Week Two: MS Word for Composition Writers

"The greatest trick [MSGC] ever played was convincing the world it didn't exist."

Outside of jesting, however, Weiser makes a good point (544). The easiest way to make something "ubiquitous" and indispensable is to be useful, but to stay in the background, like a secretary who anticipates all needs before her boss asks for anything. But what if, one day, the boss needs something that the secretary can't anticipate, or she mixes up his requests in her head and gives him regular milk in his coffee rather than soy. That could be potentially "dangerous" (though I laughed when McGee/Ericksson made the comment that the "problems of the MGSC are numerous and often dangerous" (459)). It's not the same as a snake bite or sticking your finger into a piranha's tank to play a little coochie-coo. It is, I suppose, dangerous to a student's grade if she doesn't use her own reasoning and if the teacher does not allow first drafts for correction purposes.

I think that the one major assumption of this article is that teachers are going to be completely outside of the writing process, and that all that matters to these teachers is grammar. First off, if teachers only care about grammar, they are probably more likely to allow first drafts so that they can mark up the pages and hand them back for correction (it's almost addictive to use that little red pen for nit-picking). Secondly, teachers are not going anywhere. Until we all become cyborgs, like Sidler suggests could happen only to those able to afford it, teachers will not become obsolete. They need us. So, if we are conscious and we teach our students to be conscious and to think and edit for themselves, then everything should be just peachy.

This article spends a great deal of time going over all of the problems with MS Word, and I am not even certain that they are problems so much, anymore. It has been ages since I have had a squiggly green line that was not helpful, but I use Office 2007 or there 'bouts. I have not really tried to do anything out of the ordinary in Word in a while, but I have a feeling that the problems with Word that were expressed in this article might be outdated. So, the lesson here, as far as I can tell, is: Don't let your students swim alone, even if they're wearing those little orange floaties, not until they are confident swimmers.

Week Two: Label Me This, Batman

For the most part, I agree with Matsuda's idea of the "discursive" (65) nature of any sort of theory, especially if the proponents of the theory claim for it to be the be-all and end-all of theories: "Big Theory" (74). It took until the end of the essay to bring Kent and Mary Lawrence into the discussion, but they both seemed to have very good ideas about this whole process/post-process idea. 

I agree with Kent that all "writing constitutes a process of some sort," and whether this process is prescribed through teacher and peer input, or whether it is solely the process of the author, it is still a process. To say that writing of the latter sort is without a process is incorrect. I agree that students can benefit from finding their own voices and also from peer and professor-responses to the work, but, as I have said ad nauseam, it does not mean that we should discount all that has come before and has, until recently, informed our composition process.

I think that Lawrence's ideas (through Bruner, apparently) are excellent: "independence and accountability" should be at the top of every student's to-do list when they enter a college setting. Their culture will, inevitably, influence them, as will the cultures and ideas of their peers. As educators, we should also keep in mind that, with this individuality, comes a certain amount of open-minded evaluation of student work. We can't teach our students to think for themselves unless we encourage them to be their own people. Of course there are rules, but we have all bloomed into individuals within the rules of society, or in spite of.

Lastly, I understand that we must have labels and we must be able to take certain things for granted in order to function in academic situations, but it is hubris to think that there is no other way than the way that has been set before us as educators, especially when, as Matsuda says, the process theory (not to mention the post-process that was derived from it) "hardly reached the status of a paradigm" (78). 

Week Two: Sidler's Genetic Assumption

Other than scaring me, this article made me think about how important it will be for composition teachers to teach composition to non-English majors. I wouldn't say that all, or even most, composition teachers fall into the folly of thinking that all of their students will go on to become brilliant English majors, but it is a danger. My composition 122 professor was just such an educator. She fed us literary texts to be analyzed and discussed via compositional rhetoric and made us feel that we were on the wrong track if we verged away from her narrow view of academics. On the other hand, my composition 121 professor delved into science, mathematics, history and philosophy in order to teach us the importance of a well-rounded education.

