Book Club

Analysis
“And I worried about me. I had always loved writing (at least away from school). I was a secret novelist who stuffed a thirty-page “manuscript” under my mattress at the age of thirteen. I wrote corny poems and gave them as gifts to friends and relatives. I carried with my the joy that my Aunt Cathy has saved every piece of my writing, including letters, cards, and a copy of my autobiography at age ten, in a box in her bedside table drawer. But – I had never kept a writer’s notebook. How could I possibly ask students and teachers to begin doing something I had never experienced myself?” (Hindley 13)
I really appreciated this passage and the subsequent paragraphs in which Hindley described herself as a person who likes to ‘save words’ (this went on for multiple paragraphs, so I did not transcribe them here). This part of the book struck a nerve with me because I could really relate to Hindley’s dilemma about requiring students to do something that you as a teacher have never done. I think that even having this dilemma speaks volumes about Hindley as a teacher because she clearly cares about the significance of the tasks she asks her students to complete – she wants each task to DO something for each child. How can a teacher evaluate the effectiveness of any task without having completed it him or herself? I think that is an especially important question to consider when implementing any new activity because it requires teachers to really dig into the heart of the activity and find what makes any given activity work, and why.
We, as teachers and tutors, should actively participate in lessons and projects with our students. What better way to see things ‘from the other side’ and gather invaluable insight on our teaching? On a larger scale, it is important to put aside biases we have as individuals against particular subjects and assignments in order to be an effective teacher for the diverse children with various learning styles who will inevitably show up in our classrooms. If you, as a teacher, are willing to try something that is uncomfortable or unfamiliar to you, your students will be more willing to do the same. Willingness to try something new sets an excellent example for students of any age!

Discussion Questions
1. Investigate Paul’s motives for reading the Goosebumps series, when he previously had little interest in reading at all. What was the turning point in his opinion about reading? (p. 92)
There are many factors that may influence a child’s desire to read: the topic of a book, the way it is written, a book’s popularity … The reasons a child may decide to read are as varied as the children themselves! It is important to look at all of the possible ‘sparks’ for children in order to reach as many students as possible. However, the most important thing to remember is that it is nearly impossible to predict a spark for every student, so teachers should provide a wide variety of books and encourage children to read different types (through read-alouds, book talks, etc.) to help children find their niche.

2. Justify the use of mini-lessons (as opposed to ‘maxi-lessons’) in the classroom. Hindley seems to rely heavily on these in her own classroom and references them often in this text. If they are as effective and important as Hindley says that are, why don’t more teachers use this format?
First of all, it is important to remember that just because something is not widely used does not mean it isn’t pedagogically effective. Though I got through school just fine with ‘maxi-lessons’, perhaps I would’ve done better with mini-lessons. Hindley certainly had me convinced of their use by the end of this text. They capture students’ attention about a particular skill/topic for a minimal amount of time (before the kids’ attention span runs out), then gives them ample opportunity to practice the new skill/concept. Since authentic experience is one of the most effective learning tools, this format is extremely valuable in the classroom.

3. Have you ever used or heard about writer’s notebooks in elementary school classrooms? Were they effective? Do you think writer’s notebooks would be effective at the high school or even college level?
I have never seen (or even heard of!) the concept of a writer’s notebook. The closest thing I’ve heard of has been a journal, but those have scripted prompts and are very structured in general – so they went against the whole point of a writer’s notebook, as I saw it. I think writer’s notebooks would be an effective tool at any grade because they invite creativity and experimentation. It is important to feel free to create writing in any form, because not all writers produce their pieces in the same way. I love how these notebooks encourage expression in many ways – everyone could benefit from that encouragement!

Why Study Grammar?

How can teachers walk the line between boring, isolated grammar instruction and no grammar instruction at all when teaching a variety of students?

I'm a believer in the idea that you have to know the rules first, and know them well, before you break them. I think this ESPECIALLY applies to grammar -- it is hard to take someone seriously if they are speaking improperly. I wouldn't take a grammar lesson from someone who told me "you gots to learn grammar or else you're not gonna be no good". That's not to say that this dialect doesn't have a place, or that it is not 100% effective for those who understand it and use it, but it's not standard English ... it's not proper grammar.

