Source #2

This article, Revealing Silence: Rethinking Personal Writing, dealt with many of the issues I have with personal writing in the classroom. Gere talks about getting personal narratives that are far too painful to read, often about death, abuse, and rape. She says that sometimes they are"too painful to read". She ends with saying that this a part of the student and this other part must come out for the student to move on in their writing careers.

Gere does realize one particular downfall of using personal writing in the classroom and it involves the idea of colonization. She takes a quote from bell hooks to explain, "No need to hear your voice when I can talk about you better than you can speak about yourself. No need to hear you voice. Only tell me about your pain. I want to know your story. And then I will tell it back to you in such a way that has become mine, my own. Re-writing you I write myself anew" (216).

This is a particularly fascinating idea mostly because I've never came across it before. But it's true, we take someone else's story and re-tell it in a way that keeps us involved as the author. I thought this was a particularly good part of the article.

Gere, Anne Ruggles. "Revealing Silence: Rethinking Personal Writing" College Composition and Communication. 53 (2001): 203-223. Jstor. MSU Library, Springfield, MO. 12 March 2009.

Source #1

I should first probably inform everyone of my topic before I get into the sources. For English 621, my paper will be debating personal narrative based writing or sourced, academic writing assignments in BW classrooms. From what I've found so far, BW classes should utilize both types of writing, starting out with personal writing and moving into academic writing.

The article I found, Personal Writing Assignments, was written by Robert J. Connors and appeared in the College Composition and Communication in May 1987. This article gives a history rundown of how personal writing assignments have been used in Composition classrooms. Connors focuses early on in the article on classic rhetoric and draws from the great Greek and Roman philosophers to prove his point. He stresses the importance of rhetoric in early "classical" educations and talks about how during the time before the Romantic movement.

He basically says that the Romantic movement, first and later, modal discourse (narration, description, exposition, and argument) that were the initiators of the personal writing movement in composition. He concludes with the same basic idea I have already mentioned, "On the level of practical teaching, most of us take, I think, a sort of middle position. Learning that one has a right to speak....is an important step. Personal writing...is necessary for this step, especially when one is being encouraged to enter the conversation at age eighteen" (181).


Connors, Robert J. "Personal Writing Assignments." College Composition and Communication. 38 (1987): 166-183. Jstor. MSU Library, Springfield, MO. 12 March 2009.

My Literature Fear Realized!!!!

I was Facebook chatting with a friend of mine last night and she was telling me about her Composition class at Middle Tennessessee State University. She is going back to school to pursue a degree in social work, but her grades from MSU were too low in composition and she had to retake the course. She was complaining about the constant revision, so I explained the reason why the teacher had her revise. Then she went on to tell me the teacher has them read As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner. It's a great book; I'm not all trying to bad mouth it. But giving it to freshmen students, in a Comp class, does this sound strange to anyone else?

She also told me that the instructor was writing his thesis on the book, so therefore, he subjected his class to reading and writing about it too. She also pointed out that any time anyone in class had different ideas about the book, he would immediately shut them down and offer up the "right" opinon.

I just thought I would offer up this story to show that my fears of a composition class turning into a literature class were real and legitimate. I also thought that book was far too hard for freshmen to take on in any kind of beginning class. Let me know what you think.

I know this may sound harsh, but I don’t expect all students to succeed in the classroom. It isn’t always the students’ fault if they don’t succeed. Sometimes they have outside things that happen to them that make it impossible to devote the needed time to their writing. This happens.

I expect from the basic writing student to be just like any other student: willing to learn, willing to do the work, and willing to be there in the classroom. I do realize that there is one exception with basic writing students. They have been told their writing isn’t good enough. To be told that something as personal is writing isn’t good enough is a hard blow. I understand that they are angry, upset, and/or frustrated. Like I said in my earlier post, teachers and students have a relationship that requires work. Students should expect to do that work in order to improve. Shaughnessy says on 293, “The BW student merely comes to them [problems with writing] later than most and must therefore work harder and faster to solve them”.

I do expect to see improvement from students, but I do not expect to see it overnight. As Shaughnessy says, “Some lessons bear immediate fruit, some fall by the way, and others lie dormant until one day the student bursts out in an ‘I see!’ or produces a piece of writing that moves him, seemingly overnight, to a new plane of competence”. (276) I think it is going to take work and perseverance from the student and patience from the teacher to reach this goal.

Shaughnessy, Mina. Errors and Expectations. New York: Oxford University Press, 1977.