Since the purpose of this course is to educate us as possible future educators, I feel that, for me, it is important to view these articles as tools for my future classroom, and Sidler's genetic analysis made me feel that it might be important to allow students to choose their own reading material (such as articles/short stories relating to their interests--with limitations, of course--or relating to their choices for professional majors) and then educate them on how to properly argue for or against what they have read. I believe that the argument is the key, not the subject matter. There are ethical, logical and even emotional arguments in any field that a student can enter into. The key is to teach them which argument will assist them the most in what they wish to accomplish and to give them the tools to make that argument.

Delving into the other part of the article was a little more difficult. Much of what Sidler was saying seemed irrelevant to anything but proving that genetic research is like composition, but this could be said for so many fields, especially of research, and much of his assertions (so he admitted) seemed to be choices on the part of the author and his contemporaries to view scientific research (both in genetics and computers) as parallels to the American English language(135).

Sidler admits: "This discussion may sound futuristic, irrelevant and maybe a little bit wacky, especially in the context of teaching composition" (138), and I agree. One of the biggest problems that I had with the M. Night Shyamalan movie Signs is that the lessons and themes in the movie could have easily been translated into a non-alien context, because the movie was more about those lessons (and the coincidences that led to some of them), than about the impact of the aliens in the world. This article could have easily taught its compositional lessons in another context.

I am very interested in science, especially genes, and yet I still had a difficult time swallowing this article within the context of composition. 

The 6-Essay Smack Down

I'm with Scott, I am so glad that I have completed the assignment for this week. I cannot believe how difficult some of the essays were to read, and how glad I am that the reading is done for the week. I will admit that I was able to learn some new and useful ideas from the essays, and that 

I daydreamed several times about instruction that I would be able to give, once I get my own composition class to teach. 

Some of the ideas that I have I included in my other blog posts, but I really would like to employ as many valued techniques as possible without going overboard, like I felt Williams did. I think that the best way to teach writing is to have the students write. That, to me, is a no-brainer. In my senior writing class, my professor had all of us write on a single topic at the start of every class. The subject would be so vague, like "doughnut" or "werewolf," and we would freewrite for ten-fifteen minutes. She allowed us to continue writing if we got rolling on a particular idea. The topics could easily relate to something cultural, or something from the previous class's readings, and then the students could use those freewrites to help them write their papers. 

I heard the coolest idea once of how writing should be conducted...You bring the naughty child (right brain) into the room and let him wreak as much havoc as possible, paint on the walls, toy trucks glued to the ceiling, the works, and then when he has done all the damage he can do, you lock him in a closet and let your well-behaved child come out (left brain), not to clean up the mess, per se, but to make sense of it. The freewrite at the beginning of the class would allow the naughty kid an opportunity to get some of his energy out (like telling kids to wave to their parents before the choir concert starts so that they are not frantically waving the whole time), and then mechanics can be introduced.

I am a firm believer with starting simple and working into complicated. Subject matter does not mean anything if students do not have the tools to correctly and adequately express their ideas on any particular topic. First come the mechanics and voice and then come important topics and theory. There are two comp classes for every student, and one semester for each (though I believe it should be a year, and I have a feeling not many other comp profs would disagree with me), and that is enough time to equip students with the basics. I do believe in starting with the five-paragraph essay to get their feet wet, focusing solely on one text (and I like anthologies because they tend to provide students with well-written and over-analyzed essays of which there is plenty of information), no research. Then, same text (give them the option of choosing which one they would like to focus on through weekly readings), introduce research, then comp theories, and have them roll it all into a portfolio that they will retain at the end of the semester.

Perhaps I am over-reaching and idealizing, but I do not see any flaws in this particular plan. Of course, that is what the readers of this blog are for. Tear, tear away.

Popken and Hopkins - Badovinac

This entire essay seems to focus on how difficult it is to be a composition instructor. I noticed that everything we read this week, somehow, focused on what we might be faced with as composition instructors, and this essay made me glad that I am planning to teach community college. University teaching seems like it would be such a difficult road. 100+ students in one freshmen composition class would be daunting to say the least. And I agree with the point that Popken made, ad nauseum, in this essay, that educators cannot properly educate if they are over-worked (632). All of the other lessons that the other five essays taught are completely worthless if an instructor has neither the time nor the means to follow through on proper instruction and analysis of papers.

