In my classes I have often seen the confusion about which Graff writes. Students often don’t understand why they are asked to do something. Even though I try to explain the purpose of assignments to them, sometimes they don’t quite make the connection. “Why do I have to write this?” is a frequent question. Of course, my least favorite question would have to be “Is this busy work.” (Is it any wonder that at times I think all high school teachers should be shot? Of course none of you would assign busy work)

This is problem is particularly true of the assignment to “write an argument paper.” I think there are multiple reasons for this. The first one is the dreaded 5 paragraph essay. While I recognize the usefulness of this structure as a way to teach writing in the initial stages (Though I did not learn to write with this formula and I think I do okay.), like the training wheels on a bike, it must eventually be abandoned. However, like the child who refuses to attempt riding without the security of training wheels, students are reluctant to abandoned a reliable method of composing. Even though a parent can watch a child pedal away with the training wheels never touching the ground, students don’t realize their own capabilities.

Another formula that students cling to is the concept of proving something with their argument. This again may be the result of earlier teaching. (My apologies to all you high school teachers. I am not really blaming you for this.) Many freshman composition teachers assign some form of the standard argument paper. “Choose a topic. Write a paper that proves your point of view. Use sources.” I even assign this very basic essay in my freshman comp classes. The problem begins when I try to introduce students to the concept that an argument is sometimes just a debate. I want them to choose a topic and discuss it. They don’t have to come to a resounding conclusion. They can even, horror of horrors, leave the reader with a question at the end of the essay. But my students have been too well trained (by me or someone else?) to accept this easily. A paper must have a provable thesis. The thesis must state the topic ideas of each paragraph. (That is my personal pet peeve. After all, how boring is that?) Each paragraph must make a single claim that relates directly to the thesis. That is writing with training wheels. But the students are comfortable there. Removing that support might allow them to fall.

Another area that causes difficulty for students is that they don’t value their own opinion. The first argument based paper that I assign has the stipulation of “no research allowed.” This frequently elicits the response of “then how do I know what to write.” In addition to not valuing their own opinion, students think that teachers also won’t value their opinions. In one class discussion, I kept asking questions in an attempt to get students to pay more attention to the literature we were reading. One student, in frustration, finally blurted, “Why don’t you just tell us what you want us to say.” I’m not sure I ever fully convinced that student that I was not looking for a specific answer, only an answer.

So what does all this have to do with Graff and teaching literature? I, of course, believe that I FULLY and COMPLETELY explain all rationales, purposes, and reasons to my students. So imagine my surprise when I read Graff’s section about a Comparative Curriculum and thought to myself that we do have a comparative curriculum. By exposing students to opposing views in the classroom, we are allowing them to compare philosophies and beliefs, to compare and evaluate these in order to form their own beliefs. After all, isn’t this what we are really doing? Then I realized that I know this, and probably some of the A students know this, but it is one of the “fogged areas” for most students. They probably don’t realize the comparative opportunity we are offering them. Maybe (just maybe) I am more a part of the problem than I would like to admit.

So on to relating this to literature. We have talked a lot this semester about helping students to connect to literature, about allowing them to perform their own interpretations. That is all wonderful. But how do we let students know why they are doing this? How do we keep literature from becoming a “fogged area?” One of the first things we need to do is decide for ourselves why reading literature is important. This may sound banal, but it is a long debated and hotly contested issue. And I have no answer. At this point I really don’t even have much discussion (not because I couldn’t, but because am already 818 words). If reading “The Cask of Amontillado” is to be anything more than just another assignment, we need to answer that question for ourselves, and we need to be willing to discuss it with our students, even in all its incompleteness.

When I read Peter Elbow’s comment that he has “come to want some kind of workshop” in his literature classes instead of a straight discussion, I thought “No.” I like discussions in literature classes. In fact, my favorite literature classes have been ones that required absolutely no writing at all. The lit class that I taught without any writing was a Great Books class. We met once a month, discussed the novel that we had read and chose the next novel to be read and discussed. The class ran for about four months. Attendance was perfect except for one student who had surgery. Discussions were lively. Opinions were varied. Of course, the class was voluntary and filled with adults who wanted to be there and were interested in the topic. And yes, I was actually PAID to do this.