Teacher Expectations

In regard to Errors and Expectations, I believe that Mina Shaughnessy is right about ‘remediating’ teachers. It is important to remember that the teacher-student relationship is not strictly about one party or the other. Teachers should remember that they are paid to help the students. Sometimes this means adjusting the course and course work to the needs of the student. I’ll get into the job of the student in the next blog. This relationship is like any other relationship it requires compromise on both sides of the desk.

Shaughnessy asks on 286, “What is the goal of instruction?”. The goal, of course, is better writing on the sentence level and the overall structure and content of the paper. I think there is a deeper goal than just better writing-self awareness. She hits on this point earlier when she gives an example from a basic writing student. The student wrote an earlier piece, full of errors, and with an unsteady tone and syntax. The second piece she wrote begins, “I am the smartest girl in this class”. (277) She goes on to describe how she has gained confidence through every writing assignment. She also realizes that revision helps her out immensely.

The student now feels like she heard and that she is a part of the discourse community. She begins to see herself as an academic, as someone with a bright future. My expectation as a teacher is to give my students this same feeling, that they have a voice, it does matter, and someone is listening. I don’t expect myself to be amazing at teaching basic writing the first time, but as long as I help some students make the improvements to their writing and themselves, then I have done my job.

Shaughnessy, Mina. Errors and Expectations. New York: Oxford University Press, 1977.

More on AWP

As I said before in my previous post, I found many ideas from AWP that applied to composition studies. Another panel, "The Writer in the Community: Taking Creative Writing from the Campus to the People", discussed teaching creative writing outside of academia. One panelist worked in a retirement community, others worked in a rural community in a teen center, and another panelist worked with two inner city boys on writing novels. The interesting thing all panelists discussed was the resistance to revision. All the presenters said that once the students wrote, they were done with the piece. The participants in their programs all saw writing as a product rather than a process, something we encounter in composition classrooms all the time. Students don't see the point in revision. Once they are done, they are done with the essay.



Another problem that one of the panelists discussed was the distance between written language and language of talking. The panelist said the participants, both 17 year old boys, could describe the novels they were planning on writing in detail while talking about their ideas. When the time came to write the novels both boys had frustration and difficulty expressing their ideas in written form.



I've had the same problem with many of my composition students. Especially, when it comes to discussing complex issues surrounding the research argument, they can talk all day long about it. When it comes to writing they experience frustration. Students don't understand that the language we speak with and the language we write with are the same. They see them as two very different languages.



Going along with my other post, I think this is just contributing evidence that all writing is equal. No teaching of writing should be considered "better" than another kind of writing. If all teachers of any kind of writing are experiencing the same problems, shouldn't that mean that we should all come together to figure out how to solve these problems? Doesn't all forms of writing look for the same basic characteristics: clarity, word usage, structure, cohesiveness, etc? You could apply those chartacteristics to poetry, fiction, and yes, even composition. All writing in some form or another is also creative.

AWP

I just returned from the AWP conference in Chicago.  Though this conference is directed at creative writers I found many particular things that interested me as a teacher of composition.  

Firstly, at the panel discussion, "But That's Not Creative! Mentoring Creative Writers About Research, Teaching, and Service" one member of the panel called teaching composition classes both "soul crushing" and like "paying your dues" in response to an audience member's question.    The question was how to gain experience teaching creative writing classes when the only classes available to graduate assistants were composition. 

I would like to repudiate this statement with an anecdotal response.  As an undergraduate student I was a creative writer; as a master's student I am in the literature track.  I currently teach composition.  After graduation, I hope to find a job at a community college where I'm sure my teaching load will focus more on composition classes and less on teaching literature.   I personally think I am very fortunate to be in such a position.  I don't just teach English majors; I teach students from every possible major and background.  It's like Ken Gillam says, "Why do teachers only want good writers?  If all we had were good writers we wouldn't have a job."

Possible Wiki-Book Additions

I have my wiki-book additions narrowed down to two ideas. As you all know, I have an interest in using literature in the composition classroom, but I'm not exactly sure how I would relate that to a student audience. If anyone has any awesome ideas about this let me know.
The second idea I have is a section on choosing a topic. From my limited experience, many students have difficulty with this. After a discussion in 603 today, many GAs said that it was the part their students hated the most and struggled with. What makes a good topic to write a research paper or rhetorical analysis about? Why do students pick the topics they do? We're starting the research paper on Thursday and I'm going to have them do a freewrite about why they picked the topic they did, mainly because I'm curious. Just something I've been thinking about lately.

