Please visit my new blog entitled "A Rose In Winter" to view my final project. Here is the link:
If the link doesn't work, just type this address:
http://katpalmer12.blogspot.com/
Awesome class! Good luck to everyone!
Friday, April 29, 2011
Sunday, April 24, 2011
Beliefs About Writing and Learning-Revisited
Time to reflect and revisit ideas presented this semester and juxtapose them next to beliefs I had at the beginning of the semester. As a current teacher of writing -- in a high school composition class of senior Advanced Placement level students -- most of which are brighter and more motivated than those I would face in a standard freshmen composition class at the college level -- my standards for what it means to be a teacher of composition cannot really be altered much in terms of the high standards I expect of my students. I have always viewed writing with an open mind in terms of what can be done with it and have also resented the restrictions I have had in the past and present in terms of the methods I am allowed and not allowed to use in which to teach writing. So, this course has opened my eyes to what is now being considered in college level composition courses new ways in which to teach writing as new media influences the ways in which students compose. It has also inspired me to think of teaching composition in terms of viewing the act of writing as an act of composing. With that in mind, I will briefly revisit the original questions posed to us at the beginning of the semester.
1. Some people struggle with writing because they are not comfortable with the particular materiality of the writing process in which they are required to write. Some people would thrive better in a situation that allowed for them to compose in a media and format that is most comfortable for them and frees up the most potential for creative thinking.
2. I still believe some are more talented at writing than others and always will be. For someone like me to believe otherwise is to denigrate a talent that I myself possess. However, I do believe, with practice, writing, like any other skill, can be improved greatly. And hidden talents can be freed-up by alternative and varied methods of written composition.
3. I still go with my original answer. Writers need feedback and an audience for their work in order to improve. Maybe this can now be accomplished with our on-line writing communities and audiences, too.
4. I still enjoy picturing Hemingway at his old black Underwood in Paris. But, I realize that is an antiquated picture easily replaced by the lone blogger in a Starbuck's, shutting out the external world as he composes a new world on the screen.
5. I don't need to re-reflect on writing images in my head. At my age, there are too many. Writing and the teaching of writing has been a part of my life for a long time.
6. Technology is a fair weather friend and we must recognize its power and its shortcomings. Any skill that can be learned is technical in its way (like the writing process). Technology -- wonderful and exciting as it is -- should be used wisely as we should never become so dependent on it that we forget how to think and do things without it. And I don't say that with any kind of moral judgment or moral panic. I just think that even in Socrates time, when Plato and his buddies were scared that writing and reading would replace oral storytelling and teaching, the best remedy to that fear should have been to embrace the new but not forget the old. And lo and behold, hundreds of years later, we can still communicate, teach, tell stories, with only our mouth and our memories. Make new friends but keep the old.
7. My answer to 7 has not changed much except to add that technology has definitely changed the writing process. For me and everyone else. I know that I now never draft anything out in long hand on yellow legal pads anymore like I used to. First drafts disappear completely unless I think to electronically save each draft. Sometimes I do, sometimes I don't save drafts. My brain works too fast for my handwriting skills -- my typing skills keep up better. I haven't quite mastered the art of thumb typing though, so my text messaging composition skills are lacking. Technology has definitely changed the writing process for the better for all writers. We just need to remember to safeguard our work against file corruption!
8. My answer hasn't changed much. Writing is social and private, but with the advent of the internet and text communication devices, it has become much more social than ever before and definitely an outlet for those who believe even their most private thoughts should be on display for anyone to see. Fun for the exhibitionist and voyeur in all of us!
9. If we can combat illiteracy using new media technologies I am all for it. I still believe much of the work and initiative needs to be taken by those who are considered illiterate. You can lead a horse to water and all that . . .
10. I am excited by the new possibilities for writing and rhetoric in the digital age. Like I said -- it's a good thing -- but we still need to remember some of the good methods of old and incorporate them with new. I am also excited about the possibility of teaching outside of the high school environment as hopefully at the college level, if the texts we have read are any indication of what is really happening out there, instructors of composition will be able to embrace new media technologies and teach composition in alternative and exciting ways that will be beneficial to students at all levels and backgrounds.
I have much to think about and learn. As a teacher, I have been, and always will be, the perpetual student.
1. Some people struggle with writing because they are not comfortable with the particular materiality of the writing process in which they are required to write. Some people would thrive better in a situation that allowed for them to compose in a media and format that is most comfortable for them and frees up the most potential for creative thinking.
2. I still believe some are more talented at writing than others and always will be. For someone like me to believe otherwise is to denigrate a talent that I myself possess. However, I do believe, with practice, writing, like any other skill, can be improved greatly. And hidden talents can be freed-up by alternative and varied methods of written composition.
3. I still go with my original answer. Writers need feedback and an audience for their work in order to improve. Maybe this can now be accomplished with our on-line writing communities and audiences, too.
4. I still enjoy picturing Hemingway at his old black Underwood in Paris. But, I realize that is an antiquated picture easily replaced by the lone blogger in a Starbuck's, shutting out the external world as he composes a new world on the screen.
5. I don't need to re-reflect on writing images in my head. At my age, there are too many. Writing and the teaching of writing has been a part of my life for a long time.
6. Technology is a fair weather friend and we must recognize its power and its shortcomings. Any skill that can be learned is technical in its way (like the writing process). Technology -- wonderful and exciting as it is -- should be used wisely as we should never become so dependent on it that we forget how to think and do things without it. And I don't say that with any kind of moral judgment or moral panic. I just think that even in Socrates time, when Plato and his buddies were scared that writing and reading would replace oral storytelling and teaching, the best remedy to that fear should have been to embrace the new but not forget the old. And lo and behold, hundreds of years later, we can still communicate, teach, tell stories, with only our mouth and our memories. Make new friends but keep the old.
7. My answer to 7 has not changed much except to add that technology has definitely changed the writing process. For me and everyone else. I know that I now never draft anything out in long hand on yellow legal pads anymore like I used to. First drafts disappear completely unless I think to electronically save each draft. Sometimes I do, sometimes I don't save drafts. My brain works too fast for my handwriting skills -- my typing skills keep up better. I haven't quite mastered the art of thumb typing though, so my text messaging composition skills are lacking. Technology has definitely changed the writing process for the better for all writers. We just need to remember to safeguard our work against file corruption!
8. My answer hasn't changed much. Writing is social and private, but with the advent of the internet and text communication devices, it has become much more social than ever before and definitely an outlet for those who believe even their most private thoughts should be on display for anyone to see. Fun for the exhibitionist and voyeur in all of us!
9. If we can combat illiteracy using new media technologies I am all for it. I still believe much of the work and initiative needs to be taken by those who are considered illiterate. You can lead a horse to water and all that . . .
10. I am excited by the new possibilities for writing and rhetoric in the digital age. Like I said -- it's a good thing -- but we still need to remember some of the good methods of old and incorporate them with new. I am also excited about the possibility of teaching outside of the high school environment as hopefully at the college level, if the texts we have read are any indication of what is really happening out there, instructors of composition will be able to embrace new media technologies and teach composition in alternative and exciting ways that will be beneficial to students at all levels and backgrounds.
I have much to think about and learn. As a teacher, I have been, and always will be, the perpetual student.
Saturday, April 23, 2011
Author as Collector
After presenting the chapter "Box Logic" to our class, it got me thinking of the idea of author as collector. If composing is indeed a collection of ideas, who is to say how these ideas can or "should" be organized. (That reminds me, I have a very self-reflective friend, forever questing to improve himself, who is attempting to eliminate the word "should" from his personal vocabulary. The power of language, indeed!) But, back to organizing ideas. Poets have had a handle on this much longer. Why can't ideas be organized in ways that do not always make sense to a linear perspective? The writer does not even have to have total control of how the ideas are organized. The reader can also have an active role. All of this intrigues me as a writer and as a teacher of writing.
As an aspiring novelist, I know eventually I would like to experiment with alternate ways in which to organize a story. In class, I brought up Mary Robison's novel "Why Did I Ever" as an example. In it Robison reflects her main character "Money's" ADD by embracing the result of her own battle with writer's block. To combat it, Robison set about writing a series of ideas and character sketches on notecards which instead of turning into a "traditional" novel, she collected them, put them in an order that made "sense" to the story, and thus the novel was born. At first glance, one might think that this was taking the easy way out of creating a conventional novel plot structure, but as one critic notes, "Don't be fooled by the short sequences and the fast pace of Mary Robison's wry and tragic novel into thinking that this is a 'light' or an 'easy' book. Quite the contrary; each section, however brief, is finely crafted and perfectly in tune. The pathos that runs through the story -- and we get it in increasing doses as the novel unfolds -- is as heartbreaking as the humor is laugh out loud funny." To read excerpts or find this novel, see this link.
http://www.amazon.com/Why-Did-Ever-Mary-Robison/dp/1582432554/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1303572335&sr=1-1
Geoffrey Sirc's ideas intrigue me and inspire me to think of ways in which I can reach the creative and compositional sensibilities of my students by allowing them to be archivists and curators as well as architects of their ideas. As Sirc states: "So composition as craving: teaching students to feel desire and lack . . .I want students, for example, to be as obsessed about rap, as interested in creating their boxed homages to it as Cornell was about Fanny Cerrito. It's important, I think, to have students work with lived texts of desire . . . in order to develop a passional aesthetic like Cornell's and Benjamin's" (117).
