Rhetorical Analysis: The Digital Parent Trap

In her essay, The Digital Parent Trap, Eliana Dockterman carefully builds her argument by using ethos, pathos, and by using purposeful word choice to strengthen her argument that there are benefits to early exposure to technology for children. She supports her claims with evidence by using quotes, and by citing data from research studies and interviews. She leaves out any fluff and unnecessary words which makes the words remaining even stronger.

The Tethered Generation, written by Kathryn Tyler, a self-identified member of Generation X, published this article in HR Magazine, a magazine for HR Professionals. In this piece, Tyler elaborates on what she believes to be the most dependent generation to exist: Millennials. A “frequent contributor” to the publication as a freelance writer, she has quite the background in human resources and training, which reflects in the style of this particular article. In the beginning Tyler discusses the effect that tethering to technology, peers, and parents has had on this generation. Towards the end, she writes a sort of “how to” guide on dealing with those effects in the workforce, and how to make the transition into the workplace for those individuals (and other employees) as smooth as possible. Her thesis is evident in the beginning of the article. Tyler argues that because millennials are too attached to technology and dependent on other people that are close to them (like parents and peers), they lack the skills and traits that previous generations possessed, as well as autonomy, and in the process created an epidemic of very overbearing parents that may be too concerned and involved in the life of their children, which could be detrimental to the new young adult’s development of their professional life. This rhetorical analysis is going to dissect the writer’s use of logos, pathos, and ethos in her argument.

Throughout time, women have been considered housewives and mothers. Not all women stayed home, throughout history women have worked, mainly clerical jobs, teaching, charity workers, and other less demanding physical work. It was never a new thing that women were in the work force, it was the impact the propaganda posters and WWII made on the women in that workforce. This propaganda poster; titled “We Can Do It” features a beautiful women with her arm flexed and she is in her work coveralls, above her it say “We can do it.” the author is J. Howard Miller, he uses pathos and ethos to inspire a social movement that increased the number of working women, and changed the face of the workforce.

In this document Eliana Dockterman writes about how traditional views of childhood consumption of technology with emphasis on “screen use” is outdated and technology usage should in fact be embraced by children. Dockterman is able to effectively portray this argument through the use of a variety of persuasive techniques.

Children need guidance to become successful in life. One exceptional man wrote about the wrong type of parenting that causes children to be unproductive. In this article, he talks about how these styles can ruin a child’s life, because they are not being taught to be survive everyday life. Throughout this piece, the audience begins to understand his argument, because he uses many examples and rhetorical questions to persuade the readers. During the reading, he also brings up that severe parents are overprotective, since they think they are helping their children become wise, but they are actually afraid of teaching them about the necessities of the world. Furthermore, he supports his idea by saying things such as the wrong type of parenting

The Editorial Board of The Sacramento Bee, in their opinion editorial, “California is Adult in the Room Amid Childishness Over Bathrooms” (16 February 2016), argues that going to the bathroom is a necessity, and thus, lawmakers should not pass laws that base the legal use of bathrooms on the gender from one’s birth. They support their claim by first exposing the faults in the opposite side's opinions, then providing information on California’s plan for bathrooms, then promoting California’s policy that takes safety and comfort into consideration, and finally posing the solution of replacing gender-biased signs on the bathrooms with “all-gender” signs. The Editorial Board’s purpose is to make people who support strict gender-based bathroom laws

Technology connects people from all corners of the world. Inventions like the web and the internet has been heralded as the greatest inventions of man. The twenty first century is a fast paced world, with information available at a person’s fingertips. With this new drastic change in society, advocates of education reformation, like Cathy Davidson, pushes for education to be more modernized. In her essay “Project Classroom Makeover”, she points out the outdated education system, and the benefits, technology can have on the failing American education system.

Upon analyzing "The Digital Parent Trap" by Eliana Dockterman, it is very apparent that she uses multiple types of rhetorical devices to support her claim of how early exposure to technology benefits children and children's test scores. Dockterman claims studies show that student test scores improve after playing certain games. In a test done by SRI, studies showed that "kids who played games like Samorost (solving puzzles) did 12% better on logic tests than those who did not [play the games]"(Dockterman 8). This quote from the study done by SRI is one of many factual evidence pieces that Dockterman uses throughout her article to help support her point.