I think that in order to communicate with people we need to have some kind of common ground. Yes, people can speak their different dialects to varying discourse communities, but it would be nice to be able to walk up to a stranger and communicate with them without having to analyze their dialect first. I'm not advocating that we all speak the King's English or anything, I just think that we need to be able to have a baseline dialect for communication. In that vein, I really like Calderonello's idea that we should teach grammar in context -- not get bogged down with the nitty gritty rules and terminology, but teach children how to USE grammar effectively in everyday life.

Easier said than done, though. How can we take a class of various language-speakers and even more varying dialects and teach them all that baseline? An even harder question is: how can we make that fun?! I think the difficulty of these questions is why teachers often resort to language drills and standard-English, isolated grammar instruction. It is HARD to toe the line between improper grammar and 'good enough' grammar, especially when you have to take lots of student dialects into consideration. Is the best way to do this to simply correct grammar on papers and assignments and hope that it sinks in? Or are some sort of specific grammar exercises necessary? Where do we stand between the King's English and the chaos of millions of dialects? Where SHOULD we stand?

Technology in Writing

The article I chose is called electronic Texts in ESOL Classrooms, and it speaks to all the benefits integrating technology into learning brings. This is particularly true in ESOL classrooms, where students are typically behind, or lack confidence, or both. The authors' point is that "computers do not simply affect individual learning but tend to reshape classroom processes overall" (Meskill & Mossop 586), and they prove that over the course of the article. The programs the authors speak of are word-processing programs, where children can create (write, illustrate, etc.) stories and play games that support content and literacy in the classroom. These experiences allow these ESOL students to "practice the language and literacy needed for school" (Meskill & Mossop 588).

The biggest benefit of computers is that using them inspires and motivates students, changing the learning process from a teacher-centered one to a student-centered one. The authors say that the locus of control in internal; lies with the students, as the teacher's role becomes supportive instead of one of leadership. Children are excited to learn when a computer is involved! Students take responsibility for their learning and initiate learning experiences on compters. They are also extremely proud of their work and their success in school when they work on computers because their work is public and they can clearly see their work minute-to-minute. When given the opportunity to work with computers extensively in ESOL classrooms, ESOL students become well-versed in computers and can become leaders in their homeroom classrooms when it comes to computers, another sense of pride and accomplishment.

Ultimately, computers help ESOL students acheive, and allow them to be proud of their achievements!

Using Textual Sources Persuasively

If the problem in college-level writing is caused by writers being 'stuck' in main-idea/summary writing, why don't Elementary School teachers change their method of teaching writing? Is main-idea/summary writing appropriate for young children, but not for older ones? Why? Aren't young children just as capable of forming their own opinions?

That's a long question, and I know there are a lot of ways to answer it. I will probably only answer it partially myself, but I just wanted to put it all out there. Kantz's focus on college-level writing was not relevant to me as a teacher, but was certainly relevant to me as a student. I recognized the struggles she spoke about and appreciated her insight into how to 'bridge the gap' (excuse my use of her idea!) from high school writing to college writing. The more I read, though, the more I questioned the need to bridge that gap. If students were taught from a young age to think analytically and write critically, there wouldn't be a great divide. Students would not need to re-learn how to write ... and wouldn't that be incredible?!

I understand that young students must first be charged with reading comprehension questions, more to get the hang of reading properly than for any benefit to their writing. These questions are basic and of course must be addressed. However, why can't we ask them deeper questions, or allow them to delve further into the gray area between fact and opinion? I'm a big believer in the idea that simply setting high expectations for students is the greatest way to get them to succeed. How do we can we hope that students will learn to synthesize texts and integrate opinions into writing if we don't ask them to in the first place? While a third grader may not be able to analyze the U.S.'s involvement in World War II easily, he/she could certainly look up sources on the interactions between Virginia Indians and English settlers (and help reach an SOL, to boot!) I believe a third grader could look at these sources and pick out discrepancies, form his/her own opinion, and write critically about them -- if he/she is asked to.

Why don't we try to 'bridge the gap' by teaching students how to write effectively from the get-go? Great expectations often lead to even greater results! :)

Postmodern and Post-Postmodern Rhetoric

Do alternative discourses have a place in the classroom?