In other words, I wish for my students as writers what I wish for myself. To not let form or structure hinder the voice and passion of their writing -- no matter what kind of writing it is. And to allow themselves to "collect" and "find" ideas that inspire them. As a teacher, and most intriguingly, as a writer, I hope to incorporate the objet trouve -- or "found object" into my writing assignments and my writing -- which as an idea is not new. Sirc quotes Apollonaire in 1912: "Prospectus, catalogues, posters, advertisements of all sorts which contain the poetry of our age: The collage technique, that art of reassembling fragments of preexisting images in such a way as to form a new image, is the most important innovation in the art of this century . . ." (118). As the aforementioned media was also new to that century, one cannot help but imagine what kinds of creations we as writers today can create using not only those types of media created 100 years ago that are still important today, but incorporating them with the new media of today. The possibilities are endless.
As an aspiring novelist, I know eventually I would like to experiment with alternate ways in which to organize a story. In class, I brought up Mary Robison's novel "Why Did I Ever" as an example. In it Robison reflects her main character "Money's" ADD by embracing the result of her own battle with writer's block. To combat it, Robison set about writing a series of ideas and character sketches on notecards which instead of turning into a "traditional" novel, she collected them, put them in an order that made "sense" to the story, and thus the novel was born. At first glance, one might think that this was taking the easy way out of creating a conventional novel plot structure, but as one critic notes, "Don't be fooled by the short sequences and the fast pace of Mary Robison's wry and tragic novel into thinking that this is a 'light' or an 'easy' book. Quite the contrary; each section, however brief, is finely crafted and perfectly in tune. The pathos that runs through the story -- and we get it in increasing doses as the novel unfolds -- is as heartbreaking as the humor is laugh out loud funny." To read excerpts or find this novel, see this link.
http://www.amazon.com/Why-Did-Ever-Mary-Robison/dp/1582432554/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1303572335&sr=1-1
Geoffrey Sirc's ideas intrigue me and inspire me to think of ways in which I can reach the creative and compositional sensibilities of my students by allowing them to be archivists and curators as well as architects of their ideas. As Sirc states: "So composition as craving: teaching students to feel desire and lack . . .I want students, for example, to be as obsessed about rap, as interested in creating their boxed homages to it as Cornell was about Fanny Cerrito. It's important, I think, to have students work with lived texts of desire . . . in order to develop a passional aesthetic like Cornell's and Benjamin's" (117).
In other words, I wish for my students as writers what I wish for myself. To not let form or structure hinder the voice and passion of their writing -- no matter what kind of writing it is. And to allow themselves to "collect" and "find" ideas that inspire them. As a teacher, and most intriguingly, as a writer, I hope to incorporate the objet trouve -- or "found object" into my writing assignments and my writing -- which as an idea is not new. Sirc quotes Apollonaire in 1912: "Prospectus, catalogues, posters, advertisements of all sorts which contain the poetry of our age: The collage technique, that art of reassembling fragments of preexisting images in such a way as to form a new image, is the most important innovation in the art of this century . . ." (118). As the aforementioned media was also new to that century, one cannot help but imagine what kinds of creations we as writers today can create using not only those types of media created 100 years ago that are still important today, but incorporating them with the new media of today. The possibilities are endless.
Wednesday, April 20, 2011
Students Who Teach Us
Note: Sorry again that I'm behind on the blogs. Hoping to catch up in a chunk this week while on spring break from my teaching job. Been thinking a lot about all of this material -- just haven't had a chance to get it all down. So, here goes.
I found the chapter on "Students Who Teach Us" to be alternately inspiring and infuriating. As a teacher, most of what I was "taught" by reading this chapter is the confirmation of an idea I have been harboring for a long time. Not every student -- not even every intelligent, talented student -- needs to be bound for a traditional academic college or university. What ever happenend to acknowledging that some people have talent for things other than what a traditional college education can bring them? If "David's" story teaches us nothing else, it is that a student like him has the talent and ambition to "make it" and become successful using the talent he is most interested in honing -- in his case -- web design. What would have been so wrong with steering a student like him to a school like, for instance, DeVry Technical University? I don't know much about a school like that, but I am hoping a traditional freshman comp. English class would not be part of the curriculum to succeed there. Why can't students go on to hone professional skills without someone attempting to make academics or academic writers out of them if they are just not interested in honing those types of skills? Shouldn't a person choose the kind of education that suits them best once they get out of the public school rat race? I've heard even from a few students at the "college prep" school where I teach that some of them wonder why they are being pushed to go to college when they really don't want to go. Why is it that we, as composition teachers, have to become all things to all students? Shouldn't there be classes geared toward different kinds of literacy and communication depending on the kind of field or interest that students have and want to participate in?
Cynthia L. Selfe points out that "to make it possible for students to practice, value, and understand a full range of literacies -- emerging, competing, and fading -- English composition teachers have got to be willing to expand their own understanding of composing beyond conventional bounds of the alphabetic. And we have to do so quickly or risk having composition studies become increasingly irrelevant" (54). While I can appreciate her point and her urgency, I also wonder how much we as composition teachers have to accept that written language is becoming increasingly irrelevant. Is it? Or are we just expanding our boundaries of "composition" to include other forms of communication. While I agree that non-alphabetic communication is compelling and more relevant to some students, I do feel that until that time that the written word and conventional forms of composition disappear all together (which is hopefully never), it is still the job of the composition teacher to teach students to think well on the page using the written word. We can and should expand our knowledge and acknowledge that some students have more talent in other forms of communication, but that is where "differentiated" instruction comes into play. If we teach to all forms of communicators -- the visual, the verbal, the tactile, and anything in between -- hopefully we can cover all bases and all learn from each other.
Which again begs the question: What is so wrong with taking what you "need" from education and leaving the rest? As Selfe states through David's case, that he does not "subscribe -- at least in the same way his teachers do -- to the print literacy values and practices that many faculty at his university still hold up as standards; he has found them, frankly, of limited relevance in his life, in his attempts to get an education and to enter a sphere of economic success and personal fulfillment . . .And, I suspect that if forced to choose between the traditional authority associated with a college degree -- based on the standards of and allegiance to -- print literacy -- and an opportunity to make a living as a Web designer . . . there would be little to sway him toward the degree" (54). Why does he need to make a choice? If he can gain "economic success and personal fulfillment" without the college degree, why does he need it? Is it society's guilty conscience that says he does? Why can't he attend a technical university instead that doesn't care if he can write a literary analysis or other traditionally academic paper? Or, is it that traditional universities, for fear of becoming obsolete or being accused of being "elitist" now feel that a college degree should be reinvented to acommodate a less academic kind of student? Is our point of embracing new literacies truly to keep up with the times or to acommodate students who are too distracted by the times to keep up with traditional methods of academic curriculum? Either way, the writing is on the wall. Students are different now than they ever were before and new forms of literacy do need to be embraced in the classroom. But, in embracing the new, we will hopefully continue to teach what is good about the old, or risk alienating students who still thrive by communicating with "traditional" forms of the written word. The key might be in finding the right balance to accomodate all.
I found the chapter on "Students Who Teach Us" to be alternately inspiring and infuriating. As a teacher, most of what I was "taught" by reading this chapter is the confirmation of an idea I have been harboring for a long time. Not every student -- not even every intelligent, talented student -- needs to be bound for a traditional academic college or university. What ever happenend to acknowledging that some people have talent for things other than what a traditional college education can bring them? If "David's" story teaches us nothing else, it is that a student like him has the talent and ambition to "make it" and become successful using the talent he is most interested in honing -- in his case -- web design. What would have been so wrong with steering a student like him to a school like, for instance, DeVry Technical University? I don't know much about a school like that, but I am hoping a traditional freshman comp. English class would not be part of the curriculum to succeed there. Why can't students go on to hone professional skills without someone attempting to make academics or academic writers out of them if they are just not interested in honing those types of skills? Shouldn't a person choose the kind of education that suits them best once they get out of the public school rat race? I've heard even from a few students at the "college prep" school where I teach that some of them wonder why they are being pushed to go to college when they really don't want to go. Why is it that we, as composition teachers, have to become all things to all students? Shouldn't there be classes geared toward different kinds of literacy and communication depending on the kind of field or interest that students have and want to participate in?