I often wish that I could teach an introductory lit class like that one which did not require writing. Students are frequently so worried about the PAPER that will be due that they fail to focus on the reading at hand. They are worried about analyzing and critiquing. They are worried about abiding by STANDARD AMERICAN ACADEMIC PROSE. The are worried about proper MLA documentation. They are worried about writing the correct “thing.” They are worried about their grade. Unfortunately, this worry overshadows the simple pleasure of reading and discussing the text at hand. My favorite part of teaching literature is actually talking about it in class with students, not forcing them to write about it. In a perfect world, students would come to class having read and contemplated the assignment. They would have annotated the text, writing in the margins and adding sticky tabs to the pages to mark what they deemed as relevant passages or areas where they had questions. In a perfect world this would happen. Perhaps I am lucky because this does sometimes happen in my classes. These are the days that I live for.

Unfortunately, not all students are so dedicated. There are students who come to class without having contemplated, without having annotated, sometimes without having even read the text. While I LOVE the prepared students who are already making personal connections with the texts, it is the latter students who challenge me. I somehow want to reach those students and convince them that reading can be entertaining, enlightening, and down right fun, even if it does take work. So for them, I choose such selections as “The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas” and Gattaca. These are accessible and entertaining readings (or viewings). Unfortunately, some students are already so jaded that they don’t even want to give the assignments the benefit of the doubt. So along come the dreaded journals mentioned by Lovitt.

Though I use these as a way to ensure that students are doing the readings (I collect them at irregular, unannounced intervals), I also use them as prompts to help students begin to connect with the readings. I tell my students that grammar, spelling, and documentation do not count. I provide them with a prompt that asks them to note passages that affect them, images that they think are strong. These are followed by the question “Why.” I encourage them to note any questions (think difficulties) they encounter while reading. I have found this assignment to be successful in getting most students to engage with the text. Of course, there will always be those who simply do not want to read. For many, however, the journals help to focus their own thoughts on the texts. Many students have told me at the end of the semester that they actually have begun to enjoy reading. Be still my heart!!! This is my goal in a literature class. My goal is not to create the next generation of literary critics turning out pages of Shakespearian interpretation. It is to engender a love, or at least a greater like, for reading.

While I recognize the relevance of writing, while I realize that writing forces rigorous thought, I do not think that is always needed. Sometimes a good discussion is more than adequate. Sorry Uncle Peter.

Edith

Okay, so I posted on entry early. To make up for it, I am posting this one late. Not to confuse you, this is my post about the Scholes text. I will post again for this week’s readings.

Inside/Outside

There are three things that struck me in the Scholes’ text that I feel the urge to comment on. The first two are relatively simple; the third is more personal. I recognize that none of these are the “deep” content of the text, but I believe they are worthy of discussion and note.

To begin, on page 46 Scholes advocates withholding information that would help students to understand Hemmingway’s references to Mantegna until “after they have worried the meaning … a bit without this evidence.” This withholding empowers the teacher and diminishes the student reader. If Scholes really believes that this information is vital to understanding the passage in question, keeping that information from his students will only frustrate them, and in the process make him look like the revered holder of all knowledge. I also think Scholes’ word choice of “worry the meaning is telling.” Does he want his students to actually worry, as in have anxiety because they are unable to perform the required task? If so, he is then able to rescue them with his profound knowledge as the all-seeing, all-knowing teacher. (Actually, this strikes me as his attitude throughout the text with his constant references to his other writings. But I digress.) Perhaps I am reading too much into his word choice and intentions in this passage. Perhaps I am interpreting wrongly.

Secondly, on page 43, Scholes writes that literary study “opens the way to a critique of culture.” I find this an interesting comment in the light of other arguments that the study of literature is solely for the purpose of enjoying literature, that it serves no real purpose. Perhaps Scholes is attempting to create a “real” reason for studying literature that will validate it outside the ivory tower of academia. (More on this later.) Even if not, this leads to the dangerous territory of teachers leading and dominating the discussion and critique of society. I know this is true because I usually (I would love to say always but was taught to never (ha!) use absolute words in writing.) try to link readings to life with the “so what” question. This does typically lead to a discussion of society. Students are very quick to condemn the cultures of our society that preceded our own. They desperately want to condemn the husbands in “The Story of an Hour” and “The Yellow Wall Paper.” They automatically read these stories from a feminist perspective without even realizing it while I, on the other hand, have a certain amount of sympathy for the husbands. I find it difficult to maintain a completely hands off attitude in these discussions. Yet I don’t want to lead the students into the “only acceptable reading” idea that the teacher knows best.

