Another blog--it's long

Emig—we discussed last week how writing is deliberate. Vygotsky discussed this extensively in Thought and Language—writing is an expansion of inner speech. Students would probably have at least a little bit of an easier time writing if they knew they were “allowed” to write what they are thinking. So often a student will ask me, after a discussion about their writing topic, “So, should I write that?” I always say, “Well, what else did you plan on writing?” But it still never fails…they’ll come back up and what they have on paper is not even close to what they said to me. I’ll tell them, “No…what you actually said to me is much better than this…it’s more clear…it’s more detailed.” Their response is always the same: “Oh. So…am I allowed to write that?” Yes!!!! Writing is a learning process very weaved in with reading, talking, listening, and speaking. It’s about being aware of your emotions and what you are feeling, your opinions…and that in and of itself is a learning process for kids. Using the language to explore that.

Berlin-I have to be honest. I had to re-read many, many, many times. Very wordy. I had a hard time getting thru a paragraph without looking at least one word up. I am going to have to talk this one out in this blog. Page 719—“Ideology enters all features of our language experiences.” That’s deep. That’s not conscious thought…this is sitting down with people who talk about why they think how they think and where it comes from. Philosophy. In terms of writing anyway. I don’t get it. Who does that? Is he actually talking writing or …what…he says something about “what remains outside of the field of phenominonological experience.” What the hell does that mean? Is he saying that the ideology behind writing class is based on our beliefs of what structure and “normal” is? Page 721-I think, possibly, that what he is talking about is getting into the brain processes behind how kids write and the steps they take in their heads—why they compose the way they do…??? “Composing behavior” ???? Gosh I am having a hard time with this one. This is all very scientific. Ok, 722…all this to talk about the mental process in writing? To pick apart the cognitive structures? How can that be done? I think we had this discussion last week. Is the idea here (723) to access the mind of a good writer? What is it that makes them self-aware? How do they guide themselves? But, I hate to say it…just like with kids in school who just will never do well…don’t we just have kids who will never learn to put their ideas on paper because well, maybe there just isn’t much thought going on? By the way, “reitification” on page 733 is not in the dictionary. At least the one on my computer. I’ve about had it with this article. I’m not dumb, but this sure makes me feel like it. Either the concepts in here are way over my head, or he is saying that writing is a discourse that caries with it everything the writers carries emotionally….the unchangeable social system the writer is in, the economic system the writer is in…am I at least on the right track??

Burnham-I really should have read this before Berlin. In one fell swoop he explains the point of Berlin’s theory that all pedagogy is ideological. Maybe I was so caught up in the wordiness of Berlins article that that simple translation escaped me. But it did. The whole idea, and again here is this inter-woven connection among al the readings…that the writer is the center and their understanding of writing is directly related to how they think, where they come from, what they believe, and their own ways of seeing the world. It is the teachers job to have a theoretical base from which they teach and use various resources to help writers develop. It is not about the grammar-in the beginning or even in the middle-it’s about helping the writer make meaning of the language in their head by putting it on paper.. Page 23 discusses peer writing groups. I have seen good things come from this idea. I use it in my LA class, and, when given the right tools, students rally do use it to their advantage and gain from it by testing their potential audience. This whole idea of expressivism and its grounding in the relations between language, meaning-making, and self-development (page 25) …there’s a lot of thinking going on with the writer. They are both participant and spectator (26) They are reader and writer. What I keep thinking when I read all this is that…all these processes go on in a writer’s head, but they don’t know it. Just the simple act of re-reading what they’ve written can send a writer into a tailspin, and they have no idea that the reason is most likely because they suddenly became their own audience…but they would never be able to articulate that. I guess the whole idea is to make the writer conscious of those very thought processes and self-awareness.

Elbow- Looking forward to this one already and I’ve only read the first paragraph. I LOVE the idea of “ink-shedding.” It’s a new word to use with the kids…and serves a great purpose. I can use it as the “topic” portion of the Six Traits model or for free-writing…the part where the students say they have “nothing” to write about when they have an assignment.

And “figuring out what we mean”…boy so true…I can’t tell you how often I’ll have a conversation with a student regarding some topic of a writing assignment, I’ll ask them to sit and think about our conversation and write the details. They come back up with half the details missing…and they were the best part of the conversation. Then, just like in the article, they’ll say…OH! Well, that wasn’t what I really meant. ??? They articulate it so well, but then it all gets lost in the translation between head and hand. What happens?

Wow…I am using what’s on page 17…it’s not what you say but how you say it. I actually just came out of a meeting where that was the pinnacle of a problem. Just because you say it nice doesn’t mean it was a nice thing to say. That said…words mean everything. Speaking or writing…they hold a lot in their hands.

I don’t usually like to break down articles like this, but this one merits it. So many good ideas. Anyway…intonation…getting that meaning out. That includes reading with emotion and feeling. It’s all part of the comprehension process…and that includes when someone is reading what you’ve written. If you’ve written it flatly, then that’s how it’s going to be read. It’s not something that’s easy to teach students. Even if they full well how to use punctuation correctly, they don’t know how to read it…I’ve heard students read a sentence that clearly warrants even a little mustering of excitement, but they read it completely flat. Maybe they are embarrassed. But this sort of thing I’m thinking inhibits them as writers. They read flatly. They write flatly. How are they supposed to get a reader as excited about their written narrative or be influenced by their persuasive piece if it’s all so...well…flat! Just like that episode on Seinfeld where Elaine gets insulted that her new guy writes a message that her friend had a baby. He wrote “Friend had a baby” She was incredulous that he didn’t have any exclamation points…and she proceeded to yell at him and draw exclamation points in the air for every sentence…and her major complaint was, “How can you NOT put an exclamation point on a memo that says my FRIEND had a BABY!?!?!?!” This whole thing ended their relationship. And rightly so. If he writes flatly, I’m sure everything else he does is just mediocre, too. ☺