Cynthia L. Selfe points out that "to make it possible for students to practice, value, and understand a full range of literacies -- emerging, competing, and fading -- English composition teachers have got to be willing to expand their own understanding of composing beyond conventional bounds of the alphabetic. And we have to do so quickly or risk having composition studies become increasingly irrelevant" (54). While I can appreciate her point and her urgency, I also wonder how much we as composition teachers have to accept that written language is becoming increasingly irrelevant. Is it? Or are we just expanding our boundaries of "composition" to include other forms of communication. While I agree that non-alphabetic communication is compelling and more relevant to some students, I do feel that until that time that the written word and conventional forms of composition disappear all together (which is hopefully never), it is still the job of the composition teacher to teach students to think well on the page using the written word. We can and should expand our knowledge and acknowledge that some students have more talent in other forms of communication, but that is where "differentiated" instruction comes into play. If we teach to all forms of communicators -- the visual, the verbal, the tactile, and anything in between -- hopefully we can cover all bases and all learn from each other.
Which again begs the question: What is so wrong with taking what you "need" from education and leaving the rest? As Selfe states through David's case, that he does not "subscribe -- at least in the same way his teachers do -- to the print literacy values and practices that many faculty at his university still hold up as standards; he has found them, frankly, of limited relevance in his life, in his attempts to get an education and to enter a sphere of economic success and personal fulfillment . . .And, I suspect that if forced to choose between the traditional authority associated with a college degree -- based on the standards of and allegiance to -- print literacy -- and an opportunity to make a living as a Web designer . . . there would be little to sway him toward the degree" (54). Why does he need to make a choice? If he can gain "economic success and personal fulfillment" without the college degree, why does he need it? Is it society's guilty conscience that says he does? Why can't he attend a technical university instead that doesn't care if he can write a literary analysis or other traditionally academic paper? Or, is it that traditional universities, for fear of becoming obsolete or being accused of being "elitist" now feel that a college degree should be reinvented to acommodate a less academic kind of student? Is our point of embracing new literacies truly to keep up with the times or to acommodate students who are too distracted by the times to keep up with traditional methods of academic curriculum? Either way, the writing is on the wall. Students are different now than they ever were before and new forms of literacy do need to be embraced in the classroom. But, in embracing the new, we will hopefully continue to teach what is good about the old, or risk alienating students who still thrive by communicating with "traditional" forms of the written word. The key might be in finding the right balance to accomodate all.
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
Living in the Materiality Word
This post is for last week's readings on Opening New Media and Materiality. Sorry. Busy and sick last week, so just catching up now.
So, yesterday, I am sitting next to a woman on the train who is reading her Amazon Kindle. She either has poor eyesight or forgot her reading glasses, because the text was so big she was lucky if there were 10 lines of text on the screen. It drove me crazy watching her press the little side button every half a minute or so to turn the virtual page and it made me realize that it would not be fun or relaxing for me to read a book for pleasure (as opposed to reading for academic or other knowledge -- which is fine with me) using an Amazon Kindle. Granted I may not have to blow up the text that big (if I had my glasses) but the particulars of reading that kind of new media text is a materiality that is not friendly to my sensibilities as a reader. It is not a reading world in which I feel safe and comfortable -- at least not yet.
The texture, feel, smell, and physical presence of books is not something one can take easily away from a lifelong reader, scholar, and teacher of the written word. Although I get that I have to see text in a new way or become a teacher that is as obsolete as an IBM Selectric Typewriter or as clunky and ineffectual as a Hewlitt Packard Desktop Computer. However, I feel the need to pause for reflection here. Ten plus years ago when I was going through a divorce, a child custody battle, and changing careers, the only thing that would alleviate my acute attacks of anxiety was to go to a bookstore or library. Surrounding myself with books had a calming effect on me that was better and more positive than anything else I tried at the time -- including alcohol or prescriptions. During that time, I looked a lot like this well-known cartoon.
So, to quote the cliched statement that "books saved my life" is pretty significant for me.
To be practical, yes, it would be cool to have a device that makes text appear like magic and could be blown up to readable fonts when I forget my reading glasses. I am not saying new media text is bad -- and for many it is better -- but for some of us -- the "old way" is always going to be relevant or comfortable for us in ways that run much deeper than the opinion that we just need to get on the new media bandwagon.
But to recognize my own comfort levels with text only serves to make me realize that I must recognize, acknowledge, and celebrate the many levels of textual materiality in which my students are comfortable. Composing text in new media formats is something I already have my students utilize and I look forward to experimenting with more ways in which to turn student "writers" into student "composers" by unlocking creativity and ability through new media writing and the materiality of varied finished texts -- be they digital or crayon created!
Wysocki wants us to realize that "the materiality of writing might be understood to include social relations -- say, between students and teachers in the writing classroom; relations of rece, gender, class, ethnicity ,sexual orientation, generation, and region, among others within the classroom and/or the larger social realm . . ." This to me means that we cannot divorce ourselves from who we are as a person from who we are as writers and readers and teachers. So, it follows that we cannot expect our students to write or read or react to text or the materiality of text the same way we do or even the way the student next to them does. We all need to be comfortable "living" in the "materiality" of our words.
That being said, I spent an hour on Amazon. com last weekend doing searches for old, out of print books that I might want to buy someday and "preserve" in my collection. It had a familiar calming affect in the midst of the busy-ness of my weekend. Enjoying the experience of Amazon's virtual library of books may not be quite the same as surrounding myself with them in a building -- but it is a step in the right direction for me in opening my mind to new possibilites.
So, yesterday, I am sitting next to a woman on the train who is reading her Amazon Kindle. She either has poor eyesight or forgot her reading glasses, because the text was so big she was lucky if there were 10 lines of text on the screen. It drove me crazy watching her press the little side button every half a minute or so to turn the virtual page and it made me realize that it would not be fun or relaxing for me to read a book for pleasure (as opposed to reading for academic or other knowledge -- which is fine with me) using an Amazon Kindle. Granted I may not have to blow up the text that big (if I had my glasses) but the particulars of reading that kind of new media text is a materiality that is not friendly to my sensibilities as a reader. It is not a reading world in which I feel safe and comfortable -- at least not yet.
The texture, feel, smell, and physical presence of books is not something one can take easily away from a lifelong reader, scholar, and teacher of the written word. Although I get that I have to see text in a new way or become a teacher that is as obsolete as an IBM Selectric Typewriter or as clunky and ineffectual as a Hewlitt Packard Desktop Computer. However, I feel the need to pause for reflection here. Ten plus years ago when I was going through a divorce, a child custody battle, and changing careers, the only thing that would alleviate my acute attacks of anxiety was to go to a bookstore or library. Surrounding myself with books had a calming effect on me that was better and more positive than anything else I tried at the time -- including alcohol or prescriptions. During that time, I looked a lot like this well-known cartoon.
So, to quote the cliched statement that "books saved my life" is pretty significant for me.
To be practical, yes, it would be cool to have a device that makes text appear like magic and could be blown up to readable fonts when I forget my reading glasses. I am not saying new media text is bad -- and for many it is better -- but for some of us -- the "old way" is always going to be relevant or comfortable for us in ways that run much deeper than the opinion that we just need to get on the new media bandwagon.
But to recognize my own comfort levels with text only serves to make me realize that I must recognize, acknowledge, and celebrate the many levels of textual materiality in which my students are comfortable. Composing text in new media formats is something I already have my students utilize and I look forward to experimenting with more ways in which to turn student "writers" into student "composers" by unlocking creativity and ability through new media writing and the materiality of varied finished texts -- be they digital or crayon created!
Wysocki wants us to realize that "the materiality of writing might be understood to include social relations -- say, between students and teachers in the writing classroom; relations of rece, gender, class, ethnicity ,sexual orientation, generation, and region, among others within the classroom and/or the larger social realm . . ." This to me means that we cannot divorce ourselves from who we are as a person from who we are as writers and readers and teachers. So, it follows that we cannot expect our students to write or read or react to text or the materiality of text the same way we do or even the way the student next to them does. We all need to be comfortable "living" in the "materiality" of our words.
That being said, I spent an hour on Amazon. com last weekend doing searches for old, out of print books that I might want to buy someday and "preserve" in my collection. It had a familiar calming affect in the midst of the busy-ness of my weekend. Enjoying the experience of Amazon's virtual library of books may not be quite the same as surrounding myself with them in a building -- but it is a step in the right direction for me in opening my mind to new possibilites.