This chapter used a lot of words to describe a somewhat common problem in the American education system: people have lots of great ideas about what needs to/should be done, but have no clue as to how to implement them.

In my Studies in Literacy course, we just read a piece on Spanglish and its place in the classroom. The author argued that students should be able to use a combination of English and Spanish on a variety of assignments throughout the school year. We discussed this in class and I think it meshes very well with today's readings, especially with the segment on alternative writing styles. While I was reading, I was appalled to see that some teachers accept WRitInG tHat LooKS lIKe thIs in their classrooms. However, I was less appalled to read that some teachers accepted a comination of English & Spanish. Why is this? Perhaps because I see Spanish as a more accepted discourse, or at least a more widely used one. I might even say that I'm fearful of looking discrimanatory if I reject Spanish, but don't have that same worry when I reject ThIS tyPe oF WRitINg.

Either way, it is one thing to say that those forms of literacy have a place in the classroom but another to actually give them that space. How would a first-grade teacher, to whom simple things like capitalization and spelling are paramount, grade an assignment on which the student switches between Spanish and English or mixes capital and lower case letters? If the teacher doesn't know Spanish, she would have no idea how to correct the Spanish words, or have no idea if a seemingly improperly spelled English word is actually a Spanish one. She would be forced to give up on correcting capitalization altogethether! So, in a first-grade environment, accepting alternate discourses just seems like too much of a hassle. After all, you have to learn the rules before you can break them, right?

Perhaps in a classroom of older children or college students alternative discourses may have a place. At that point, hopefully students have learned the 'correct' (standard English) way to write, and can then be given more leeway in their writing style. Perhaps Spanish words can be put in italics, and teachers don't really have to worry about capitalization anymore. I might even go so far as to say that allowing teachers to completely take their focus off of such mundane things as spelling and capitalization might give them more freedom to speak to students about the theme, genre, and audience of their writing -- the more important things, in my opinion.

So, where do we draw the line?

Collaborative Learning

Consider the times you've been asked to learn collaboratively in your classes. In which subjects does it work best? In which subjects is it counterproductive? Why?

Before I read Bruffee's article, I never would have considered using collaboration in a writing class. To me, writing is personal and individualistic -- asking students to collaborate on a writing piece would take away the entire meaning of the process. This is probably because I've had a handful of negative experiences with writing in groups. My experiences have run the gammit ... I've had group members who have terrible grammar/spelling, those who don't contribute anything useful, and even those who plagiarize (and it's a well-known fact that I am on the Honor Council! Come on, people). The worst of them all, though, is working with students whose core ideas and thoughts differ from my own. It is nearly impossible to work collaboratively with a student whom you have nothing in common with! For all of those reasons, writing collaboratively has always been a sore subject for me ... but the I read Bruffee's definition of collaboration more closely.

It seemed to me that Bruffee treated collaboration in writing as an additional way to try to grasp concepts and ideas; working together to piece together an understanding of subjects. In this way, I wholeheartedly agree with him. He speaks about writing as an extension of conversation -- and that is how I operate. I learn things by talking them through, hearing other people's points of view and modifying mine. My writing often sounds stream-of-consciousness because I write like I talk. Bruffee and I definitely agree on this "conversation" thing.

However, I hardly think I'm alone in my preconceptions of how collaboration works in a classroom. So, how do we reconcile Bruffe's definition with mine? How can we modify our existing ideas about collaboration in order to use it effectively? I still think that collaboration works best for science or reading -- these subjects provide explicit instances about which you can compare opinions and understandings. Math is more straightforward, and there's not much room for disagreement. Writing is more personal, and there is a lot less to argue about because it's okay for each person to be right in his or her own way. Where can we collaborate effectively? And how?

Romantic Rhetoric

Does romantic rhetoric have to be the opposite of all of the other rhetorics we've learned about? Are romantic rhetoric and academic writing mutually exclusive?