Blog 2

I did an author study on James Britton for Julie either last semester or last fall. I had never heard of him and in the end, was glad I chose him. I wondered how it was I had never heard of him at that point in my educational career, but perhaps I would not have appreciated his contributions quite as much had I learned about him prior to entering the writing certification program. It means more at this point. As for this article, he searches for some grounding in commonalities in literature, more specifically in poetry. And it’s at this point that I feel he goes so back and forth between theorists, that I can’t quite tell what the hell he is agreeing with, or why he thinks everyone needs to agree on what constitutes poetry. (152-154) What I am gathering as I read the remainder of the article is that he tried to find theory that supported his preference and belief for the more informal, narrative, “gossip” type of writing…experience-laden writing. Expressive writing. Writing that is not learned. Writing that is written from the heart. Writing that speaks what the minds eye saw, without “formality”. And I like that. There’s nothing more contrived than, well, contrived writing. You can tell when you read it. It sounds fake. Voiceless. Just like in longer writing, when you can put yourself into a poet’s writing—his or her experience—they’ve done their job as a writer/poet.

Oh here we go. Grammar. You know, the one thing I find with grammar is that once the concept is taught it is best retained by allowing kids to see it--and their mistakes--in their own writing. Constant light bulbs going off in their heads. But grammar is like a double-edged sword when it comes to writing. On one hand, it really needs to be correct in order for a reader to truly get what the writer wants them to get. But you don’t want to stop the creative process by saying…OH….no comma? Kids will shut down if they’ve come to you with what they think is a great piece and you’re only concern is that there’s no apostrophe in “you’re”.

There’s a teacher where I work that teaches it in isolation and makes a point of telling the kids that’s she’s traditional and boring and this is how she teaches it. I can’t for the life of me understand how she enjoys her job. If she doesn’t enjoy her job, how can the kids enjoy their own job of learning? Of course, research supports neither my way or her way (206-207) In fact, formal instruction didn’t even improve writing. But this is where I have to ask how grammar improves writing. Isn’t it style and voice that make writing worth reading? Sure, using the English language correctly makes for easier reading, but does it make for better reading? I had a kid in class whose hilarious poem began “My X, My Box” and it went on to describe his Xbox like a first love, how it called to him, grey and smooth, the voice calling from a distant room. I laughed until I couldn’t even talk to anyone. I think he was missing a comma or two in it. …but is this what Hardwell refers to as stylistic writing?(225) Enhances awareness of language and that “verbal clay” he talks about? Not everybody would have liked this kids poem…they would have thought the quality was lacking. I say it is experience in writing, no matter how grammatically incorrect. That has to be worth something. I gave him a 60/60.

Blog 1

When I think of rhetoric, I think of a guy I dated when I was in my very early 20’s. He was annoying because he was always looking to show how much he knew. He was pompous. He steered conversations toward a topic—usually political or religious-- that he read a lot about and tried to engage everyone around him in this sort of argument about why he was right. Right or wrong, he was boring, too philosophical, opinionated, and it wasn’t long before I told him I think this thing had run its course. So, now that I am in my late 30’s, I have long developed a new appreciation for rhetoric. It’s mostly from having completed grad school and being in Julie’s classes and seeing that smart definitely did not have to—and should not--equal pompousness. It’s also because I see that rhetoric is not supposed to be arguing or staunch opinion being forcibly pushed into a person’s brain. More importantly, it’s very much about the respect and appreciation for other’s opinions, even if you are on the complete opposite end of it. I wish my mother would realize this. Neither was persuasive or effective in their rhetoric.

That said, the Bedford article gave a very interesting timeline of the emergence of the writing curriculum, and the connection between rhetoric, expression, and its place in the teaching of writing. It’s much like fashion…comes full circle…lots of changes only to come back to what worked in the first place. Sometimes things change just for the sake of change, which is natural, but sometimes just changing the nuances of something can create big changes. Overhauls aren’t always necessary.

Changing subjects and in reference to the Kinneavy article…I remember discourse being an integral part of my first master’s course. Understanding readers and writers was not just about whether or not they did what you told them to do. It is the responsibility of the educator to consider students’ discourse. I realized that when a student writes, it is very much cultural. It is environmental, whether it be work, friend groups, family groups, or school. Page 130 talks about some scientific comparison. That threw me off. As I read, I see that there is a level of reference to writing as a “science”. Anyway, what I did like was (pages 130-133) the idea that writers and what they have to offer cannot be classified into groups. It’s emotional, it questions, it informs and persuades, it expresses, it’s scientific; it uses the same language in many different ways.

And lastly, Berlin’s piece. The parts of the whole. That’s a central idea in education. How you get to the outcome that you desire. He initially repeated the writer-reality-audience-language thing to the point that what he was trying to say got lost in the words. Speaking of words, I’m not ashamed to admit I had no idea what ineluctably meant. (256) Anyway, I was contented to read that most teachers are sort of stuck on the mechanics of writing. It gives my goal at my job major purpose and literature to back what I see all the time. While mechanics are important, there is that whole element of…whatever it is they are supposed to be writing about…that is missing when kids are forced to focus on the how instead of the why. They do not learn to…as Julie talked about last week…get the speech in their head onto paper, and worry about conventions later. And therein lies the connection of composition back to rhetoric. (260) “Rhetoric is meant to adapt the discourse to its hearers…when the individual is freed from the biases of language…the senses provide the mental faculties with a clear and distinct image of the world.” That almost sounds like psychology.