Joelle Hodge holds a BA in history/political science from Messiah University in Grantham, Pennsylvania, and a Masters of Arts in Teaching from Eastern University’s Templeton Honors College. She began her career as a staffer to United States Senator Arlen Specter (R-Pa) before finding her professional home in the world of classical education in 1999. She has twenty years of classical education teaching experience. She has co-authored two logic books, The Art of Argument: An Introduction to the Informal Fallacies and The Discovery of Deduction: An Introduction to Formal Logic, both published by Classical Academic Press (CAP), and continues to support various editorial projects at CAP. Her primary focus is on supporting the growth and development of Classical Academic Press in her role as President.

 

Prior to her current President role, Joelle has also served CAP by helping to launch their online school, Scholé Academy, where she served as their Director for several years. As a consultant, she engages with educators across the country, tailoring workshops for classical schools and co-ops that seek to train their teachers in the fundamentals of dialectic-and rhetoric-stage pedagogy. In 2021, she was honored to become a Bluestocking in Residence through the Society For Women of Letters.

Consulting and Speaking Topics

For Logic and Rhetoric Teachers: How to Teach These Core Disciplines

For All Classical Educators: Logic and Rhetoric Incorporated Across the Disciplines

For Professionals: Logic and Rhetoric for the Workplace—They’re Not Just for the Classroom!

Sample Seminar Summary

Logic and Rhetoric Incorporated Across the Disciplines: Brainstorming Projects/Papers/Rubrics

(Note: This time would be spent partly as a seminar and partly as a workshop.)

A. Every educator has a rhetorical fingerprint. It’s used in every lesson plan, each lecture, every experiment, and in all discussion and communication with students, faculty, and parents. It’s inescapable. It is imperative, therefore, that every educator learn the basics of logic and rhetoric—not just for the betterment of their own professional performance, but also for the expressed purpose of modeling excellence in logical and rhetorical thought and composition to their students.

B. Review of the previous two sessions. The audience should understand the critical importance of incorporating logic and rhetoric into each developmental stage of classical education (in varying degrees and amounts). The study and incorporation of logic and rhetoric function as the skeletal system for the body—they are the framework by which all other education takes place.

C. Understanding the distinction between content and form. Educators will need to set aside time to work collaboratively with each other so that they can best assist students in the development of not just the “right” answer, but also in the construction of sound arguments and how to craft them eloquently.

Types of Assignments: Examples

• Thesis statements
• Outlining
• Abstracts
• Debates
• Opinion essays
• Research papers
• Journalism: reporting vs. editorials
• Response papers
• Journaling
• Allegories
• Proverbs

Collaborative/Hands-On Development of Projects and Papers

• Science
• History
• Literature
• Apologetics

Rubrics

• What they are, how to make them, and how to use them
• Rubrics across the disciplines
• Goals and objectives
• Translating goals into measurable achievements
• Rubric pitfalls: avoiding overspecificity (freedom within the boundaries)

Pricing

On-Site Pricing Information:
Half day (4 hours): $790 + travel
One full day (8–10 hours): $1,190 + travel
Two full days: $2,195 + travel
Long-term consulting packages negotiated

Online Consulting Fees:
90-minute session: $290
Custom topics may require additional preparation fees.

Contact Information:
Classical Academic Press
E-mail: consulting@classicalsubjects.com
Phone: 866-730-0711

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