I find myself often caught up in the same movement that sparked romantic rhetoric: the need for personally meaningful academic experiences. Perhaps this is because of my major: as someone Elementary Education, it has been drilled into my head that the best way to learn is through authentic experiences: let children use their senses to begin to understand a concept, THEN scaffold their learning through other means. After learning about the multitude of benefits this way of teaching offers, I find it hard to turn to any other method without finding it significantly less effective.

In my Elementary Education classes, we also learn about the problems that standardized testing, namely, the SOLs, pose. Some children have trouble mastering the specific facts that are included in the SOL curriculum but could give an outstanding explanation of a phenomenon not explicitly tested. Doesn't it make sense to assess students by giving them an opportunity to share their knowledge about a certain topic, as opposed to drilling them with multiple choice questions? And, does it always make sense to teach children from two totally different walks of life the same things? To some extent, yes -- I believe all children should know how to read, write and do everyday math effectively. But should the student who dreams to be an accountant be asked to master the same skills as the student who wants to be a potter? I don't think so. Perhaps specialization should be introduced into schools earlier than the college level. It's no accident that children learn best when they understand the significance and relevance of what they are learning, so it is important to make their education relevant to their lives.

Some people say that asking students to write about what is important to them, about relevant and personally-significant things, disallows them from learning how to write academically. Why does that have to be the case? Aside from the fact that students often enjoy writing in the romantic rhetoric style, that style is the best way through which children LEARN. So, why can't we apply this style -- which is an excellent teacher -- to the type of writing we want our students to produce? Why can't we use romantic rhetoric to teach students how we want them to write? Isn't there a happy medium? It makes no sense to me that the most effective teaching method and the most effective writing method have no common ground. So, why don't we combine the best way to teach with the best way to write?

Revision Strategies

Though we read 3 pieces for today's class (and all were correlated), the one that struck me the most was Sommers' piece entitled Revision Strategies of Student Writers and Experienced Adult Writers. I had a lot of "aha" moments -- the best part of learning, in my opinion!

I loved Sommers' idea that "the extent to which [students] revise is a function of their level of inspiration" (79). Isn't that true about most anything? I think most people find that when they are inspired, they tend to go the extra mile. We're actually learning about this is my economics class, too ... the concept of incentives. Whether those incentives are intrinsic or extrinsic, they cause people to work harder and perform better ... right?

My first "aha" moment was also on page 79, when Sommers said "writing is translating: the thought to the page...". I thought this was especially shocking because this is EXACTLY how I write: transcribing my thoughts on to the page. I wrote about this extensively in my Writer's Profile because I don't think my writing style (ie transcription) fits in very well in academia. My writing truly sounds like someone is speaking, and most renowned authors don't write as they speak -- or at least I don't read them as speech. Does that even make sense? So, here's my question: is writing as translation appropriate? I don't really see Hawthorne or Hemingway or any of the greats doing it, but Sommers seems to pay positive attention to it. Is writing simply transcribing thoughts to a page, or do "real" writers go an extra step to make it sound more "written" (aka fancier or more flow-y or more formal)?

I saw myself again on page 80, when Sommers commented, "the students decide to stop revising when they decide they have not violated any of the rules for revising". That is so so true! It's hard to revise your own thoughts, because they make sense to you -- you know the back story and what you meant to say, even if the words on paper aren't crystal clear. So, plenty of students, myself included, stick to simple editing when looking over their own papers. If I'm not breaking any hard-and-fast rules, I consider myself good to go. Is this true of anyone else, or am I just a particularly lazy person? When someone else revises my work and allows me to understand my work from another perspective, it's easier to review the ideas of my piece -- without a fresh pair of eyes, though, it's too hard!

What a wonderful idea: "a piece of writing is never finished, just abandoned" (p. 81). I think I will use the term 'abandoned' exclusively in my classroom! This phrase absolutely hits home the point of writing and revising: that there is always more to be done. Then students won't think that by simply reading and revising their work a set number of times that the work is automatically perfect and/or finished. Perhaps I'll set my deadlines like this: please have a number of drafts completed before we abandon this piece on April 30. How neat is that?! That is such amazing language to use in a classroom: so clear and concise, really getting to the point -- your work is not done, but we simply have no more time to devote to it. Perhaps I will bring out the abandoned work months after the assignment and have students revise their work some more. That would really drive home the idea that writing is an ongoing process!! I love that I was able to take away something concrete that I KNOW I will be able to use in my classroom ... this is why I am taking this class. What fun!