Wednesday, March 16, 2011
Leaving a 100-Year-Old After "Taste"
After reading all those English Journal articles from different time periods I can't help but marvel at how far we have not come. Most astonishing and bizarre to me are the things I mused about after reading Fred Newton Scott's "The Undefended Gate" published in 1914 -- almost 100 years ago. When he discusses that there is "no sign . . .that boys and girls of today like literature any better than those of a generation ago, or write any better" he could be sitting in the English department meeting I just attended today. The more things change, the more they stay the same I guess and there will always be some new barbarian at the gate we teachers of English must contend with in order to defend the "standards."
These "new and improved" Illinois State Board of Education Standards for English and Language Arts were the topic, by the way, of the English department meeting at my high school today. Without boring you too much, let me just say that the new standards are way more specific than they have been in the past and the word "Shakespeare" is actually written into one of the many new standards. Hmmm . . .
But getting back to high schools of yore (or is it yesteryear). In 1914, the year "The Undefended Gate" was published, Ernest Hemingway was a 15 year old sophomore at Oak Park High School (now known as Oak Park River Forest High School) just down the street from our fair city, the city, by the way, that this article was heard first as Newton Scott's Presidential address to the National Council of Teachers of English. This council meeting and what was later reported as a scandalous speech in The Chicago Tribune was held at the "Auditorium Hotel" in Chicago. You guessed it folks -- the very building which now houses our beloved Roosevelt University since 1947. See picture below.
It gets better. I found on line that "Ferdinand Peck, a Chicago businessman, incorporated the Chicago Auditorium Association in December 1886 to develop what he wanted to be the world's largest, grandest, most expensive theater that would rival such institutions as the Metropolitan Opera House in New York City. He was said to have wanted to make high culture accessible to the working classes of Chicago."
"High culture" accessible to the "working classes" of Chicago, folks.
Does anyone else see the delicious irony in all of this?
So I got to thinking. Newton Scott is blaming poor performance in English studies on the evil daily newspaper but young Ernie Hemingway sitting in his high school class room is probably at that moment dreaming of becoming a newspaper man. Yes, this boy who is attracted to the "uncultured," "brutal," and "filthy" printed word of the evil daily, who may have gone home, sat down with a snack, and enjoyed the "crude drawings of the insane" in the likes of "The Katzenjammer Kids" or "The Adventures of Tin Tin," got his start as a newspaper writer. Hemingway, this icon of American literature, put on par at times with (dare we say it) Shakespeare was not only influenced by the style of journalistic writing, but this style helped shape the future of American fiction.
Yet Newton Scott, unaware of all of this during his speech, of course, states that he is "bound to say that less has been accomplished in raising the general average of proficiency in writing and of literary taste than might reasonably have been expected, and it is high time that we faced the condition of affairs and inquired seriously into the causes of it." His villain is the newspaper, and The Chicago Tribune's response at the time
comes across to us as something that is hard to argue against. They paint Newton Scott as a privileged, cloistered academic who has lost his grip on reality and has no business being a teacher. Isn't this how we now feel about NEA Chairman Dana Gioia as he blames the "death of reading" on the evil internet? As Gioia slams on-line writing, what Hemingway in the making is blogging at this very moment?
Newton Scott wanted the English teachers of his day to "train the students to speak and write English well, to become familiar with the best literature, and above all to become fond of the best literature." That word "best" was certainly thrown around a lot in those days. As a matter of fact, the motto of Oak Park River Forest High School since 1908 has been "Those Things that are Best." If you go to their website today, you will still see that motto, emblazoned over the picture of a smiling African American male student, giving the "thumbs up."
No, I'm not kidding. See http://www.oprfhs.org
But, just as the face of the student population of Oak Park River Forest High School has changed since Hemingway's time, hopefully, what is considered "the best" in literature and writing has changed as well.
Though I'd bet money on the fact that "A Farewell to Arms" is still required reading there.
These "new and improved" Illinois State Board of Education Standards for English and Language Arts were the topic, by the way, of the English department meeting at my high school today. Without boring you too much, let me just say that the new standards are way more specific than they have been in the past and the word "Shakespeare" is actually written into one of the many new standards. Hmmm . . .
But getting back to high schools of yore (or is it yesteryear). In 1914, the year "The Undefended Gate" was published, Ernest Hemingway was a 15 year old sophomore at Oak Park High School (now known as Oak Park River Forest High School) just down the street from our fair city, the city, by the way, that this article was heard first as Newton Scott's Presidential address to the National Council of Teachers of English. This council meeting and what was later reported as a scandalous speech in The Chicago Tribune was held at the "Auditorium Hotel" in Chicago. You guessed it folks -- the very building which now houses our beloved Roosevelt University since 1947. See picture below.
It gets better. I found on line that "Ferdinand Peck, a Chicago businessman, incorporated the Chicago Auditorium Association in December 1886 to develop what he wanted to be the world's largest, grandest, most expensive theater that would rival such institutions as the Metropolitan Opera House in New York City. He was said to have wanted to make high culture accessible to the working classes of Chicago."
"High culture" accessible to the "working classes" of Chicago, folks.
Does anyone else see the delicious irony in all of this?
So I got to thinking. Newton Scott is blaming poor performance in English studies on the evil daily newspaper but young Ernie Hemingway sitting in his high school class room is probably at that moment dreaming of becoming a newspaper man. Yes, this boy who is attracted to the "uncultured," "brutal," and "filthy" printed word of the evil daily, who may have gone home, sat down with a snack, and enjoyed the "crude drawings of the insane" in the likes of "The Katzenjammer Kids" or "The Adventures of Tin Tin," got his start as a newspaper writer. Hemingway, this icon of American literature, put on par at times with (dare we say it) Shakespeare was not only influenced by the style of journalistic writing, but this style helped shape the future of American fiction.
Yet Newton Scott, unaware of all of this during his speech, of course, states that he is "bound to say that less has been accomplished in raising the general average of proficiency in writing and of literary taste than might reasonably have been expected, and it is high time that we faced the condition of affairs and inquired seriously into the causes of it." His villain is the newspaper, and The Chicago Tribune's response at the time
comes across to us as something that is hard to argue against. They paint Newton Scott as a privileged, cloistered academic who has lost his grip on reality and has no business being a teacher. Isn't this how we now feel about NEA Chairman Dana Gioia as he blames the "death of reading" on the evil internet? As Gioia slams on-line writing, what Hemingway in the making is blogging at this very moment?
Newton Scott wanted the English teachers of his day to "train the students to speak and write English well, to become familiar with the best literature, and above all to become fond of the best literature." That word "best" was certainly thrown around a lot in those days. As a matter of fact, the motto of Oak Park River Forest High School since 1908 has been "Those Things that are Best." If you go to their website today, you will still see that motto, emblazoned over the picture of a smiling African American male student, giving the "thumbs up."
No, I'm not kidding. See http://www.oprfhs.org
But, just as the face of the student population of Oak Park River Forest High School has changed since Hemingway's time, hopefully, what is considered "the best" in literature and writing has changed as well.
Though I'd bet money on the fact that "A Farewell to Arms" is still required reading there.
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
Literature Can Soothe the Savage Barbarian? On Taste and Class
One day in my AP Language Class, my students read a series of articles on the death of Princess Diana in order to analyze different audiences and purposes for each kind of article. I chose this particular subject for the students to analyze as it related to the current topic of Prince William and Catherine Middleton's engagement and Diana's death was an event that had happened in my student's lifetime -- although they were quite young. My students, who are a very diverse crowd both economically and racial/culturally had mixed reactions to the subject. Some of my students -- mainly the Asian, Latino and African American -- did not know much about the British Royal Family and one girl, whose knowledge of Princes and Princesses came primarily from Disney films, asked if the reason Princess Diana was called a Princess was because she was still a teenager. Didn't she become Queen when she became a grown up woman? This experience was sort of a wake up call for me about class, culture, and taste.
If your ethnic background does not take your family roots back to merry old England or even Europe, why would you be interested in all things British? Even British literature? This is why it should also not be a surprise to me that the Latino and African American English teachers in my school try to avoid teaching Shakespeare and the British Literature course. What is interesting about that is if I disdained to teach Toni Morrison or Sandra Cisneros, I would be called a racist. Aren't those guys being racist for disdaining to teach "the dead white males"? I would like to say NO on both accounts, because for most of us, it is simply a matter of taste.
