Abstract
As generative AI reshapes how we learn to write and communicate, this workshop introduces practical strategies for post-genre pedagogy grounded in principles of classical rhetoric—offering enduring frameworks for cultivating critical human literacies through the language arts. This interactive session invites participants to reimagine the Western rhetorical canons through adaptive applications of classical thought to contemporary pedagogical practice. Together, we will explore strategies for teaching and observing ten foundational rhetorical modes for writing instruction across disciplines—persuasion, argumentation, definition, description, narrative, process analysis, cause and effect, comparison and contrast, and division/classification—as part of an adaptive framework that can be flexibly applied in AI-aware classrooms and multimodal learning environments. Participants will revisit Aristotle’s Poetics and the classical Trivium (grammar, logic, and rhetoric) to examine how these can inform process-based and cross-disciplinary learning while strengthening shared understandings of information literacy and academic integrity that support student agency and authorship. Grounded in rhetorical theory, sociocognitive and sociocultural approaches, and informed by everyday teaching realities, this workshop offers practical tools and strategies for cultivating critical thinking, ethical decision-making, and rhetorical adaptability in the age of AI. Participants will: 1) receive theoretically grounded frameworks for infusing writing-as-thinking prompts into existing course designs; 2) analyze AI-generated and student writing samples to identify rhetorical presence, absence, and ownership; 3) review writing task scaffolds that cultivate rhetorical adaptability with attention to AI-literate metacognition; and 4) consider adaptive assessment methods that value process and writing-to-learn as central to human innovation and meaning-making in technology-saturated societies.
Presenters
Kyle OddisAssistant Professor of English, Arts and Sciences, Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences, United States
Details
Presentation Type
Theme
KEYWORDS
Writing, Critical Thinking, AI Literacy, Metacognition, Rhetorical Adaptability, Process-Based Learning