This leads me to my third area of interest in Scholes’ text. Scholes points out a dichotomy between reality and the academic life. He claims that this is “the most problematic, and, therefore, perhaps the most important” distinction in his basic structure (5). He explains that we “despise our own activities as trivial unless we can link then to a “reality outside academic life” (5). He advocates that this distinction is false and that there does not need to be a link to reality to validate the study of literature. Yet he later states that the study of literature “opens the way to a critique of culture” (43). In this statement he contradicts his earlier statement that we do not need to have a link to the world outside of academia for the study of literature. At one point Scholes echoes Fish’s argument that literature needs no reason to exist as an area of study; it is its own validation. Yet Scholes later counters his own argument.

It is this very contradiction that I find intriguing because it is echoed through history and my own teaching experience. From the early stages of education in this country there has been a battle between composition and literature. Literature was the elite study that needed no reason to exist. It simply was. Composition, on the other hand, was very egalitarian in its efforts to raise the less culturally refined to the ranks of the elite. Not only has this struggle been seen through the history of English departments, but it can also be traced through my own teaching career. I teach both composition and literature. For a long time, though I thoroughly enjoyed teaching literature, I saw no use for it outside the ivory towers of academia. Therefore I turned to composition to deem my job as worthy. Everyone needs to be able to communicate and to write well. This was an area that translated well to the real world outside of academia. It was easy to explain to students why they needed to take composition, no matter what the major. It was less easy to justify literature as a required study. Yet I continued to struggle to justify it to both my students and to myself. Finally I allowed myself to say to my students (and to myself) that they needed to take it because it was fun. Of course they looked at me as if I was crazy. However, once I admitted this to myself and gave up on the idea of justifying literature as being “useful,” my students did actually begin to enjoy the study, at least some of them. Yes, our conversations frequently turn to the “so what,” which I think is a good thing, but sometimes we just read something and admit, “wow, that was pretty neat.”

So I may have focused on a minor part of Scholes’ work, but it is a part that speaks to me personally as it elucidates my own struggle with “why.”

Edith

I am reposting my essay from last week, the one that I did on the wrong readings. I figure that I wrote it so you can read it. If you read it last week despite my warning, thanks. If not, here it is to haunt you again.

Musings

For this week’s entry I will borrow Blau’s alternative assignment of “a collection of loosely connected notes or comments on a text or topic, each identified by a heading or number, requiring no transitions between them.” I choose to do this because I had disparate reactions to the readings and because I have never tried this type of writing. It is engrained in me that my writing must meet the standard criteria of academic texts: have one central point that is fully developed through a series of well organized and interconnected paragraphs. So in the spirit of exploration and taking risks, I will try something new.

1.         Elbow’s argument that writing should precede reading because filling student’s heads with the ideas of others stifles their own creativity sounds like the no-content curriculum that was popular in the 1990’s. As Elbow’s article was published in 1993, there is little wonder that there are similarities. The concept of a no-content curriculum was that the psyches of children would be damaged by telling them things, even things such as basic math facts and sentence structure (Breed). So teachers were expected to teach students how to do things without teaching them any facts. Imagine teaching a student to read without being able to assign them a text because it might inhibit the student’s development as an individual. Luckily, this theory of teaching fell out of favor and we moved on to other ideas.

            We also need to remember that students do not come to our classes as empty vessels that need only be filled with wisdom. Instead they come to our class rooms filled with their own ideas and experiences. Sometimes this is a good thing; other times it is not. Remember the film we watched the first night of class? Those students not only had mis-information, they refused to give up on the ideas they had. It is sometimes painful to read student essays in which students are assigned to argue their side of a belief. While I will readily defend a person’s right to his belief, I will also insist that person be able to defend that belief. Students often have firm beliefs. The believe things because it is what they have been taught, it is what they have heard, it is what they want to believe, or it is what is beneficial to them to believe. A little bit of reading often changes their minds.

            In an ideal world, emphasizing writing over reading would be marvelous. However, in the real world, how can we expect students to discuss something of which they are not even aware? If we assign readings to students to give them new view points, we will encourage them to examine their own beliefs along with the ideas in the reading.

