Why does it have to be one or the other? (Long post)

 Post-class Discussion Reflection, Uncategorized  No Responses »
Dec 122015
 

Having reread Berlin and Inkster’s “Current-Traditional Rhetoric: Paradigm and Practice,” I am convinced of its truth. As I grade final papers, I am simultaneously engaging in a post-mortem of my first semester teaching, and I see that the FAU Writing Program, at least as introduced to me, is firmly ensconced in the CTR theory camp, at least for freshman writing.

GTAs are not given any sort of instruction in pedagogy prior to stepping foot in the classroom. All we really are given to go on in the beginning is a book of texts (not a textbook), a work book, and a syllabus. That is, of course, until we’ve worked through 6700 and Colloquium. So, I found my pedagogical inspiration from the grading criteria provided in Elements, which instructs us to grade for argument, organization, evidence, grammar/formatting, and audience. Is it any wonder that I find myself chastised by Berlin and Inkster?

This past semester, I was the incarnation of the textbooks they examined. I didn’t exactly instruct the students to find, sharpen, and believe your thesis,” but just as these texts gave very little if any instruction on how to write an effective thesis, I felt lost just about the entire semester thrashing away at the ether trying to do more than evaluate arguments. I can tell students what an effective thesis is, but how can I get this through to their brains? I often felt useless when trying to get my students to move beyond a summary thesis and five paragraph essay.

Also, I have found it intriguing that there is no grading criteria for quality of writing. It seems perfectly plausible that a student could receive perfect marks for argument, organization, evidence, grammar/formatting and audience and write the dullest, a most dull and uninteresting paper. I haven’t experienced this, but I can certainly see the possibility. CRT leaves no room for creativity and expression, at least according to the grading criteria and especially considering the texts our students are writing on.

Berlin and Inskster do not acknowledge the benefits of this instruction, however. There is value in the instruction of form and genre. We are charged with preparing students for academic writing, and it would be wrong and a disservice to the students to take a wholly aleatory approach. Despite this, I do not see any reason why we cannot teach our students to be good academic writers and to be good writers at the same time.

 

 

 

 

 Posted by at 9:33 pm

Postprocess Theory

 Post-class Discussion Reflection  No Responses »
Dec 122015
 

What is good:

We have been told many times that one of our goals as freshman composition instructors is to teach critical thinking. While that matter has been the subject of some debate in our class, I think that of all the theory camps, the various post-process pedagogical provide the best approach to meeting this goal.

This is because these approaches make the students think in new ways, then write about them. When we have our students read Restak then write a reply to him in the manner of the prompts provided, we find it very frustrating when we receive back 20 pages of summary on the dangers of multitasking. An eco-composition approach would get the student away from summary and encourage them to examine the text in new ways. It is similar to using theoretical approaches in literary studies to examine text.

What is necessary/possible:

While this approach has quite a bit of promise, I think that a realistic approach to ENC 1101 (as it is structured by the writing department), precludes its implementation. While trying to have students critically think is necessary, there is simply too much to do in ENC 1101. It has always seemed to me that the true purpose of 1101 is to introduce the student to the genre of academic writing and teach the students the expectations of the compositional expectations of the academy.

Certainly, it is possible to introduce this pedagogical approach in ENC 1102. I say this with the caveat that I have not yet actually taught 1102, but it seems that this would be a better time to do so.  In fact, after having seen the sequence for 1102 that the writing department has provided, I am considering an eco-compositional approach to the feminist related pieces.

 Posted by at 6:59 pm

6700 Takeaway

 Post-class Discussion Reflection  No Responses »
Dec 092015
 

There’s more than one way to bait a rhetorical hook.

In the classroom, the neophyte instructor will likely choose a blended ideological approach to first year writing. This approach may change or it may never change. That the instructor is willing to be flexible, willing to accept new ideas and experiment with them to find what’s most effective is all that really matters.

Thanks for a great class J. Mason!

More Typewriter (just what you were hoping for)

 Post-class Discussion Reflection  No Responses »
Dec 092015
 

One typewriter benefit I neglected to mention in my inarticulate presentation is defense against surfing. For the writer, the typewriter is an excellent hedge against squandering hours on the web instead of working. A writer can, of course, temporarily disable connectivity on a laptop or desktop but how long is that going to last? Eventually the urge to Google something, the urge to log into something is going to rear up. Surely that’s not to say that you can’t be distracted by smart phones or tablets conveniently left sitting next to your typewriter. But those temptations are far more escapable. Working on a device that is internet capable is, by far, a less escapable temptation.

Thoughts on a Tech Tool

 Post-class Discussion Reflection  No Responses »
Dec 092015
 

Not all novels may benefit from management software designed to aid the drafting process. Though I think such tools are helpful for plot-driven novels, especially epics, they may not aid character-driven novels. To my mind they may saturate the writer’s characters with prescribed qualities and situations and therefore weaken or hide the unexpected discoveries the writer can make in the drafting process. I suppose, rightly or wrongly, that I have always considered the creation of character-driven novels to be something a kin to an unmapped journey. Perhaps that’s just the impression left on me from works that so often have vapory plots. Perhaps I’m really arguing for the converse but I don’t think so. I think there must be eureka moments in the drafting process that achieve their eureka-ness due to the absence of preconceived characteristics or trajectories held in the writer’s mind (or metal surrogate). A digital template seems an impediment to such moments.

THE FINAL POST

 Post-class Discussion Reflection  No Responses »
Dec 092015
 

So, I admit I’ve been terrible at posting on this. I mean, look at the date on this. I’m a horrible student.

…But this class has helped me think about my teaching a lot.

Going in, I was really more focused on what was being said in the readings. I got hyped for Richard Restak! I was going to…

…okay, I couldn’t get hyped for Richard Restak, I hate the guy with a passion after this.