I thought that getting those surveys filled out by faculty members from many colleges was a good idea, but it did not seem to produce any results. The graph on page 635 indicates that the ratio of students to faculty members had decreased from 1901 to 1925, and I have a feeling--from my personal experiences in different colleges and universities as an undergrad--that class sizes have still decreased since the early 1920s (and how much significance do those numbers have now or how much did they have in 2004, when this essay was written, other than to visually prove the point that teachers in the early 1900s were over-worked?). 

The same ideas, as I said before, seemed to run through the essay. Lower work = happier teachers = better education for the students. It wasn't that difficult a concept to grasp, and yet...I am sad for Hopkins that he retired without achieving the grand scheme of his goals. He was able to get smaller class loads near the end, but the quality for the other professors really didn't seem to improve, despite the information provided in Table 1, and I know that some professors continue to be overworked, in spite of the increase of TA's and professors available for courses.

Ultimately, I am choosing not to worry too much, in spite of this article. I know that teaching is not an easy job, and teaching composition can be a nightmare, but I choose to think of it as a challenge, at least until it sends me of the track like it did to Hopkins.

Stewart's "History for Comp Teachers" - Badovinac

Comparing comp/rhet back in the 80's to the new methods was the same argument that has been made over the last century (or more), debating whether grammar/syntax or content are more important (135). My reaction to this argument in Stewart's "Some History" is the same as it has been in the other postings. I wonder what the problem is in teaching both at the same time. I learned how to write well by paying attention to the editing marks that were given to me on my papers in high school. Why does there have to be this constant fight between rhetoric and mechanics, especially with "micro-computers which can do the things they do more efficiently and with less resistance from students" (136). Stewart had no idea how quickly this concept of word process correction would become a reality on every home computer in the country. Now we have green squiggles under our sentences if it is improperly formed, and a red line under misspelled words. While this is not a perfect system, students also have access to writing centers, peer reviews/workshopping, and many professors offer the option of a second or third draft as well.

The main argument that I have for these authors that we have read over this last week is the idea that old and new ideas are incompatible, and the only way to make things "right" is to overhaul the entire system. Stewart suggests chucking the entire 5-paragraph system, and even, partially the 3-piece essay structure (137). While these are good solutions for seasoned composition writers, basic principals must be learned by students before they will be able to be comfortable enough to experiment.

Stewart also offers a different grammar option ("Grammar B") that I thought would not be acceptable to most academic courses, and most departments would not want to accept this "radical" idea of sentence fragments and grammatical inconsistencies (142-43). The only way to accept Grammar B is to not have any sort of scales to measure by. Writing would become lazy and chaotic and, perhaps, incomprehensible. Last semester I took the Beat writing course, and some of the writing was so far outside of the accepted norm that it was nearly impossible to follow. While there is a certain popularity amongst bad grammar in emails and text messages, academia has always been on a different par than hand-written or typed letters from one friend to another, and certainly a difference between Dickens and a telegram from a woman in Toledo to her sister in Los Angeles. These inconsistencies in communication outside of academia have always been around, but we have not accepted them into our learning or composition practices, and I do not see the need to begin doing it now.

Additionally, what is there to be gained by over-hauling the entire system? Acceptance of new ways does not make a person necessarily progressive--just accepting, and if we can learn anything from history it is that it is folly to discard all that has come before in favor for what is acceptable and popular now. The English language has survived with basic composition for hundreds of years. I don't mean let's not change it, but what is the necessity for changing it entirely. I, personally, do not see any, except to make things easier on our students, which I think is also folly.

Bishop's lecture - Badovinac

Bishop's lecture was my favorite of all the compositions we read this week, not by merit of being better written or even having a lot of really good ideas stuffed into 10 pages, but because it was sweet and a little bit sassy. The contrast of the poems at the beginning and end and the playful manner of her public address made the article a welcome break from all of the compositional theory and argumentation that preceded and succeeded "Against the Odds." Even the cliche title made the article stand out in its light delivery. The language was very simple, since it was intended to be spoken rather than read.