2.         Blau mentions several assignments that sound like some of the things that I already do in other formats in my classes. He mentions others that I would like to try. (I wonder if I can change the assignments in the middle of the semester. Perhaps not) I am particularly interested in using technology to teach literature and composition. Some of Blau’s assignments could easily be transferred to on-line assignments that could be used in hybrid of DL classes to enhance either F2F meetings or discussion boards.

            For instance, I already assign reading journals in my classes. Students are to record first impressions, areas of interest, questions, or any comments they would like to make. These journal entries could be done as a class blog, allowing classmates the opportunity to share difficulties or perhaps offer answers in follow-up comments. This would also make grading easier because the students would never know which entries would be read by the teacher on a specific week. It is also easy to simply count the number of entries made by each member of the blog. This would not necessarily check for content, but it could certainly satisfy the collection portion of Blau’s portfolio assignment.

            We will return to the idea teaching literature with technology in my teaching presentation. I look forward to your comments on what I finally come up with. This is something that I probably can introduce into my current classes. Perhaps I should practice on them?

3.         Okay, so I wrote two completely unrelated sections in this paper. I edited the transition between them several times because I kept putting in a transition. Old habits are hard to break. If there is no connection between the sections of my paper, do I need a conclusion? I think not. BY!

Edith

            Works Cited

Breed, Jerry and Mary Breed. “No-Content Curriculum.” The Washington Post 1995,

            May 14. Retrieved February 16, 2008, from National Newspapers (9) database.

            (Document ID: 19564506).

I learned a long time ago that it was difficult to transition between creative and expository writing. If I had been concentrating on writing literary criticisms, the characters in my stories spoke in a very stilted fashion. There were no contractions in their speech and they never began a sentence with and or but. If I had been concentrating on creative writing, my expository essays were colorful but lacked cohesiveness. By reading through my blog posts I have discovered that it is also difficult to transition from teacher to student.

Though I believe that teachers are always students to some degree, we are not always aware of some of the struggles that our students undergo. We are certainly aware of the deadlines for papers and readings. We are equally aware that some texts are difficult to read. I can’t imagine assigning some of the essays that I have struggled through to my undergraduates, even though they may be highly applicable. For instance, in a recent composition class, I had assigned an article about critical thinking to my students. In class, we worked through pointing, writing about a line, sharing in groups, and reporting. During the reporting section, the conversation turned from thinking with concepts to signifiers. I have read Derrida and tried to simplify his idea for my freshman students, but I could not imagine assigning his texts for them to read. The point here is that I recognize that students have difficulties with texts because I also do.

What has become clearer to me from reading my posts is that as I have worked through the issue of being teacher to being student. This is not to imply that I came into this class with the thought of being the teacher here. I came to learn, to be a student. But my concept of student has changed. I find that I have unconsciously done what I really want my students to do. My first posts reflect a more scholarly approach to the theories we are considering in class. Though I had already overcome my reluctance to write in the first person through previous class room blogs, there was still a theoretical tome to my writing. As the blogs progressed, there was less theory and more application.

My first post was very much a teacher’s reaction to the reading. Even though I used Salvatori’s difficulty paper format, I was engaging her text from the standpoint of a teacher. I commented on the use of voice and writing style. I expressed and understanding of the content, but never really engaged deeply with it, despite the fact that I wrote a difficulty paper.

The readings for the second week elicited a similar response. I was concerned with the theory if how students learn. I did take a step away from theory, however, when I identified myself with one of the students in Linkon’s study. But this quickly reverted to the teacher mode when I commented on my own method of teaching research to my students. It is not my intention to say that concentrating on this information as a teacher is wrong. It is simply that in order to be effective, this knowledge needs to move beyond the theoretical. The act of employing these methods in my writing or in my classes isn’t even enough. They need to become more than concepts or signifiers.

In the third post I feel that I made a strong step in this direction. I was now taking the theories out of the text and applying them. My discussion of falling trees and conversations was an attempt to engage the content of the readings on a deeper level. There was also evidence that theories from previous readings in other classes was beginning to gel with the ideas I was facing in this class. They were becoming and integrated whole.

The titles of the last two entries is revealing of the direction my writing had taken: “Down Memory Lane” and “Musings.” My comments on the readings had taken on a much more personal tone. They were becoming a part of my thinking outside of the class room. My writing has also become less formal, and more conversational. Overall my writing/focus moved steadily away from theory and into internalization and application.