David Hume reminds us that the temperate rather than the passionate nature will make us "happier" human beings. It is most of the time not within our control to experience good or bad fortune, so one should cultivate a calmer disposition in order to enjoy the ordinary days in life rather than let our extreme passions on good and bad days overshadow the joy of everyday living. However, one of the things Hume suggests adds to the joy of everyday living is our capacity to become passionate about the artistic beauty we choose to expose ourselves to -- specifically in literature. He notes that ". . . delicacy of taste has the same effect as delicacy of passion: It enlarges the sphere of both our happiness and misery and makes us sensible to pains as well as pleasures, which escape the rest of mankind . . .the good or ill accidents of life are very little at our disposal; but we are pretty much masters of what books we shall read, what diversions we shall partake of, and what company we keep . . . every wise man will endeavor to place his happiness on such objects chiefly as depend upon himself; and that is not to be attained so much by any other means by this delicacy of sentiment. When a man is possessed of that talent, he is more happy by what pleases his taste, than by what gratifies his appetites, and receives more enjoyment from a poem or a piece of reasoning than the most expensive luxury can afford."
That being said, even if one's background or culture does not naturally gravitate one toward what Hume calls the "higher and more refined taste" that does not mean teachers should not attempt to expose students to work they might not naturally gravitate toward. I like to use Literature Circles with my students which gives them somewhat of a choice. If I have to teach British Literature, students can at least choose their novel or author based on what they might most be naturally interested in. This has been somewhat successful, even with kids who had not been exposed much to British literature. Plus, my passion toward the subject goes a long way in showing students the beauty and power of the language of authors such as Shakespeare or Dickens or Austen.
Conversely, my natural affinity may not be to gravitate toward authors outside of my comfort zone, but have learned to love and appreciate work of multicultural authors. Refined and higher minded work does not always come from the dead white males -- and I never thought it did -- but I also think there is still much to be appreciated and taught from those tried and true classics.
Matthew Arnold believes taste varies between the classes of the Populace, the Philistines, and the Barbarians and he concedes that there is much to admire in the culture of all three of these classes. I think it is dangerous to pigeon hole the taste of humans into social classes, even if there is a lot of truth behind stereotypes and categories. As a teacher of high school English, I believe it is my job to expose my students and myself to a wide variety of taste in literature and to never look down on anyone's taste in literature or music or art. This kind of beauty does what Hume says it should do -- adds passion and happiness to our ordinary lives.
However, the question of what kinds of literature one should be exposed to in order to qualify as "well educated" is still highly debated -- but I think it is dangerous when the debate becomes too race and culture oriented. It should be a matter of taste. The educated palate should be able to, as Hume suggests, "judge the character of men, of compositions of genius, and productions of the nobler arts" regardless of the race or social class from which this work of art originated.
If your ethnic background does not take your family roots back to merry old England or even Europe, why would you be interested in all things British? Even British literature? This is why it should also not be a surprise to me that the Latino and African American English teachers in my school try to avoid teaching Shakespeare and the British Literature course. What is interesting about that is if I disdained to teach Toni Morrison or Sandra Cisneros, I would be called a racist. Aren't those guys being racist for disdaining to teach "the dead white males"? I would like to say NO on both accounts, because for most of us, it is simply a matter of taste.
David Hume reminds us that the temperate rather than the passionate nature will make us "happier" human beings. It is most of the time not within our control to experience good or bad fortune, so one should cultivate a calmer disposition in order to enjoy the ordinary days in life rather than let our extreme passions on good and bad days overshadow the joy of everyday living. However, one of the things Hume suggests adds to the joy of everyday living is our capacity to become passionate about the artistic beauty we choose to expose ourselves to -- specifically in literature. He notes that ". . . delicacy of taste has the same effect as delicacy of passion: It enlarges the sphere of both our happiness and misery and makes us sensible to pains as well as pleasures, which escape the rest of mankind . . .the good or ill accidents of life are very little at our disposal; but we are pretty much masters of what books we shall read, what diversions we shall partake of, and what company we keep . . . every wise man will endeavor to place his happiness on such objects chiefly as depend upon himself; and that is not to be attained so much by any other means by this delicacy of sentiment. When a man is possessed of that talent, he is more happy by what pleases his taste, than by what gratifies his appetites, and receives more enjoyment from a poem or a piece of reasoning than the most expensive luxury can afford."
That being said, even if one's background or culture does not naturally gravitate one toward what Hume calls the "higher and more refined taste" that does not mean teachers should not attempt to expose students to work they might not naturally gravitate toward. I like to use Literature Circles with my students which gives them somewhat of a choice. If I have to teach British Literature, students can at least choose their novel or author based on what they might most be naturally interested in. This has been somewhat successful, even with kids who had not been exposed much to British literature. Plus, my passion toward the subject goes a long way in showing students the beauty and power of the language of authors such as Shakespeare or Dickens or Austen.
Conversely, my natural affinity may not be to gravitate toward authors outside of my comfort zone, but have learned to love and appreciate work of multicultural authors. Refined and higher minded work does not always come from the dead white males -- and I never thought it did -- but I also think there is still much to be appreciated and taught from those tried and true classics.
Matthew Arnold believes taste varies between the classes of the Populace, the Philistines, and the Barbarians and he concedes that there is much to admire in the culture of all three of these classes. I think it is dangerous to pigeon hole the taste of humans into social classes, even if there is a lot of truth behind stereotypes and categories. As a teacher of high school English, I believe it is my job to expose my students and myself to a wide variety of taste in literature and to never look down on anyone's taste in literature or music or art. This kind of beauty does what Hume says it should do -- adds passion and happiness to our ordinary lives.
However, the question of what kinds of literature one should be exposed to in order to qualify as "well educated" is still highly debated -- but I think it is dangerous when the debate becomes too race and culture oriented. It should be a matter of taste. The educated palate should be able to, as Hume suggests, "judge the character of men, of compositions of genius, and productions of the nobler arts" regardless of the race or social class from which this work of art originated.
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
Oh Dream Weaver, I Believe You Can Get Me Through the Day . . .
Nietzsche, in "On Truth and Lies in the Non-moral Sense" expands on the Ancient Greek's concept of reality and non-reality by challenging us to try to remember that there was once a time when "human intellect" did not exist and there was no "knowing." This makes me think of Albert Einstein's quote of "To know is nothing at all but to imagine is everything." Nietzsche would probably agree with this in the sense that he seems to think that human existence could be nothing more than an imagined dream. Just where does the dream end and the reality begin? How do we know we are not dreaming now? This imagined reality is a concept that seems popular in this digital age, as evidenced by a recent influx of motion pictures devoted to reality and non-reality. My daughter points out that it seems many of these films star Leonardo DiCaprio, but whether that is relevant or not, one wonders if writers and directors had Nietzsche in mind when they created the film "Inception." (Here is where I wish I knew how to create hyper-text. Is it really simple to learn this?)
Anyway, for those who have not seen Inception, it deals with how the mind during sleep is able to trick itself into all kinds of beliefs about what is real. It is a breeding ground for the power of suggestion which allows, in this fictional tale, infiltrators to enter your dreams and alter your dream consciousness so much that it affects what you think or feel or believe in your waking consciousness. Nietzsche states that "Pascal is right in maintaining that if the same dream came to us every night we would be just as occupied with it as we are with the things that we see every day. Quoting Pascal, he continues, "If a workman were sure to dream for twelve straight hours every night that he was king, I believe that he would be just as happy as a king who dreamt for twelve hours every night that he was a workman." Nietzsche believes that man wants to alter his own truth or reality, as it is a way to experience the elusive happiness. "[M]an has in invincible inclination to allow himself to be deceived and is, as it were, enchanted with happiness when the rhapsodist tells him epic fables as if they were true, or when the actor in the theater acts more royally than any real king. So long as it is able to deceive without injuring, that master of deception, the intellect, is free; it is relased from its former slavery and celebrates its Saturnalia. It is never more luxuriant, richer, prouder, more clever and more daring." Is this an argument that the human intellect needs to occasionally exchange reality for imagined reality in order for it to thrive?
Nietzsche's belief is never more relevant than it is today as film, television, and computer-generated digital realities take over most of our "waking" lives, blurring even more the lines between illusion and reality, truth and untruth. Like Plato's men in "The Allegory of the Cave" we are sometimes more comfortable in our "shadow realities" or the the images projected to us on a screen. Why else would virtual computer worlds become so popular and virtual actions? Why become an actual rock star or tennis player when Wii can make you feel as if you are -- or, as Nietzsche would put it -- lie to yourself that you are what you imagine you are.