New Rhetoric and Best Practices

I'm SO glad to finally be getting into stuff that I can really see the importance of. Not that the other stuff wasn't important, but reading about things I can picture myself doing in the next few years is fun!

I thought the section on New Rhetoric was interesting because it seems so simple! Focusing on the process through revision and individualized instruction seems like the best way to create writers, hands-down (at least compared to what I've read about so far) ... so why isn't it used more often? Williams seems to understand that the whole point of this method is allowing students to take the process at their own pace and make it into whatever is most helpful and productive for them. He makes it so clear to his readers in this chapter! Why, then, do most teachers misuse this method? Obviously (at least to Williams and I), the reason this method works is because of its flexibility and individuality -- so why do teachers insist on "fossiliz[ing] the [writing] stages as composing universals"? The 'universal steps' are meant to be more of a guide than law, right? If I'm just a lowly college student and I get that, why can't experienced teachers? Or is it harder than that? Perhaps Williams doesn't address the difficulties of this method fully. He touches on them, saying this method is "incongruent with the assembly-line organization of public education", that "collaborative work groups can be very difficult", and that "individual conferences can be a daunting challenge". My main issue with Williams stems from this passage. In this text, he often brings up issues/problems/holes in logic, but rarely addresses them. In this case, he simply said it was worth it to overcome these challenges ... well, HOW?! There are a lot of improvements to be made to the school system if 'just suck it up' is considered an acceptable answer to teachers problems. So, if these issues are overcome-able, how do teachers overcome them? Explaining how to implement this process is how to get teachers to use it correctly. Providing answers to questions and solutions to problems is how to make this system as effective as it was designed to be!

The "best practices" section was extremely applicable to my future career. Thank you, Williams! He spoke about the process approach again in this system, further mourning the improper implementation of it. My comments above still stand. I really appreciated his three-factor approach: asking students to write often in meaningful contexts, providing frequent feedback on work in progress, and requiring lots of revisions. In this case, I loved how Williams told teachers exactly how to accomplish those three goals: through writing workshops. However, do the obstacles mentioned regarding the process approach (individual conferences and group work proving to be a challenge in the classroom)? I would assume so. How, then are those obstacles overcome? I really appreciated the examples Williams gave about each stage of the composing process (invention, discussion, freewriting, outlining, etc.). How should teachers choose which activities to use in their classes? Should the teacher make all of them available and have the children choose from among them, or make a limited amount available, or have each student try each method once, or have Mondays be designated for one activity and Tuesdays for another, or ... the possibilities are endless! What is most effective? I understand that allowing the students choose is the best way to go, but how do teachers facilitate that? I'm sure the students should be exposed to a variety of options before they are allowed to choose one. How does one go about that? Also, the "pausing" section (p.117-118) REALLY confused me. What is the point of pausing?! I think the "phase model" example really summed up this section well -- the stages are in flux depending on each student's process; they reoccur and are interchangeable depending on the students. Love it!

Contemporary Rhetoric

I really enjoyed this practical look at teaching writing, and found myself comparing my "teaching style" to each style of teaching writing that Williams explored. His thoughts about teaching the way you were taught is certainly valid and sound, but I think that the more we talk about that issue, the less likely it is to happen. I feel like I've heard that over and over and, as a result, am going to be extremely cautious of that phenomenon and critical of my reasoning.

The section I found myself putting the most notes in the margin of was the section on current-traditional rhetoric. I liked where this school of thought was coming from: the idea of "writing as thinking", hence, teaching students to think will produce good writers. However, I don't understand why so many teachers view the study of literature as a way to cultivate critical thinking. Where did that come from? What is the reasoning behind that ... or do teachers simply teach that way without thinking? Is this an example of teachers teaching as they were taught, or do people truly believe that literature fosters creative thinking? I, like Williams, have noticed the shift in instruction from essay to letter writing because I was a product of a letter-writing curriculum! I know how to write business letters, friendly letters, personal letters, memos ... the list goes on. Is that a signal of low standards, or do teachers actually think letter-writing develops critical thinking skills. I cannot imagine many people believe the latter, so I consider the former: haven't most (if not all) teachers learned that student performance is a function of expectation? Low expectation leads to low performance, and high expectations lead to higher performance. If all a teacher expects of a student is for him/her to be able to write a letter, of course they won't be able to interpret literature or think critically!

