Filmed in November 2016, Wendy Troxel's speech has a staggering 1.2 million views meaning she effectively got her point across that schools should start later for adolescents and teens because their brains do not start going to sleep until later than adults and younger children and so therefore early school is making them all sleep deprived. Troxel uses her humor as a mother of a teen and her intellect to keep people listening to her speech. Troxel builds ethos and trust by stating that she is a sleep scientist and she studies sleeping habits. Troxel starts off her speech with pathos in her story about waking her son and at 0:55 saying "How can I -- knowing what I know and doing what I do for a living-- be doing this to my own son?" (Troxel). But throughout the speech Troxel tends to lean more towards facts and statistics, or logos such as "only about one in ten [teens] gets the eight to ten hours of sleep per night recommended by sleep scientists and pediatricians"(Troxel). The most important example of logos Troxel uses is a series of facts starting at 5:46 some of which include that "teens with sleep problems were 55 percent more likely to have used alcohol in the past month... for each hour of lost sleep there was a 38 percent increase in feeling sad or hopeless, and a 58 percent increase in teen suicide attempts"(Troxel). This is the most compelling part of her argument because it shows that not getting enough sleep is one of the main things hurting the youth in this country and causing the youth to lose faith in the society and themselves. This shows an underlying cause of an epidemic was sleep deprivation.
Troxel is an incredible speaker and she shows that in her speech sometimes in simple things like the phrase "tired but wired youth" (Troxel) at 4:27, which has a good ring to it, it sounds very pleasant to the ears, but it also is a fantastic way of describing teens who are sleep deprived but are energized by caffeine. Troxel also has much bigger ways of showing off her knack for public speaking, such as at 8:39 when she describes the counter argument which is that we should not delay start times because " we need to toughen them [teens] up for the real world" (Troxel) but she then also states her point which puts it into perspective. This point is "that's like saying to the parent of a two year old, 'Don't let Johnny nap, or he won't be ready for kindergarten' " (Troxel). This is such and effective speech in that moment because Troxel puts sleeping and the ages of teenagers into what they really are, they are kids, and they will change when they grow up and enter the working world and will not need those delayed start times just as kindergartners no longer needed naps. The best audience for this speech is parents and school board members so they can try to make the difference where they live. Two important things to be learned from this is that school should not start before 8:30 for optimal learning for teens, and sleep deprivation causes many of the problems teens face today. One way to improve this speech would be to give information on how early teens usually have to wake up to get to school on time so the audience can have a fairly accurate guess of how much teens are actually sleeping. One question for Troxel would be would she ever just let her son sleep in and be late for school? Is sleep that important to her?
Troxel's speech fits in with the American dream because her speech is about making education and the world better for the children of this generation and a big part of the American dream is making things better for the next generation and having a good education system. Immigrants came to America to follow this dream and give their children a better life so giving children these better lives is one of the original American dreams. Having good public school is another American dream because it proves not everyone has to be rich to succeed and Troxel's speech she is trying to improve schools and the health and lives of children so she is following both aspects of the American dream. These aspects of the American dream go into the global dream because as a whole the world wants its children to live on happy and healthy for generations to come with a good education system. In Obama's Keynote Address to the 2004 Democratic Convention Obama mentions how his parents left their homes to give him a better life and better schooling and that goes along with Troxel's speech because she is trying to actively improve her son's school and physical health as Obama's parents were for him. A lot of the families in My Reality: A Hidden America were working hard to do the same for their children, improve their lives, in fact in most any text read where families had children the parents were always doing as much as they could to better their children's lives and that is the common thread that runs through Troxel's speech and every American family.
I liked Troxel's speech because it struck a chord with me as I have a problem falling asleep before midnight no matter how tired I am and Troxel gave me a reason behind that. It also gave very practical as well as sentimental reasons as to why the country should do what is best for the children which I thought was very persuasive because it spoke to different types of people and not just one way of thinking which I believe is the best way to make change. What I will take away from her speech is that it is normal for teens to stay up late and as a country still trying to better ourselves we should change our standards to help teens so that our school system can rise in rank with the rest of the world and our teens can finally be more healthy and happy. Troxel's speech stresses the importance of sleep and I believe every one of us could live a better life if we got a proper amount of sleep as a teen.
Troxel is an incredible speaker and she shows that in her speech sometimes in simple things like the phrase "tired but wired youth" (Troxel) at 4:27, which has a good ring to it, it sounds very pleasant to the ears, but it also is a fantastic way of describing teens who are sleep deprived but are energized by caffeine. Troxel also has much bigger ways of showing off her knack for public speaking, such as at 8:39 when she describes the counter argument which is that we should not delay start times because " we need to toughen them [teens] up for the real world" (Troxel) but she then also states her point which puts it into perspective. This point is "that's like saying to the parent of a two year old, 'Don't let Johnny nap, or he won't be ready for kindergarten' " (Troxel). This is such and effective speech in that moment because Troxel puts sleeping and the ages of teenagers into what they really are, they are kids, and they will change when they grow up and enter the working world and will not need those delayed start times just as kindergartners no longer needed naps. The best audience for this speech is parents and school board members so they can try to make the difference where they live. Two important things to be learned from this is that school should not start before 8:30 for optimal learning for teens, and sleep deprivation causes many of the problems teens face today. One way to improve this speech would be to give information on how early teens usually have to wake up to get to school on time so the audience can have a fairly accurate guess of how much teens are actually sleeping. One question for Troxel would be would she ever just let her son sleep in and be late for school? Is sleep that important to her?
Troxel's speech fits in with the American dream because her speech is about making education and the world better for the children of this generation and a big part of the American dream is making things better for the next generation and having a good education system. Immigrants came to America to follow this dream and give their children a better life so giving children these better lives is one of the original American dreams. Having good public school is another American dream because it proves not everyone has to be rich to succeed and Troxel's speech she is trying to improve schools and the health and lives of children so she is following both aspects of the American dream. These aspects of the American dream go into the global dream because as a whole the world wants its children to live on happy and healthy for generations to come with a good education system. In Obama's Keynote Address to the 2004 Democratic Convention Obama mentions how his parents left their homes to give him a better life and better schooling and that goes along with Troxel's speech because she is trying to actively improve her son's school and physical health as Obama's parents were for him. A lot of the families in My Reality: A Hidden America were working hard to do the same for their children, improve their lives, in fact in most any text read where families had children the parents were always doing as much as they could to better their children's lives and that is the common thread that runs through Troxel's speech and every American family.
I liked Troxel's speech because it struck a chord with me as I have a problem falling asleep before midnight no matter how tired I am and Troxel gave me a reason behind that. It also gave very practical as well as sentimental reasons as to why the country should do what is best for the children which I thought was very persuasive because it spoke to different types of people and not just one way of thinking which I believe is the best way to make change. What I will take away from her speech is that it is normal for teens to stay up late and as a country still trying to better ourselves we should change our standards to help teens so that our school system can rise in rank with the rest of the world and our teens can finally be more healthy and happy. Troxel's speech stresses the importance of sleep and I believe every one of us could live a better life if we got a proper amount of sleep as a teen.