Next, I'd tell you to enjoy some scenes from Inception that I found on You-Tube, but I can't figure out how to post the video. Drat! My daughter was home from college and helped me last time. Seriously, it can't be this hard to figure out!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=OmY6A6YW-qQ
Anyway, for those who have not seen Inception, it deals with how the mind during sleep is able to trick itself into all kinds of beliefs about what is real. It is a breeding ground for the power of suggestion which allows, in this fictional tale, infiltrators to enter your dreams and alter your dream consciousness so much that it affects what you think or feel or believe in your waking consciousness. Nietzsche states that "Pascal is right in maintaining that if the same dream came to us every night we would be just as occupied with it as we are with the things that we see every day. Quoting Pascal, he continues, "If a workman were sure to dream for twelve straight hours every night that he was king, I believe that he would be just as happy as a king who dreamt for twelve hours every night that he was a workman." Nietzsche believes that man wants to alter his own truth or reality, as it is a way to experience the elusive happiness. "[M]an has in invincible inclination to allow himself to be deceived and is, as it were, enchanted with happiness when the rhapsodist tells him epic fables as if they were true, or when the actor in the theater acts more royally than any real king. So long as it is able to deceive without injuring, that master of deception, the intellect, is free; it is relased from its former slavery and celebrates its Saturnalia. It is never more luxuriant, richer, prouder, more clever and more daring." Is this an argument that the human intellect needs to occasionally exchange reality for imagined reality in order for it to thrive?
Nietzsche's belief is never more relevant than it is today as film, television, and computer-generated digital realities take over most of our "waking" lives, blurring even more the lines between illusion and reality, truth and untruth. Like Plato's men in "The Allegory of the Cave" we are sometimes more comfortable in our "shadow realities" or the the images projected to us on a screen. Why else would virtual computer worlds become so popular and virtual actions? Why become an actual rock star or tennis player when Wii can make you feel as if you are -- or, as Nietzsche would put it -- lie to yourself that you are what you imagine you are.
Next, I'd tell you to enjoy some scenes from Inception that I found on You-Tube, but I can't figure out how to post the video. Drat! My daughter was home from college and helped me last time. Seriously, it can't be this hard to figure out!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=OmY6A6YW-qQ
Tuesday, February 8, 2011
Night of the Living and Dead Word: On Dialogue
I'm constantly making my students dialogue with each other. Not only does this satisfy the current educational buzz term of "differentiated instruction," I also truly belive that they learn more and absorb concepts better when they "talk among themselves" about the concepts I am teaching them or the issues that come up in our readings. I teach AP Language and Composition and it is all about getting high school upperclassmen tho understand and analyze the power of language. It's about the art of rhetoric. So, dialogue as a genre being relevant to teaching? You bet it is. We do it everyday in our graduate classes as well.
According to Plato, the "art of the dialectic" has the "power of dividing a whole into parts and of uniting the parts in a whole . . . which may also be regarded as the process of the mind talking with herself." As I am understanding this, dialogue helps the mind to think better as it takes a topic and breaks it down and understands it through the art of a "conversation among friends" in the case of the Sophists -- friends that are worthy of appreciating your intellect and level of ideas. A concept becomes better understood -- a truth revealed in real time -- through the art of conversation or dialogue. It does seem slightly ironic that Socrates was such a critc of the written word -- calling it the "dead" as opposed to the "living" word. This makes me think of how Christians view the Bible as the "living word" which does not just mean the Catholic notion that the word becomes flesh in Jesus Christ, but also that the word in the Bible becomes "living" through the actions of those who read it and then decide to LIVE according to the teachings. Why couldn't Socrates see that his words would live longer when written down as they then would forever be the "living word" through people reading them and then living in accordance with the teachings.
Plato has chosen to preserve the words and teachings of Socrates through the genre of the dialogue. It is writing, yes, but it attempts to preserve what is amazing about dialogue and the living word as it is written in dialectic, conversational form. The reader gets a sense of the working of the mind of the Sophists as their ideas form freely -- or in flux -- as they come out of their mouths. The spoken word as Plato sees it through the Sophists is "transitory, diffuse, more elastic and capable of adaptation to moods and tones" and that the written word is "more permanent, more concentrated and uttered not to this or that person or audience but to all the world." What Plato has done then with the genre of dialogue is to take what Socrates and others said to a SELECT audience and preserve it for all time to "all the world." The genre of dialogue continues to happen each and every day in classrooms. It is just now we take those "dead words" on the page and keep them alive through the living words of our continued dialogue about the things we have read. In Plato's society -- in societies of the present -- and hopefully the future -- wherever there are thinkers to think and ideas to share -- dialogue will be an important tool of teaching, sharing ideas, and intellectual reflection -- whether that dialogue is preserved for future audiences or not.
According to Plato, the "art of the dialectic" has the "power of dividing a whole into parts and of uniting the parts in a whole . . . which may also be regarded as the process of the mind talking with herself." As I am understanding this, dialogue helps the mind to think better as it takes a topic and breaks it down and understands it through the art of a "conversation among friends" in the case of the Sophists -- friends that are worthy of appreciating your intellect and level of ideas. A concept becomes better understood -- a truth revealed in real time -- through the art of conversation or dialogue. It does seem slightly ironic that Socrates was such a critc of the written word -- calling it the "dead" as opposed to the "living" word. This makes me think of how Christians view the Bible as the "living word" which does not just mean the Catholic notion that the word becomes flesh in Jesus Christ, but also that the word in the Bible becomes "living" through the actions of those who read it and then decide to LIVE according to the teachings. Why couldn't Socrates see that his words would live longer when written down as they then would forever be the "living word" through people reading them and then living in accordance with the teachings.
Plato has chosen to preserve the words and teachings of Socrates through the genre of the dialogue. It is writing, yes, but it attempts to preserve what is amazing about dialogue and the living word as it is written in dialectic, conversational form. The reader gets a sense of the working of the mind of the Sophists as their ideas form freely -- or in flux -- as they come out of their mouths. The spoken word as Plato sees it through the Sophists is "transitory, diffuse, more elastic and capable of adaptation to moods and tones" and that the written word is "more permanent, more concentrated and uttered not to this or that person or audience but to all the world." What Plato has done then with the genre of dialogue is to take what Socrates and others said to a SELECT audience and preserve it for all time to "all the world." The genre of dialogue continues to happen each and every day in classrooms. It is just now we take those "dead words" on the page and keep them alive through the living words of our continued dialogue about the things we have read. In Plato's society -- in societies of the present -- and hopefully the future -- wherever there are thinkers to think and ideas to share -- dialogue will be an important tool of teaching, sharing ideas, and intellectual reflection -- whether that dialogue is preserved for future audiences or not.
Thursday, February 3, 2011
Effective Communication
Well, so much to think about this week. So sorry I am responding late, but since I was not in class last week, I missed that discussion on effective communication and therefore had to not only read our assigned readings, but really wanted to read everyone's blog so I could see what was on everyone's minds. Wow. Great stuff out there.
So, on to effective communication. First, I am in awe of some of my fellow students who are talented with graphic arts and blog design, however, this is part of what is lost in effectively communicating electronically. Some of the websites and blogs are too "busy" and therefore it takes the reader awhile to navigate through them to find what he/she is looking for. Jenna claims to "hate blank space" and although I think her blog is really cute and clever, I had a harder time reading the text because I was distracted by all the busy-ness of her lack of blank space. And I don't think that is just my generation speaking. The more distracted our minds are, the less likely they focus and retain. Hmmm... perhaps why reading scores are going down?
Aaron claims that "in fact grammar has little to do with effectively relaying ideas or arguments. We speak using poor grammar constantly, but we are still understood." Okay. Is that really a fact? Where is your evidence? I get what you are saying about letting students know that there are different audiences in which writing laced with poor grammar will still get the point across, but if you state your line I quoted to a director of an English department in any school or institute of higher learning, I doubt you will get the job. And you will be asked about grammar. They always ask.
Plato states in the Phaedrus that "the first rule of good speaking is to know and speak the truth; as a Spartan proverb says, 'true art is truth'; whereas rhetoric is an art of enchantment, which makes things appear good and evil, like and unlike, as the speaker pleases." Essentially, speaking well will always enable one to get truths or lies across most effectively. If President Obama spoke using incorrect grammar, I doubt he would be president today. The poet Keats also said "beauty is truth -- truth beauty," which I think can refer to truth being found most effectively in the beauty of language. Whether that means "correct or incorrect" I guess depends on what one deems "beautiful" language.
Plato also states that "living is better than the written word" which is translated to me as a man's actions are the best example of the story of his life -- not what he says or writes. However, Plato means it more in that truth comes better "live" from the open mouth. Which makes me think of Twitter, but I will get back to that. Plato does realize that the best reason for the written word in contrast with the spoken word is its permanence. It guards against memory loss, yes, but also that it "will bring forth fruit in the minds of others as well as his own." (bugs me that I cannot cite because of Kindle having no page numbers!). Anyway, that's my ADD-type problem -- I like structure and tradition and order over chaos. Grammar is just one way to bring order to the chaos of communication. I am not a grammarian, however, so it's not like I'm in love with it. It's just a road map that helps aid in efffective communication. The written word, retained, because it is valued will be able to, as Plato states, allow fruitful ideas to form in the minds of people who read it.
