Rhetorical Analysis Portfolio Draft

Section 1: Introduction to the Community

By looking at the community of computer science, it is clear that the community itself is

difficult to become a part of. The aspiring members are put through a series of tests that, as

highlighted in the article, make it virtually impossible to join the group without some sort of

difficulty. It is acknowledged that there is a high drop-out rate in higher education for these

members, and this is due to the fact that the knowledge gap between what is considered a

novice and an expert programmer is about ten years of experience. This experience consists

of countless hours practicing actual coding as well as years of interacting with other

programmers, keeping up to date with new technologies, and taking courses to become a well-

rounded coder. Because of this, programmers tend to value hard work, perseverance, and most of

all, patience. Coding is seen by society as a difficult subject, and thus coders are highly valued in

a variety of fields; from IT workers, to artists, to engineers and scientists, the programmers

involved in these diverse fields have one common goal: to create instructions for the problem or

program they are utilizing. Although they all might be approaching different subjects, they all

have that one common goal that unites them. Their objective is dependent on their capacity of

engaging in the literate activity of creating a written code that allows the computer to function as

it is meant to, and their expertise in this community is evaluated by their competence to do so.

The literacy sponsors of this community are the primary audience for the text that will be

discussed in this paper. The teachers, professors, course designers, and essentially anyone who

has taught or been taught programming are all concerned with the way programming is taught.

The knowledge gap between novice and expert programmers is something that has affected

everyone in this community, as everyone was a considered a novice at some point in their lives.
Because of this, they acknowledge the struggle new members are faced with when learning

programming, and they look for ways to make the teaching of it easier. As this text discusses the

issues with the way programming is taught as well as some possible solutions to these issues, the

members of the community who are interested in teaching programming are an audience for it.

Section 2: Introduction to Text:

This text is primarily concerned with the teaching of programming as a skill. It focuses

on the way the skill is taught, compares the trends between novice and expert programmers, and

explains the strengths and weaknesses of both groups and how these difficulties can be surpassed

through different teaching strategies. There is a notable gap between what is considered a novice

and expert programmer, and the texts intent is to find a way to close it. By explaining where the

issue lies, the audience, which is primarily programming educators, get a scope of the problem

and can take initiative towards a solution.

The text follows the four elements of a rhetorical situation. The rhetors, in this case, are

people who are concerned with how programmers are taught and experts in this field. These

people are just members of the audience that have taken a step back to acknowledge the problem,

and they are spreading the information they discovered.

The text illustrates how different situations can affect different people, and how this can

hinder someones learning. It acknowledges that the process of learning programming is arduous

and tedious, which leads to increased burn-out rates in college, and highlights how this is an

issue that concerns all educators. Ultimately, educators want a fair shot at learning for their

students. With a skill like programming, accessibility is a big factor that affects a persons

capability to learn. For instance, if an individual did not have access to a computer during high
school but choose to pursue a career in programming in college, they could be considered

behind some of their classmates in a sense, due to the fact that some of them might have had

access to a computer and programming courses in their youth. Educators possess altruistic

motivation, meaning they seek out for the benefit of others, and by seeing this issue, they will

take initiative to make the learning process a less tedious, more concise activity. This is the

purpose, or exigence, of the article: to highlight the issue in the education system for

programmers and to make the audience aware of it, ultimately leading them to act upon this.

Considering how broad the programming community is, a major constraint is trying to

put all the factors that play into this situation into one article. The community is complex, and

the rhetorical situation has too many variables for all of them to be mentioned. It is difficult to

pick out the key ideas of the situation and to explain them in a concise manner, as many of them

overlap and are interrelated. The whole situation is very conceptual, as there is no set-in stone

plan on how to change things, and no solution will occur overnight. Besides how extensive the

topic is, the article will only reach those who research the topic. The audience is constrained to

be those who are members of the community, as some of the lexis utilized and the overall

exigence of the article is community-specific.

Section 3: Methods:

Initially, this article was chosen with the purpose of using it for a group project where

rhetorical ecology was applied to it. Since it was a group project, we all came to the consensus to

look within the computer science community, since three fifths of the group are majoring in the

subject. After settling on this community we were going to approach, we looked on google

scholar for articles that were relevant to the overall goals and requirements in the rubric, as well

as an article where rhetorical ecology could have been easily depicted. We found several samples
that covered multiple topics that were relevant to the computer science community in different

platforms; an article about hackers, a forum post about declarative programming, and a few other

scholarly journals about programming techniques. After some deliberation, we all agreed upon

using Learning and Teaching Programming: A Review and Discussion by Anthony Robins.

This article had a very clear application of rhetorical ecology, and it had a clear exigence which

made the analysis easier. Although as a group we came to the compromise that the computer

science community was a community of practice, I believe that this specific subdivision of the

community is a discourse community, as the community meets all the characteristics of a

discourse as described in Johns article. The members of the community have the shared goal of

making education more effective and accessible, giving people an equal opportunity. The

community has specific lexis, such as words like array, structures, and other specific names for

coding styles.