But I was deterermined to teach people about these IMPORTANT IDEAS, and WRITING, at the SAME TIME.

And I do realize that I have an ethical duty to share those ideas, but I also know now that my job isn’t so much to be some sort of defmented social studies teacher, but a rhetoric teacher. That’s what these essays are for.

Hell, that’s why Richard Restak’s essay is full of more logical fallacies than a dinner conversation with my dad after a few drinks.

No one gives a DAMN about what any of these people actually have to say; it’s all about how it’s being said. And in the future, I want to make sure my syllabus reflects that.

I want to restructure my sequences so that they start with rhetoric, and move on to more engaging topics over time. I might even spend more time allowing my students to do their own research.  Though… I’m a little afraid as to what will happen.

…In any case, I want to thank you all for putting up with me during this semester. It’s been great.

 

 Posted by at 8:38 am

It’s All Been Said Before

 Post-class Discussion Reflection  No Responses »
Dec 092015
 

As Bartholemae argues, it’s impossible to discuss something without evoking what has been said (or rather, written) in the past. That’s come to light a few times in my grading.

During Essay 1, with one reading, I had a lot of students who basically just restated the reading’s main point. I gave out a lot of Cs, at that point. Over time, their arguements got more nuanced.

But when Essay 4 came around, with one topic? Everyone fell back into the pattern of restating things. It was FRUSTRATING. I was thinking, “is something wrong? How could my whole class be doing this?”

…Then I had a realization; it’s really hard to come up with an original thought when all you have is a single view point to work from. It’s not impossible, but there’s that whole inescapable pit of language thing. You either agree with it, or you disagree. That’s it.

So perhaps those early essays should be structured differently. Rather than having them focus on WHAT the author is saying, we should have them focus primarily on how it’s being said. How is this person making their arguement? Why are they doing it this way? I don’t care if you agree ot not, I want to know what the rhetoric at play is. Identify rhetorical devices and logical fallacies. Talk about what they might have left out, or have done differently.

Then, once they have a grasp of that, they can start constructing their own rhetorical arguements and persuasive essays.

 Posted by at 8:30 am

Students and Thought

 Classroom Praxis, Post-class Discussion Reflection  No Responses »
Dec 092015
 

So, I wanted to explain one of my philosophies in the light of the whole Cognitive “our students can’t think” angle that showed up in class.

Namely, the idea of encouraging students to think.

When I was in high school, I had thoughts. A lot of thoughts. Dumb thoughts, at times, but thoughts. It was a nerve wracking time for me. I was growing up in a Post 9/11 world, coming of age during the biggest financial crisis in decades, and reaching the point in life where I was expected to make some sort of final decision about my life. There was a lot going on in my head.

But my issue was… well… I wasn’t sure what to do with it. My biggest moment of enlightenment came when I was assigned a simple pre-class response, where I had to explain why I liked a certain song. I knew why I liked the song. I had feelings associated with the song. But I had never been asked to put them into words before.

And… that’s really what our job is, right? Teaching people to put thoughts into words. Doing so will give people a more nuanced understanding of those thoughts, but it doesn’t mean they weren’t there to begin with.

 Posted by at 8:22 am

Can writing change the world?

 Post-class Discussion Reflection  No Responses »
Dec 082015
 

During the first week of class, I cynically read Bizzell’s “Composition Studies Saves the World!” in response to Fish’s “What Should Colleges Teach?” I remember thinking, “Writing. We should teach writing. Leave the rest alone.” I was surprised that this was even a debated topic. I didn’t encounter ideological debates in the classrooms of my undergraduate career – not in philosophy, journalism or composition courses – and didn’t expect to. Now that the semester is ending, I wish these debates had occurred. Bizzell wasn’t suggesting indoctrinating students, but simply encouraging them to question the rational behind rhetoric that surrounds us, so they can eventually interpret the world on their own well-reasoned terms.

In the beginning of the semester, I saw class discussions as a way for students to understand the text and prepare for their essay. I remember covering our first reading, Restak. from a comprehensive perspective instead of rhetorical. During class, I assigned groups to dissect different pieces of the text and create an outline. While this may have been useful for developing a close reading, we didn’t move to a critical analysis. By the end of class, discussions were our main activity. In one of my classes, students readily engaged with one another and challenged them on their beliefs. Students began to see that this rational, argumentative discussion was an extension of what they should be attempting in their writing.

I also began to see that beliefs form in the act of writing. Until an idea is articulated, it only exists as a thin, vague possibility. Students agreed, saying they often didn’t realize they believed something until the pen began to move. Through these individual perspective evaluations, hopefully people begin to critically evaluate their own beliefs and the arguments surrounding them. So yes – writing changes the world, and this can start in composition classrooms.

Post-Presentations

 Post-class Discussion Reflection  No Responses »
Dec 082015
 

It wasn’t just the nutritional components of presentation night that made it memorable (although  it did rose-color an already engaging and entertaining experience). What really stuck were the plethora tools and services available to aid educators and researchers in their endeavors. In terms of educators, this was especially true of unique assignment-crafting. With the ease and accessibility of ReelDirector, the video-editing app Ashley presented, I can feasibly assign a weekend project on a reading and utilize the results for my own pedagogical applications! If I’m in a social-epistemical mood, I might require my students to signup and build a profile via Kathleen’s Wattpad. And I’m digging graphic design at the moment, I’m not hesitating to assign a project around Trina’s Piktochart.

More than anything, the presentations made evident that pre-essay assignments don’t have to be the dry brainstormings and bubble-outlines of yesteryear. Utilizing these technologies won’t only make for more material engagement–their use acknowledges and appeals to the largely digital interests and inclinations of our students.

 

 

 

 

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