Which brings me back to Twitter. Twitter, more than any other form of the written word is "live" truth (or lies) instant and spontaneous as the spoken word, but translated not from human voice to human ear, but from human thumb, to electronic device, to human eye. But are these "Tweets" of value, truth to be retained? Some may be. Others are self-involved musings clogging the minds of others, rather than being fruit. Does Twitter make our minds, for lack of a better word, constipated, rather than providing the fiber of energy the fruit of knowledge would inspire? Oh hell. I'm just trying to be humorous and it's epic failing. So, instead, I will let You-Tube and the talent of actual communicators by comedy do this for me. For, in closing, I do believe comedy or satire to be a wonderful tool in effective communication. As Jonathan Swift was aware, especially when writing essays like "A Modest Proposal," sometimes the best way to get society to think about its foibles is to get them to laugh at themselves. Enjoy the attached.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Axzxe1a78E
So, on to effective communication. First, I am in awe of some of my fellow students who are talented with graphic arts and blog design, however, this is part of what is lost in effectively communicating electronically. Some of the websites and blogs are too "busy" and therefore it takes the reader awhile to navigate through them to find what he/she is looking for. Jenna claims to "hate blank space" and although I think her blog is really cute and clever, I had a harder time reading the text because I was distracted by all the busy-ness of her lack of blank space. And I don't think that is just my generation speaking. The more distracted our minds are, the less likely they focus and retain. Hmmm... perhaps why reading scores are going down?
Aaron claims that "in fact grammar has little to do with effectively relaying ideas or arguments. We speak using poor grammar constantly, but we are still understood." Okay. Is that really a fact? Where is your evidence? I get what you are saying about letting students know that there are different audiences in which writing laced with poor grammar will still get the point across, but if you state your line I quoted to a director of an English department in any school or institute of higher learning, I doubt you will get the job. And you will be asked about grammar. They always ask.
Plato states in the Phaedrus that "the first rule of good speaking is to know and speak the truth; as a Spartan proverb says, 'true art is truth'; whereas rhetoric is an art of enchantment, which makes things appear good and evil, like and unlike, as the speaker pleases." Essentially, speaking well will always enable one to get truths or lies across most effectively. If President Obama spoke using incorrect grammar, I doubt he would be president today. The poet Keats also said "beauty is truth -- truth beauty," which I think can refer to truth being found most effectively in the beauty of language. Whether that means "correct or incorrect" I guess depends on what one deems "beautiful" language.
Plato also states that "living is better than the written word" which is translated to me as a man's actions are the best example of the story of his life -- not what he says or writes. However, Plato means it more in that truth comes better "live" from the open mouth. Which makes me think of Twitter, but I will get back to that. Plato does realize that the best reason for the written word in contrast with the spoken word is its permanence. It guards against memory loss, yes, but also that it "will bring forth fruit in the minds of others as well as his own." (bugs me that I cannot cite because of Kindle having no page numbers!). Anyway, that's my ADD-type problem -- I like structure and tradition and order over chaos. Grammar is just one way to bring order to the chaos of communication. I am not a grammarian, however, so it's not like I'm in love with it. It's just a road map that helps aid in efffective communication. The written word, retained, because it is valued will be able to, as Plato states, allow fruitful ideas to form in the minds of people who read it.
Which brings me back to Twitter. Twitter, more than any other form of the written word is "live" truth (or lies) instant and spontaneous as the spoken word, but translated not from human voice to human ear, but from human thumb, to electronic device, to human eye. But are these "Tweets" of value, truth to be retained? Some may be. Others are self-involved musings clogging the minds of others, rather than being fruit. Does Twitter make our minds, for lack of a better word, constipated, rather than providing the fiber of energy the fruit of knowledge would inspire? Oh hell. I'm just trying to be humorous and it's epic failing. So, instead, I will let You-Tube and the talent of actual communicators by comedy do this for me. For, in closing, I do believe comedy or satire to be a wonderful tool in effective communication. As Jonathan Swift was aware, especially when writing essays like "A Modest Proposal," sometimes the best way to get society to think about its foibles is to get them to laugh at themselves. Enjoy the attached.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Axzxe1a78E
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
RU Really Reading?
Well, after spending the day giving final exams to my AP English Language students and watching many of them sigh, shift around, and fall asleep while reading the close reading section, I can't help but wonder -- do students REALLY believe they will do well in college if they cannot stand to read? The teenaged girl, Nadya in the "RU Really Reading" article seems to believe that "nobody said you have to read books to get into college." That's true -- I'm sure the University of Phoenix or Robert Morris will be thrilled to have you.
I do believe though that a love of text and stories has developed from internet reading. The Nadya girl loves reading Fanfiction, and although most of it is probably as badly written as the example the article provided, I also happen to know a well-educated colleague and British Literature scholar who regularly contributes stories to a FanFiction website. It is also hard to argue with the statistics that show dyslexic kids doing better with the internet than they do with books. And it's hard to argue with the logic that the Internet allows you to read many different points of view at once, interact with text, and develop an intellectual curiosity to learn more. Bravo to all of that. But, we also cannot ignore the fact that it is hard to keep the attention of today's youth in a classroom.
As educators we almost have to switch gears every 15 minutes to keep up with the fragmented attention span of students. And, if reading scores are going down -- I have to say it -- it is not because somehow the teachers are "bad." It is because the internet generation does not have the attention span to read books anymore. Books are assigned to them and they don't read -- they look up Spark Notes. Students sitting in English graduate writing programs claim they want to be novelists but have not read any substantial authors. That Nadya girl in the article who hates to read books wants to be an English major. God help we English teachers and professors! So, what is the problem? This girl supposedly gets A's and B's but she and others like her think that books are too "one-sided" but what's really happening is what the debate on "Is Google Making Us Smarter or Dumber" is trying to argue. The Internet is making our brains behave differently. So whether that is good or bad it does seem those who are starting to hate books are losing the ability to use their imaginations and cognitive thinking skills to decipher complex meaning without clicking a mouse to take them to another window to give them bits and pieces of information that they don't have to wade through text to discover. What reading tests ask students to do is a skill that they are losing because of the quick fix information they can get on the internet. Internet searching and synthesizing of information is yes, indeed, a grand and valuable skill to have for higher education and for the job market. However, if the skills acquired by using your imagination and comprehension skills to decipher lengthy bits of text are still valued by employers and still measurable in their link to greater success in higher education and brainier jobs, then "reading" on the Internet will not be able to replace reading books. Nor should it.
I do believe though that a love of text and stories has developed from internet reading. The Nadya girl loves reading Fanfiction, and although most of it is probably as badly written as the example the article provided, I also happen to know a well-educated colleague and British Literature scholar who regularly contributes stories to a FanFiction website. It is also hard to argue with the statistics that show dyslexic kids doing better with the internet than they do with books. And it's hard to argue with the logic that the Internet allows you to read many different points of view at once, interact with text, and develop an intellectual curiosity to learn more. Bravo to all of that. But, we also cannot ignore the fact that it is hard to keep the attention of today's youth in a classroom.
As educators we almost have to switch gears every 15 minutes to keep up with the fragmented attention span of students. And, if reading scores are going down -- I have to say it -- it is not because somehow the teachers are "bad." It is because the internet generation does not have the attention span to read books anymore. Books are assigned to them and they don't read -- they look up Spark Notes. Students sitting in English graduate writing programs claim they want to be novelists but have not read any substantial authors. That Nadya girl in the article who hates to read books wants to be an English major. God help we English teachers and professors! So, what is the problem? This girl supposedly gets A's and B's but she and others like her think that books are too "one-sided" but what's really happening is what the debate on "Is Google Making Us Smarter or Dumber" is trying to argue. The Internet is making our brains behave differently. So whether that is good or bad it does seem those who are starting to hate books are losing the ability to use their imaginations and cognitive thinking skills to decipher complex meaning without clicking a mouse to take them to another window to give them bits and pieces of information that they don't have to wade through text to discover. What reading tests ask students to do is a skill that they are losing because of the quick fix information they can get on the internet. Internet searching and synthesizing of information is yes, indeed, a grand and valuable skill to have for higher education and for the job market. However, if the skills acquired by using your imagination and comprehension skills to decipher lengthy bits of text are still valued by employers and still measurable in their link to greater success in higher education and brainier jobs, then "reading" on the Internet will not be able to replace reading books. Nor should it.