[Paragraph Split] However, although rhetorical ecology was prominent throughout the

rhetorical situation, the article was also heavy on ethos, pathos, and logos. The article was

primarily focused on highlighting an issue and motivating educators to take a step forward and

word towards a solution, which is a persuasive argument. Ethos, pathos, and logos are the most

relevant analytics to use when creating an argument, so it was not a surprise to find them in this

article. As mentioned in the article by Higgengs, "Rhetorical studies are concerned with how

language and other symbolic forms influence the way an audience thinks, feels or acts." (2012).

The application of ethos, pathos, and logos in this particular article serve the purpose of

persuading the audience to take action. By using strategic statistics to create credibility, or using

logos to establish ethos, they appeal to the altruistic nature educators have when it comes to their
students, which in itself is pathos. As the use of these rhetorical moves was analyzed, it became

clear why they were used in the way they were, and how they influenced the audience.

Section 4: Analytics and Findings

After settling on using ethos, pathos, and logos as analytics for this text, I read the article

one more time, and looked for an article that would help me understand the analytics a little

better. I found that Aristotles rhetorical proofs of ethos, pathos, and logos added to the

persuasiveness of the text, which was a connection made in the Higgengs article where the

philosophers analysis of ethos, pathos, and logos was made.

The rhetors appealed to the emotions of the audience by making them empathize with

how much of an arduous process learning programming is. Throughout the text, the length and

complexity of learning programming is mentioned multiple times. In the section about novices,

the opening line is "From our perspective as teachers we are most interested in the question of

how novices learn to program (Robins, Rountree, Rountree. 2012.) Then, several studies

illustrating the complex process of learning programming are mentioned. In particular, a study

conducted by Rogalsky and Samuray in 1970 is mentioned; there, it is described how learning

programming is a multi-step process that requires high cognitive ability to be able to engage in

the activities necessary, and how the knowledge acquired is an addition of things. It it

emphasized that learning programming is not as simple as learning it straight out of the book.

There are endless amounts of practices programmers must participate in, and each one is to learn

a different concept. After emphasizing these points, it becomes clearer why the dropout rates are

so high. Educators who are passionate about teaching want nothing less than the best experience

for their students, and by bringing up how students felt as they went through the tedious gates the

process of learning brings them, it highlights the true underlying issue of the community. By
seeing the stress the problem causes to the students, educators will be more likely to take a step

forward and help make change occur. And perhaps they shared similar frustrations when they

were learning programming, so seeing that there are efforts being made towards a solution might

motivate them to also step forward.

Logos appears whenever a text uses data and statistics to help build credibility and

emphasize a point. The article brings up overwhelming statistics about the high dropout rates and

the 10-year experience gap between novice and expert programmers with the end goal of

emphasizing where the problem lies: education. Before introducing an argument, the article cites

multiple studies regarding the way students learn programming. Each section that focuses on a

different aspect, whether that is how novices learn or types of coding, has multiple studies with

data that help build the credibility of the argument.

Ethos is built through the use of both pathos and logos. By bringing up relevant research

studies, the rhetors build credibility because they demonstrate that they examined the situation

and did cross studies to come up with conclusions. The use of certain lexis, such as different

types of programming, steps most students go through when learning, and coding specific

language, that is specific to the community also demonstrates how they are a part of this specific

Discourse, this ties in with pathos, as they show that they care about the topic and the future of

programming education.

Section 5: Discussion and Meaning.

By using ethos, pathos, and logos as analytic tools, it becomes clear how the argument

the article focuses on is structured and how these are effective persuasive methods. The

utilization of ethos, pathos, and logos in Learning and Teaching Programming: A Review and
Discussion helps develop a substantial argument as to why there is an issue with the way

programming is taught. These analytics create a bridge between the rhetor and the audience and,

as the journal focuses on the teaching side of programming in the computer science community,

they shine a light on a problem that is predominant in the overall community and appeal to the

people who can solve it: educators. These educators are persuaded through emotional appeal, as

their altruistic motivation makes them naturally care about their mentees, and they are persuaded

once again by the credibility of the article as it uses relevant research and data to build upon the

argument. This article will hopefully inspire many other studies to arise so more educators can be

enlightened about this issue, and they can take suit to improve education.

Work Cited

Higgens, C (2012). Ethos, logos, pathos: strategies of persuasion in social/environmental reports.

Accounting forum, 36(3), 194-208. Doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.accfor.2012.02.003

Robins, A. Rountree, J. Rountree, N. (2003). Learning and teaching programming: a review and

discussion. Computer science education, 13 (2), 137-172.

http://home.cc.gatech.edu/csed/uploads/2/robins03.pdf