It's not to say that the article was without merit or a bit of fluff thrown into this week's reading. On the contrary, the article indicated what it will be like for those of us planning on going into teaching composition. All of the articles in this week's packets suggested that composition is not the most respected course in academia, that those who teach it are "a dedicated minority by choice" (324). In other words, we are insane, but passionate about our role as educators. We have to keep up-to-date with the new theories that are constantly coming out and being developed while also developing our understanding of older methods. A composition instructor must, therefore, be constantly on the move as educator and composer.

The other main focus of the lecture is composition conventions, especially since the lecture is being given at one said convention. A lecture or panel at a convention can be a good way to experience composition at its most challenging and least rewarding. If the talks weren't already given my seasoned composers, I would say that it would be really good practice for beginning composition instructors in the thankless work before them. It's exciting, however, to think of all the options that are available to educators and composers, alike: "person to person, feeling safe and unsafe, challenged and rewarded, confused and enthused, fatigued and renewed" (332), which is what makes being an instructor more worthwhile than difficult.

Williams' "Packaging Theory"

The problem with Williams' essay is that he can't seem to make up his mind. He points out the positive and negative of every possible contingency of theory. He seems to think that there are many unseemly aspects to composition, and yet they also, in his opinion, appear to be necessary evils, such as the fact "that developments in literary studies are never independent and autonomous from market forces," which he treats negatively because "theory anthologies [are] institutionally circulated and governed bodies of knowledge" (284). The reason that Williams must admit that this is not such a terrible thing is that the only way to circulate literary knowledge, other than at seminars, etc. through public speaking, is through publication and distribution. People like to disparage popular art and writing, but the truth of the matter is that if a body of work is not seen by anyone, it cannot become part of curriculum, let alone literary theory. Publication is what gives credence to ideas (285).

Williams also gives a good deal of time to idealizing what could be the perfect way to teach composition. His own idea of work that can be done in the classroom seems to be fairly far-reaching. There is, in my opinion, a limit to how much can be properly absorbed in one semester. That is the unfortunate consequence of having only two semesters of composition required for college students, there doesn't seem to be enough time to get in all of the ideas and skills that will be necessary for students to move on in their respective majors.

I think that Williams' encouragement of teaching both major and minor authors is appropriate, however. It allows popular and unpopular ideas some stage time, which is how unpopular ideas can find merit and usefulness (286). The idea of blending compositional theories seems a little moot, however. I have not been in too many writing classes, composition or otherwise, where compositional theories have been mutually exclusive. Just by nature of being ways to analyze texts, they have much in common. Teaching one approach does not "tacitly seal off a 'theory' or an approach from other approaches" (289), not if the educator understands all of the concepts well enough to blend them together, especially if an educator can follow a philological approach that allows students to focus both on mechanics and voice (292).

I like Williams' notion that all writing is subjective, and none of it can be professed to be absolute fact. Composition is more opinion supported by facts for the basis of making an argument rather than gospel truth. Williams also points out the potential for composition to be best used in "professional forces and institutional structures" (292), in order to allow the greater percentage of students who take composition to be able to succeed in their selected professions. Now the only thing to do is figure out how exactly all of these goals can be managed.

Schultz's "Elaborating Our History" - Badovinac

Schultz's essay focuses on both prominent works of composition that were written in the 19th century and works that existed on the fringe, with emphasis on the importance of the latter. Schultz's primary argument is that these harder to find theories, which closely resemble much of modern theory, have been available for years and yet, because of their radical content, have not been put into practice until the 20th century. Schultz also confronts the old ideas of learning by rote and the ideas that students must be baby-fed literary theory through "memorizing and rules," mainly because teachers assumed that English must be taught the same way as a foreign language (14).

There was also a strong feeling in the text of pitting authors' ideas against one another: Morley vs. Frost vs. Walker, in which Walker is painted as the old theory guru who is out of touch with the modern writer. Though I mostly agreed with Schultz on her ideas that "the practice of writing" is just as important, if not more important, than learning the mechanics of writing (16) I didn't see what might be wrong with practicing as you learn. I agree with John Rippingham's comment that "The theory and idiom of the language must first be attained; for who can express his ideas by words the relative dependency of which he has not ascertained" (15). The more language that a person learns, the more clear and expressive thoughts can be, and to negate the importance of learning the basic rules can be dangerous. 