Basically, over the course of the weeks, my writing became less formal and more internally focused. From previous experience, I know this usually happens over the course of a semester that requires weekly blog posts. This leaves me with several questions.

• Is it that familiarity breeds contempt? As I write more and become familiar with my classmates and instructor, am I less interested in impressing them? Is this a good thing or not?

• Is this loss of formality good for me because the readings/writings become less theoretical? Am I using the knowledge instead of simply storing it away?

• Would it also be good for undergraduate students? Would they become more comfortable with the reading/writing process, or would they simply become sloppy?

My answer is maybe. I think the use of blogs can be very good. As I am interested in teaching with technology, this is part of my teaching and will probably become a larger part of it. I feel that the blogs lead to more discussion and hopefully a better understanding as participants share ideas. On the other hand, my experience has shown that some students abuse the idea of ungraded responses to the point that posts become almost undecipherable. If my writing has (in my opinion) degenerated over the semester (even in our short time), what will happen to undergraduate writing? Of course, that begs the question of does that matter?

While this reflection of my own writing has been revealing, it also raises many questions. These are answers that I will have to wait to discover.

Edith

To quote one of Salvatori’s student texts, I found reading The Elements (and Pleasures) of Difficulty extremely difficult.” Well perhaps not extremely, but difficult. So to utilize the Salvatori’s instructions, I will create a difficulty paper in which I catalog the difficulties, explain why I found those points difficult, and then explore what I can learn from those points.

To begin, I found the writing style itself to be difficult. The numerous parenthetical insertions that did little more than rename (explain) the previous (preceding) word were distracting (off-putting), especially for a composition instructor who is always red-penciling (commenting on) student essays that commit (contain) that particular onerous (tedious) mistake. The text also seemed to jump from place to place and idea to idea with little or no connection joining the thoughts. There are two possible explanations for this difficulty: Salvatori is a poor writer, or she had a purpose for this style. Accepting that the difficulty is with the text and not with me, I will also accept that there is a reason for this presentation. Actually there may be two. Perhaps this is the style of writing that would appeal to Salvatori’s intended audience of beginning readers. It is also possible that by giving students a “difficult” text to deal with, Salvatori is giving them a non-literary text on which to practice the skills that she discusses within the pages of the book. This was certainly the effect on me as evidenced that I have chosen the format of a “Difficulty Paper” in which to discuss the book.

The second difficulty I perceived was the content of the discussion. The idea of embracing difficulties rather than avoiding or denying them seems a very basic idea that Salvatori discusses ad infinitum from the perspective of different genres. This almost brought the book to the point of “long and boring” texts. Conversely, there also seemed much that was left out of the text. What level were these students? How far along in the semester were they? What experience did they have before enrolling in this course? What prompts had Salvatori given in preparation for this assignment. Were these students typical or atypical? For the answers to these questions, I turned to “Difficulty: The Great Educational Divide,” a shorter, earlier version of the book. This essay describes the case study in with which Salvatori began her research for the dealing with difficulty in the classroom. This essay explains much of what is left out of the longer text. So here I guess I learned the value of making connections between readings.

My final difficulty is the one that gave me the most trouble. I had difficulty relating to the proposed audience of this text. There were references to “students such as yourself” that really seemed to make the reading intangible for me. This issue was finally resolved when I realized that Salvatori was not really addressing students like “me.” She was addressing beginning readers. By this I do not mean to elevate myself to the level of an expert. However, Salvatori’s projected audience is definitely different than the one I am trying to be a part of. When I finally placed myself in the skin of a beginning reader the book began to make sense, and the other difficulties resolved themselves. Finally, I had taken the step Salvatori wanted me to. I had embraced a difficulty, wrestled with it, and thereby gained a better understanding of the text in question.

While I did not complete all the exercises that Salvatori gave the students throughout the text, I did practice these steps on the contents of the book itself. I found it to be an interesting exercise to be frustrated by a text, something that does not happen very often for me. Yet this frustration with a simply written piece of prose exemplifies the very idea of Salvatori’s work. This is possibly something that I could not have experienced from reading a piece of “literature” because I have dealt so often with those “difficulties.” While Salvatori’s concept seems simple on the surface, it is a revealing exercise to practice.

Edith

Tags: difficulty, salvatori, reading