A quote that really got to me was on page 45, when Williams said "instruction includes little, if any, attention to audience and the reasons for writing but instead focuses on the form of writing, as though composition somehow exists outside a social context. That's impossible, not to mention completely ineffective. I think you'd be hard pressed to find someone who would write a note to his/her boss in the same way he/she would write a note to his/her child. Yes, maybe the person would use the same simple form: greeting, body, closing, but would the language, grammar, or content be similar in the two? Probably not. I love that Williams spoke to the importance of parts in a whole -- how each "type of writing" (compare/contrast, description, exposition) can be found in the same piece. These types are not mutually exclusive. Instead, they are all intertwined. Williams sums it up concisely when he says "by focusing on bits and pieces of writing ... the current-traditional approach ignores most of what writing is about". I absolutely agree!

My favorite part of this section was when Williams explained the complete ineffectiveness of this model by saying that writing is not an ordered process and cannot be sequenced: that it's too complex for that. He scorns the idea that "writing is like baking a cake" -- the precise way writing was taught to me! Williams adds that a specific, certain-number-of-steps writing process produces shallow, unreflective writing, and no one wants that! While I might have been offended by Williams "attacks" on the way I learned before reading this section, I now understand the uselessness of the cake analogy, and hope to change my writing instruction as a teacher. I don't want to fall into the "teach as you were taught" trap!

Foundations of Rhetoric

I'm a junior at JMU who has been pretty successful thus far in my college career. You can safely assume that I read well and am also fairly apt at reading for comprehension. With that being said, I could hardly get through this chapter. I picked it up and put it down at least 5 times, having read a few pages but having gotten too bored to possibly go on. I kept hoping that it would get better, but it didn't. I did read the whole thing, but about 10% of it actually "stuck" because it wasn't presented in a way that made me understand. SO ... I'm not really going to talk about the same "main ideas" Williams did in this chapter. Honestly, I couldn't care less about these people due to the way the information was presented. I admit that knowing the background of the things you are teaching is important, and I know that this information will probably be useful one day ... but really, Williams?! REALLY? It didn't even seem like HE was interested.

Reading this chapter made me think about how terrible it is to have a teacher who couldn't care less about you or your interests. As a partially college-educated person, I understand that meaning and knowledge can be gleaned from just about anything if you look for it. However, I also understand that finding that meaning is far easier, not to mention far more enjoyable, if someone makes it relevant. Answer the question children are perpetually asking: "WHY?" It's probably safe to assume that the people in this WRTC 340 class are more academically motivated than your average American, so maybe Williams thought that motivation was enough. Well, it isn't. When presented with boring, over-my-head, who cares information, I revert right back to my whiney 6-year-old self, begging anyone who will listen to make it stop.

Children are completely egocentric. This is developmentally factual. So, when a teacher presents them with material, it must be related DIRECTLY to them. Otherwise, they won't understand it and will not be able to successfully, independently apply that information. While teens and adults are not as developmentally egocentric as children, I think they're still pretty darn self-centered. So, why not help them apply what is being taught to their own lives? If the material being presented is SO important that it must be taught, there should be some pretty obvious implications to everyday life. Even in high school. Even in college. I would even daresay that it's true in the workplace. Someone wants you to know this specific information for a reason, so why not enlighten the learner?! Tell the learner why, and they'll learn better. They will internalize the reason and hopefully become intrinsically motivated to learn. The need for gold stars and snacks as prizes will lessen because students will understand WHY. They will understand that they will personally use this information in the years to come, that they'll thank their teachers later. Teachers have some amount of power over student's apathy. Don't allow them to be apathetic ... show them why it is important.

Now, I'm not saying that answering the "why" question will solve all behavior problems and make under-achievers straight A students. But if answering one question will help children find meaning or score higher or simply be spared the absolute, undeniable, make-me-want-to-cry boredom that I just experienced, why not?!