I agree with Morley that too often ideas and expressions can be taught without students knowing that they are learning, but that is the failure on the part of the educators, not the idea of teaching mechanics. I disagree with Morley that "the pupil should first gain thoughts, clear conceptions of things, and then learn their names--this is nature's process with the infant" (15). Infants learn through touch and association. You hand them a bottle and say bottle. Easy concept. But ideas cannot be touched, and they cannot be explained without language, and language cannot be effective unless it is understood. Perhaps spelling and grammar should wait, but language should not be withheld.

Frost seems to bridge this gap between the ideas of Walker, who supports the ideas of "exposition, argument and narrative," where "personal values experience" is not important, and those of Morley: "Frost maintained that at the same time that young students were learning grammatical principals they could write original compositions." His views were very similar to what I was taught, write with your right brain first and then bring in your left brain after your ideas have been expressed (18-19). 

What I am coming to understand about these assigned texts is that there are some very black and white positions in the academic world, and I have always felt that gray is the more realistic and rational approach. A hundred years is a long time to do the same thing, but to go to the opposite side of the bench and teach against what has already been laid down seems ludicrous. What could be wrong with combining approaches and finding a way to reach as many students as possible, especially that which concerns students whose intent after graduation is not to pursue English studies.

I enjoyed how Schultz did not limit herself to pursuing any one idea, and she also stepped outside of the box and cited a science teacher's view on teaching, and how that could benefit teachers of composition. It's advantageous to have the option of viewing composition from many angles.

Fulkerson's "Summary" - Badovinac

I would like to start by saying that this was the most frustrating of all the articles/essays to read. There was a paragraph on page 677 that did not make any sense at all. To me, the point of learning and teaching composition is to make sure that certain ideas and concepts are accessible to large groups of people, especially other writers and readers. The difficultly of reading this article was particularly irritating because there were so many good ideas in it. 

I enjoyed the idea that "paradigm shifts" in composition are different from that of other areas of education, because a scholar can go back in time to use older ideas while, at the same time, using more modern and innovative ideas. It's nice that the invention of new ways of composing do not negate those used by our forebears. A person must be highly adaptive to work in fields of English, even more so to work in English academia. It strikes me as funny that we have so many people working on how best to teach composition and yet we are still struggling, as teachers, to get students to write well.

I also found a very interesting scholarly blog about Chris Burnham when I was looking up the meaning of expressive pedagogy (655):

http://erickawillsprecis.wordpress.com/2008/09/14/christopher-burnhams-"expressive-pedagogy-practicetheory-theorypractice"/

I was at a loss on many of the ideas expressed in this article, and so I found myself using the internet profusely in order to discover what was being written about. 

There were a lot of ideas in this essay: process vs. pedagogy, action vs. theory, old vs. new, "heuristic" learning vs. didactic learning, subject vs. writing, and it seems that Fulkerson prefers the new learning over the old. It was from his essay that I discovered a lot of teaching methods that I would like to employ myself. I realized that one of the problems with the way that teaching is often executed is how "students must interpret to the teacher's satisfaction" (663). The very subjectivity of writing prohibits students from being able to write to their professor's desires. An educator's ideals and views should have nothing to do with how a piece of writing is read or graded.

Sherry Stanforth asks the question: "Was the goal to teach [students] better values or better writing or both?" It indicates how difficult a balancing act teaching can be. I believe, after reading this article, that the goal should be to get students' feet wet with simpler topics (pop culture, etc.) and then work them into more complex topics (to teach the basic theories of not only writing, but composition methods of argumentation, which goes beyond grammar and structure, before making the writing topics the center of the discourse). Plus, if students can learn to argue points of their own, regarding things in which they really believe, and about which they have strong ideas, there is much less likelihood of "indoctrination" (665). 

Expressive pedagogy/processes seem to be the best way to get a student writing about her own ideas, but it probably wouldn't really work for the long-term in academia, because first-person essays would probably focus more on opinion rather than making sound, thoughtful arguments based on research. So a good solution seems to be beginning with the expressive processes and then moving into the critical/cultural studies, including the more complicated "feminist pedagogy" (666). I believe that it is important for students to develop their own unique voice before becoming "au courant[s]" (670), before they can think about "writing for an audience" (672), and before they can "discuss the task in the language of argumentation: claim, evidence, assumption, counterviews, and refutation" (673). 