Thursday, January 20, 2011
Beliefs About Writing and Learning
1. Writing is thinking on the page and that is the core of the reason why some people are “good” at writing while others struggle. For some, the ability to articulate and organize their ideas is a struggle both orally and in writing. If you cannot think well, you cannot write easily. For others, they speak beautifully and thoughtfully, but cannot translate that to the page. This could be due to the lack of exposure to written communication they can emulate or due to the fact that they are a more auditory rather than visual or tactile learner/thinker. The more familiar one is with the written word – in other words – if one has read much and from a variety of both formal and informal, classic and contemporary texts – the more comfortable one will be with mimicking that form of communication. Thus, if one thinks clearly, reads a variety of texts, and becomes more and more familiar with successful written communication in any genre, one will struggle less with writing.
2. I do believe writing is more of a talent than a skill. The more I teach writing to high school students, the more I realize that, although the “skill” can be practiced in terms of mechanics, organization, sentence structure, depth and clarity of content, the students that knock my socks off are also truly talented with a turn of phrase, a nuance, an effortlessly well-crafted sentence, a beautiful metaphor. A skill is something that if done correctly, gets the job done. You can teach a robot the skill to play a Vivaldi violin concerto, but will it move you to tears? A talent is something that takes a skill to a level of beauty or excellence that goes beyond merely accomplishing the task. A talented, creative writer may lack discipline, however, and that is where skill building turns talent into effective writing. But, just as one might be able to teach anyone to paint a picture of a woman who definitely resembles a woman – it will still not be the Mona Lisa.
3. I think writing is best learned in a workshop rather than lecture situation. Unfortunately, most people were “taught” to write by being lectured about proper structures, format, and grammar and given some examples of the kind of writing to emulate, some may have been given formulas or templates for a particular kind of writing and then, boom, go write the paper. The rest of the more relevant teaching happened during the feedback and revision stage. The biggest impediment, however, comes when writers do not understand the written feedback they get from their instructors about their work – or do not understand the rubrics they are given to justify a grade, and become frustrated without the actual tools or relevant instruction on how to improve their work. The best way to improve writing is through feedback and revision and this takes more time than most writing curriculums have in place in elementary, high school, or even college. Workshops work best with creative writers but I think they would also work well for any kind of writing. Writers continually need to analyze examples of writing and receive relevant feedback on their own writing in order to improve what they do.
4. I’m sorry, but just more than one image comes to mind when picturing someone writing – probably because I am currently a working writer and a writer working as a teacher of writing at the high school level. As a teacher, I picture a teenaged boy, struggling to write an essay in long hand. It is early morning and he is seated by himself at a table in a nearly empty school library. Furiously just getting words on a page, letting his mind spit words faster than he can write them, he is cursing the prompt, cursing the teacher, cursing himself for waiting until the last minute to get this done. He is rambling on about the plot of Beowulf, trying to write himself into an essay that will satisfy the writing prompt about heroism. He is writing in a spiral notebook with a black felt-tipped pen. His handwriting is large, scrawling, and looks like a combination of printing and cursive writing. He will turn this work in to his teacher in a flurry of unstapled, curly-edged, hastily ripped disarray. As a writer, I picture a woman at a laptop computer in a sunny, well-lit room, surrounded by books. Instead of fingers flying furiously, that woman is staring past her computer and out the window at the snow-covered trees. Her thoughts are in her work – not yet in her fingers. That person might be me. Although sometimes, being a literature person as well, when I think of someone in the act of writing, I think of Hemingway (young version) typing away at a black Underwood typewriter in a charmingly dingy apartment in Paris.
5. As a teacher, I picture students struggling with writing. I wonder why I pictured a boy first since girls struggle just as much. Maybe because I just helped a boy recently in our writing center whose work looked like the work I described. I pictured myself because most days I wish I were in my home office writing rather than at the high school teaching writing – even though I love that in some ways – I wish I had more time for my own art. And last, I sometimes wish I had been intrepid enough in my youth to just go do something crazy like move to Paris to write – but I also wish writers and publishers were looked at the same way they were in Hemingway’s time -- so that image just comes from romantic notions of what it meant to be a writer in a bygone age. Are there writers or other types of writing not reflected by these images? Yep! Too numerous to name – but here are a few: technical writers, people who write in handwritten diaries, poets. And the process can be as individual and numerous and there are humans who write for any reason.
6. Webster’s Dictionary defines “Technology” in its second definition as “a manner of accomplishing a task especially using technical processes, methods or knowledge.” The reason I begin with this is that opening line is the most frustrating and boring thing I encounter kids using to find a way to start an essay. That being said, I think that the word “Technology” has come to mean using “devices” to accomplish tasks that once did not need training, knowledge, or even electricity to accomplish. But, if we look at Webster’s definition, the act of writing itself is a technology (even if one does not use technological devices to write) because depending on the kind of writing one is doing, it requires knowledge of methods, process, and a decoding of language and sentence structure. It is therefore, technical.
7. Yes, the term “writing process” is quite familiar to me. The writing process can be anything from preparing your materials in advance, to outlining ideas, to drafting and revising, to lining up your sharpened pencils next to your clean yellow legal pad, to invoking the muses for inspiration. It can mean many things to different people and different kinds of writers.
8. Writing is both a private and a social thing. As a teacher and a writer, the idea of “audience” always comes up which makes writing a social thing. We teach students to write to or target specific audiences. As a writer, I write first for myself and then for my intended audience. But, even when I wrote in my diary as a little girl, I pictured “future historians” someday finding it and reading it. The act of putting thoughts on paper or on a computer screen takes the private out of your thoughts as they are there for anyone to find. Whether you are conscious of that or not when you write, it does make writing a social thing. It is private also because it is a solitary act – not usually a collaborative act. Writing has also become way more social – becoming more popular than oral conversation – because of the advent of e-mail, text messaging, and social networks like Facebook.
9. I mainly think of illiteracy as simply people who cannot read in ANY language. It is incorrect to call someone who can read in another language illiterate if they cannot read in English. I also think illiteracy means people who cannot read well or cannot decipher text and decode it for meaning. Those who are illiterate in this country include a population of non-readers to which reading has never become a priority. You cannot completely blame the educational system for non-readers because if one has the desire to read, one will be able to eventually read. Look at what the uneducated of the past were capable of doing. Look at Frederick Douglass or Abraham Lincoln. Formal education was not the reason these two become extremely literate. If a person is curious and interested, reading is possible. There are, of course, learning deficits that hinder comprehension and those should be addressed and targeted early in children. Bilingual students may also have a hard time reading in English, but that does not mean they have a reading problem if they read in their own language. It is a separate issue. But I do not and will not blame teachers for the fact that there may be an illiteracy problem in this country. Education and teachers are better now than it and they have ever been in this country. The ability to read now competes with many more other distractions, television, video games, etc. that are becoming more and more prevalent. If reading is not a priority or a focus in one’s home or life then it becomes less important to learn to read. If there is not one book in your home, or if getting a library card is not something you were inspired to do, chance are, you may become illiterate. I hear all the time even from students sitting next to me in my graduate classes that they got by in high school English classes without reading a single text. And they wonder why they are struggling to understand complex texts today. Why Johnny can’t read is sometimes because Johnny is not interested in reading, not because some teacher never taught him. And if Johnny gets away with that at home when he is young, Johnny may become one of the illiterate. Of course illiteracy is a problem. Reading
10. As I intimated above, I worry that writing will become so truncated by abbreviations and acronyms that the beauty and power of language will be overly simplified into some kind of utilitarian language that is purely for communication and not for the pleasure of words. I do think it is cool that more writing is done than ever before because of texting and tweeting. But, are our lives richer for knowing what kind of sweater Paris Hilton buys for her dog or that Kanye West thinks it’s hard to sleep on a fur pillow? Probably not. But at least people are using the skills of reading and writing to communicate. Email has been a wonderful addition to writing in the digital age, however, as I think it has in some ways brought back the art of letter writing. But, I also think because it is less formal, the quality of writing has diminished. Although I do look forward in the future to an anthology of The Greatest Love E-mails of the Millennial Generation or Deep Twitter Thoughts of the Last Five Presidents. It will be interesting to see how history will treat the significance of writing in the digital age. For now I cannot say if all of this is a bad thing. Right now it seems more good than bad, but it also has the potential to be scary as more and more text to read does not always mean quality text to read. Will we be so distracted by so much information that we lose the ability to think critically about the text we are reading? I think we need more time to tell how it will affect us in a lasting way. But we should be vigilant about reading and writing in the digital age and to continually question how and why it is used.
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