Student papers

What should be important in a student paper? What should I, as a teacher, point out to the student?

Some teachers want to comment on everything in a student's paper. But then some students complain that that is too overwhelming. Some teachers want students to have impeccable grammar, but that's considered a low priority concern. It's important to figure out what is most important.

When I read about instructors' responses to grammar it seems like authors assume a binary approach to grammar. People are viewing grammar errors as colossal mistakes or they think that grammar errors are completely irrelevant. I think the evaluation of grammar must fall somewhere in between. No, a grammar mistake is not a reason to call in the national guard and force someone to behave differently. However, grammar exists for a reason. It makes writing more readable. If everyone spoke and wrote what was convenient for them, it would make communication more difficult. There has to be some semblance of clarity in the work.

Comp instructors also talk about the dangers of collaborative writing, and yet, it is considered a good thing because it forces the writers to think about things more thoroughly. I think grammar should fit into a similar type of format. Collaborative writing forces a writer to think about audience. It forces a writer to prepare and not wait until the last minute to do the writing. Good grammar works the same way. The writer should think about what people will think while they are reading the work-- does the grammar make it the content more clear? If a writer writes ahead and then proofreads his/her work, grammar errors usually decrease.

Inventing the University

The phrase "Inventing the University" seems so ideological. I would love to invent my ideal university. To think about about the things that I think would really make a great learning environment. But, that's not what this post is about. This is about David Bartholomae's article. He feels like students must invent the university in order to write successfully-- but I don't think he's discussing invention. He wants students to figure out what his expectations are and then write to those.

Students are faced with a daunting task when they have to write qualifying exams in English. What qualifies someone to be a good writer? The problem is that I don't think many people think the same things qualify.

Bartholomae brings up several problems that occur in composition classrooms, but he doesn't necessarily provide solutions. I agree that audience and appropriation are problematic in a composition classroom; I'm just not sure how to solve those problems.

Technology in the classroom

In the year 2005, I'm not sure how anyone can think that technology doesn't have a place in education. Granted, some teachers have more expectations of technology than others, but I feel like the idea of using technology, at least in its simplest sense, should be expected by students.

The last sections in _A Guide to Composition Pedagogies_ have annoyed me. I don't feel like they are helpful at all. We should have writing center's on college campuses. Good. We should have a basic writing option for students who are part of open admissions and don't know how to write. I agree. We should help students use computers but it will be hard because computers are expensive. Yeah, so what. what involved with college isn't expensive? Tuition is expensive. Books are expensive. Parking is expensive. Living in the dorms is expensive. Eating on campus is expensive. If I had 10 cents for every time I had a student complain to me about some various expense regarding college I could work for free. But I don't, because expense is a reality, and it wouldn't be kind of me to charge for complaining about it.

Pedagogies are teaching styles. In a book explaining teaching styles, I would expect some stylistic information-- not a defense for why the style exists.

I probably shouldn't just spout off about the tone of the articles. I'm sure there are valuable pieces of knowledge tucked into the reasons why we should have these pedagogies and the 55 other things to read in order to know about them. Maybe it's the long bibliographies that are the most useful in this book-- I know where I can begin to find more information about this or that style.

Nevertheless, I'm sticking to my thoughts from days ago that say no pedagogy is an island. They just don't work by themselves.

Blending Pedagogies

I don't think there is one right pedagogy. I also don't think it is possible to teach using only one pedagogy. When I read about so many of these different teaching methods I realize I do elements of all of them. Especially feminist pedagogy. I've never fully considered myself a feminist, but I realize that I ask all of the important feminist questions when I teach. I'm concerned with representation and equality. But, I don't think feminist pedagogy is only about women now. I think it is really about the under-represented. That could be a gender, a race, a disability. I think feminist pedagogy is more about raising awareness period than about raising awareness about women.

I think my desire to raise awareness is what fuels my interest in service learning. I'm glad I'm teaching a Service Learning Composition class this semester, because I think it is important for students to get outside themselves and help others. I also think it does work to make the learning experience more authentic. It helps students understand about planning and responsibility and deadlines in a way that a regular classroom situation cannot. I'm looking forward to doing more work with service learning. It's interesting to me that it is considered a pedagogy. For me, service should be something people want to do, not a teaching style.

Writing Across the Curriculum is another pedagogy that I find intriguing. I think it's important for students to have resources that show them that various fields view writing differently, but I'm not sure where that resource should be. In my mind I feel like teachers of various disciplines should understand this more than students. How can a composition classroom bear the responsibility of teaching it's own discipline when it has to teach all of the other disciplines? I think WAC is important-- I'm just not sure it's a teaching style.

Cultural Studies

As I'm reading about various composition pedagogies, I came to Diana George and John Trimbura's essay on cultural studies. As I said before, in composition studies, I think content is important; therefore, cultural studies can add a dimension to content. But, I don't think the composition classroom is a place to limit cultures. My background is literature, so I think of examples from there, as I realize that it is important to understand the culture of the time or the author to fully understand some pieces of literature. I think that can be translated into the composition classroom. However, I don't think that all students should feel obligated to support the same cultural behavior.

Just spouting off.

Composition Pedagogies

I don't think I realized before how many ideas there were about how to teach writing. I also don't think I realized how differently people feel about what is important in a writing classroom.

I have 2 gut feelings.
1. Interested writers create interesting writing. Anything a student writes will be better if that student wants to write about that topic.
2. Content matters. I had a student this week outraged that the professor before me graded her on content. She'll be sorely surprised this week when she discovers that I do as well.

A writing assignment isn't a Seinfeld episode-- a paper about nothing. Otherwise it isn't worth the student's time to write or the teacher's time to grade. But, in a composition classroom, I can't get away from the idea that writing itself should improve.

Lad Tobin is a process guy-- He thinks students should always take part in the writing process. not necessarily Brainstorm, Draft, Revise, Revise again, proofread, publish, but that students should never think the first thing they write is the finished product. I agree with that. But with students and technology, I think that free for all writing is dangerous. It is too easy for a student to buy a paper that can be about anything.

Christopher Burnham discusses expressive writing and refutes the idea that it ignores theory. I think it's interesting because most theory is expressive. So, why shouldn't students put their own voice into their research and findings as well? One interesting thing I see Burnham addressing is that there is a difference between ideology and practice. What I'm now interested is seeing, or thinking about, is how to make that gap as small as possible.

Reviving the old

I had thought blogging would be such a great way to keep up with all of my reading. I would write about various things I read, especially children's literature, and make notes of it so that I'd have a handy resource to go back to, but then I found I didn't keep up because I just wanted to keep reading and not keep writing, but I've found the necessity of writing about what I'm reading, so I'm going to start this all back up again. This time though I'm just going to write about it all.