragraphs, and other content relating to their lives; connecting ancient Rhetoric to modem media; (3) using the history of music sampling as a method to teach paraphrasing; (4) displaying sample student drafts with instructor commentary using rhetorical language from the course; and (5) offering an interconnectedness of lessons—students understand how components of rhetoric work together.