In response to Conclusions and Implications:

I believe that it is not necessary to discard an entire process just because part of it is not effective. Composition, writing and language are all fluid. The fact that "composition as become much more complex" means that no one process or pedagogy is going to be enough, even for the basic composition course. It seems that it would be most appropriate to teach students to be both "successful insiders" and "articulate critical outsiders" (679), and to give them the option of being either or neither. 

This essay does a lot of assuming, but the biggest assumption is that the person reading it is familiar with all of the texts that are referred to. This assumption made the piece more difficult to read, and perhaps it is an assumption that is widely held in essay writing, but a little bit of explanation of some of the ideas would have been appreciated. The research that I had to do as a result of the essay's convoluted delivery was, however, fairly beneficial to understanding the basics of composition and the purpose of it in education.

Why Comp Theory?!?

I am a nerd. Seriously. Not just a little, either. I love writing and I enjoy editing, and it occurred to me this week that I might enjoy editing more (because I am the designated editor amongst my family and friends) if what I was editing was written properly. I spend half of my time with each paper that I review worrying more about structure and grammar than content, which is, realistically, to be expected.

My dream, however, is to go beyond editing the papers (letters, emails) of my nearest and dearest to grading papers of students at the collegiate level. Teaching has always been a draw for me, and I know that if I can learn how to teach, I will definitely be more effective in the classroom. And, because of my own experience in school, I believe that if a student can learn to write well, she can accomplish anything. If I can learn in this class how to teach my students to write good papers, then I feel that I will be on my way to achieving my goals (as both educator and narcissist).

As I understand it, this class will focus mainly on us educating each other on the ideas that the most intelligent specialists in the field of composition and rhetoric have to offer. To me, that means that we will be learning how others have succeeded in teaching while, at the same time, finding our own footing in the same field.

I will admit, when I saw that this class was a requirement for gaining a masters in English, I had no idea what to expect. I read On Writing by Stephen King in my senior seminar as an undergrad, and had expected this class to be along the same ilk. Boy was I wrong! The saddest thing is that I received my bachelor's in writing and I feel that I have never really learned how to write. I have understood basic ideas of writing papers that will make professors give me a nice shiny A or B, but I never knew what made the papers good or why I might have succeeded when my classmates were struggling.

I felt like it was similar to learning how to walk. When we are small we take a few (hundred) missteps, but eventually we learn and, for the most part we do not have to think too much about how we walk. A person who has just been in a debilitating car accident, on the other hand, needs to learn how to walk again. Now, me knowing how to walk, even if I can walk really well, is not going to allow me to teach that person how to walk. I will need to learn muscle function as well as exercise management and will need to know exactly how either contributes to someone being able to walk. That seems to be what this class is for. 

After years of our students "knowing" how to write a paper, we will have to undo all that has been done and re-teach them how, not only to write, but to think. Mark Twain once said, "If we taught our children to speak the way we teach them to read [and write], we would all stutter." The same is true for composition and forming basic arguments. All students, in my opinion, are cripples until they get a teacher who wants to teach them how to think and write well. We must be the rehabilitators, we must go beyond the basic cookie-cutter education that most of us, I'm sure, received. To do this, we must know exactly what we are talking about, and all of the different forms of teaching and learning (that are within our power to learn. There are so many) before we can truly be useful as educators.

I feel that the structure of this class, and all of the different views on education that we will be exposed to, will allow us to accomplish the task of teaching others to be good writers. I also feel that, through this ability, our students will be able to succeed more readily in their college education.

There are three programs that are acceptable to get into medical school: a science emphasis, a math emphasis and, get this, an English emphasis. I know this because, at one point, I wanted to be a doctor. I wanted to help people after they had been in car accidents. I wanted to make a difference. I believe that teaching makes even more of a difference, because of the doors that can be opened for those whom we teach. I could save a life as a doctor, many, probably, but I could not give a person very many important tools to take into life with him after I had saved it. Here we are learning some important lessons to pass onto others, and, to me, that is pretty exciting.

Hello!

This is my sample blog to figure out if this really works.