Articles for Review

The two articles I chose for review are "Material Realities in the Basic Writing Classroom: Intersections of Discovery for Young Women Reading Persepolis 2" by Susan Bernstein and "The City University of New York and the Shaughnessy Legacy: Today's Scholars Talk Back" by a ton of scholars.
The reasons I chose these articles are pure self-interest. The first article deals with two young women's reactions to reading a graphic novel. The abstract says, "these women.....dealt with struggles against marginality and invisibility in a bureaucratic and unfamiliar environment." Not only does this idea seem universal, not just for women, but basic writers everywhere, it brings in literature to the composition classroom and shows reactions.
Last semester, in English 620, there was a lengthy debate about bringing literature into the comp classroom and my view on the matter suprised me. I'm a literature major; as an undergrad I was a creative writer, so by all accounts I should be for bringing literature into the composition classroom. After reading articles on both sides of the debate, I found I did not favor this action at all. I'm just curious to see how the author of this article did this without letting the class become a full-blown lit class (if she succeeded).
The second article deals with what we have been talking about in 621 and reading in the Representing the Other book. I'm curious to see what other people think about the open enrollment at CUNY and how it affected the basic writing program at that school. Thirty years have passed since the school decided to go with open enrollment and it always seems like time gives better perspective to a situation than the actual moment everything is happening.

Who are basic writers?

I'm not even sure where to start to have an answer for that question.  I think people are basic writers for a myriad of reasons.  Some students were taught poorly, some didn't apply themselves when they were younger, others just don't believe in themselves, or somehow writing has burned them in the past, like a bad relationship they just wanted out of.  Mina Shaughnessy says, "For the (Basic Writing) student, academic writing is a trap, not a way of saying something to someone."  I don't think basic writers have the idea that the language people speak with and the language they write with are the same language. Academic writing is like learning a foreign language to them. Basic writers have a negative connotation attached to academic writing.  In academic writing, the tone and the voice changes, but the basic words remain the same.  

I think there is also an idea that academic writing focuses solely around grammar, spelling, punctuation, surface level things.  Academic writing is focused on the expression of ideas; that's the big picture here.  Basic writers sometimes get so caught up in the little sentence and surface level things, they become frustrated and forget about what they are trying to express in the first place.  They are so busy looking at all the imperfections, they don't see the picture.  An example of this idea is the list of false starts on pages 7 and 8.  By false start 10 the writer is making lots of surface level mistakes and has moved away from the initial point.    

Lastly, and maybe the most important point, basic writers don't control their language, they let their language control them.  Basic writers have either a fear, a hatred, or an ignorance of their language.  They don't know or are unsure how to properly use language, so they avoid it.  

Professor X

After reading "In the Basement of the Ivory Tower", I understand why the professor in question decided to go with a single letter instead of a last name.  His/her opinion about teaching writing did not sit very well with me, or apparently, Mike Rose. 

 The first thing about this essay was the elitist attitude that he/she brought to it.  The overall tone of the essay was just mean, especially how he/she mentions "future police officers" or "future state troopers" every other paragraph.  He/she feels that future police officers or state troopers aren't in need of or capable of writing a paper or analyzing literature.  

Secondly, the writer of this essay has an overall crappy attitude toward teaching.  As a teacher, I have realized that if I go into the classroom thinking that my students will not understand something, I just become frustrated.  He/she says, that "I fail nine out of 15 students".  With any job, if I go in saying that I will fail, or my students will, then generally somebody is failing.  I also understand that students get bored, as the students did in the writer's class.  The students also may be picking up on some of bad attitude of their professor.  

The biggest problem I have with this essay is how Professor X lays all the blame for the student failure on the students.  I'm not saying that students are perfect.  (I've had some slackers and heard some of the lamest excuses ever.)  Professor X seems to sit up on his intellectual throne and look down on his poor peasant students.  That's not right.  

As for the actual writing, Professor X focuses on sentence level problems more than the context of the writing.  In the case of Ms. L's paper, "Sentences broke off in the middle of a line and resumed on the next one, with the first word inappropriately capitalized.  The was some wavering between single-and double-spacing.  She quoted articles, but cited only databases-where were the journals themselves?"  Professor X already knew that Ms. L lacked in computer skills.  I don't think it was a coincidence that most of the problems with Ms. L's paper were with grammar and formatting, both easily fixed if the student is apt with computer programs.  

Mike Rose apparently noticed this too because he says in his response, "writing filled with grammatical error does not preclude engagement with sophisticated intellectual material".  Error happens for various reasons.  More often than not, error happens because the student thinks they are correct or they learned something incorrectly.  There is almost always some sort of pattern to the error.  It is entirely possible to look beyond the surface and sentence level problems and see the content of the text.