Rhetorical Analysis Eliana Dockterman’s “The Digital Parent Trap” discusses the manner in which children in our modern era are often too criticized for spending their free time in front of a screen. Moreover, Dockterman brings forth evidence suggesting that the increased engagement and online interaction brought by screen exposure could actually be more beneficial than detrimental. She poses this argument to any parent or school who are concerned for their children’s health due to persisting ideas, arguing through the use of specific studies, establishing her knowledgeable credibility, and appealing to parental doubts. Dockterman begins the article by acknowledging the widespread use of technology by children today, going on to admitting the downsides that this influx of digital interaction has had on the generation.

The purpose of this op. ed. is to explain the Waldorf school system's policy that technology should not be allowed in a child's education. This is developed firstly through the use of explaining what parents think of their children's education. For example, many times throughout the article it is mentioned that many parents of students attending Waldorf schools are employees of technologically advanced companies such as Google and Apple. Also, the article gives quotes from parents, such as one from Alan Eagle,

Claim: Eliana Dockterman, in "The Digital Parent Trap" shows her persuasive tone in the essay on whether or not technology was a good idea to teach to young teenagers. Her purpose is to convince the readers that technology would be the right way to go in order for your child to not get left behind. Support 1: Dockterman begins her essay by emphasizing the statistics and facts on why technology would be a great path to pursue in a child's life. "This generation of American kids...27% of them use tablets, 43% use smartphones, and 52% use laptops. " This helps the author achieves her purpose by backing her stance up with hard facts.

The next generation of humans is rising, "27% of them use tablets, 43% use smartphones, and 52%" use laptops every day. In "The Digital Parent Trap", Eliana Dockterman uses sophisticated diction, relatable arguments, and a plethora of statistics to persuade and strengthen the logic and persuasiveness of her argument that digital technology is good. Dockterman's sophisticated diction in the essay improves her persuasiveness because using sentences such as "none of this means kids deserve unfettered access to the gadget of their choice - especially if they've already been caught abusing it. As with any childhood privilege, monitoring is key, but parents should keep an open mind about the benefits of tech fluency" makes the reader both impressed at her abilities to portray information and satisfied that they are not reading an essay that seems to be written by one of the children who just want to be on their electronics

War in Afghanistan against the Taliban has been raging for well over a decade. Lives have been lost; families have been broken and torn apart. Suffering thousands of losses on both sides, each must cast these unthinkable circumstances aside to communicate compassion without speaking a single word. The untitled picture of an Afghan citizen, offering tea to an American soldier and his brigade, speaks volumes against the stereotypes bystanders are exposed to regularly; employing the villager to demonstrate selfless love, and the soldiers to testify to faith and vulnerability the photographer commands us to see that language is not a barrier when replaced with respect.

The current generation of children is completely different than the preceding ones. They are living in the digital age. “Technology has blended in with daily activity to become a way of life and children today take for granted all of which is automated. It is hard for kids nowadays to imagine a world that existed without all of the gadgets, electronics and seamless operations that computer technology provides.” (3) “Children in the United States devote some 40 hours a week to television, video games and the Internet.” (12) Many psychologists and researchers are concerned about the impact that technology has on children. Children, tomorrow’s future parents and leaders, are being consumed by the negative effects that technology had on their

In the Passage “Digital Parent Trap” the Author Eliana Dockterman uses many different forms to captivate people’s attention with regards to a certain topic. In this expose the “Digital Parent Trap” Eliana conveys the children’s usage of technology and how that technology should be controlled or handled by the Parents of the children, also persuading the parents to view her stance on technology. To support her opinion and persuade the individuals that are reading this passage, which is mostly parents, she uses three different tactics: Evidence(Logistics), Reasoning(based on information given), and Emotion to be able to persuade parents of her opinion and it’s validity. Primarily, the evidence is clearly displayed at the beginning and throughout