A few more terms for thought...

A few additional terms that relate to my syllabus and/or thoughts surrounding composition. I will try to add more soon.

Freewriting	Peter Elbow. Continuous writing without regard to grammar, punctuation, etc. Focus is on getting thoughts on paper, free to stray from the topic, putting forth exploration of thoughts.  For my syllabus, I provided opportunities for students to freewrite using Blogger.
Grammar	Set of rules that make up/drive composition.  As an instructor, there will be an emphasis on grammar.
Kenneth Bruffee	Promoted collaborative learning. Social interaction with peers in collaborative groups help students have dialogue of agreement/shared knowledge.  For my syllabus, I incorporated collaborative learning in many of the partner assignments.
Plagiarism	Intentional use of someone else’s work without acknowledgement. There may be circumstances where the act is intentional and as instructors, we must address the issue without accusation.  For my syllabus, I incorporated TTU's plagiarism statement.
Voice	A writer’s style of writing – use of words, syntax, dialogue, etc. to reflect their “voice.” As an instructor, empowering students to write, developing their voice is important.
Rhetoric	It’s two things -- (1) the study of words or communication that involves persuading, informing, entertaining, etc. or (2) the art of persuasion, conveying information to elicit interest, effect change, or entertain. Rhetoric is composition; composition is rhetoric.

Defining Directions in My Syllabus & Plagiarism

Defining Directions in My Syllabus

Collaboration	As promoted by Bruffee, collaboration is where students work together toward a goal. Not to be confused with collaborative learning, learning is still taking place, but students are actively working together to achieve a goal such as completing a proposal or creating an elevator speech which are two collaborative assignments within my FYC syllabus.
Collaborative learning	Active process of students working together in such situations as classroom discussions. A collaborative learning environment is conducive to learning. My FYC syllabus includes classroom discussions, peer reviews that will take place, as well as exercises related to the day’s topic.
Empowerment	Process of gaining control over one’s life. For my FYC syllabus, I felt that by giving students the opportunity to choosde their own topics, I’m empowering them to step up, take control of their assignment and run with it, so to speak.
Peer evaluation	Peer evaluation or peer review is an excellent way to gain feedback from other students (other than the teacher). The goal of evaluation is for students to get some idea of quality work and out to improve. In order for this to be effective, the environment should be such that feedback is honest and constructive, not hurtful. There are two opportunities in my FYC syllabus -- I have an opportunity for students to use time in class to review a peer’s essay. Guidelines are given in the textbook to give some guidance for the peer evaluation. In addition, for the collaboration assignment, the partners have to give each other a peer review.
Peter Elbow	A proponent of freewriting. I took some of what he’s promoted in terms of freewriting – giving students opportunities to freewrite without worry about grammar, punctuation and such. In a way, the blog assignments allow the students to freewrite…they are not graded on grammar, punctuation but rather for the thoughts they share. Blog assignments are more of “focused” freewriting.

Plagiarism

Upon reading Dr. Rice’s SOP, I found it to be clear for students in terms of defining plagiarism. I do not think it’s something that is stressed in the K-12 area enough that when students go to post secondary schools, they are faced with this scary word. It brings about a memory that has made me anxious over the years as I completed my BA, one MA and now am on a second MA. Because of my hearing loss, I am a very visual person and for a time there, had a bit of a photographic memory about what I’ve read. I wrote a paper for my FYC class and was called into the professor’s office and accused of plagiarism. Naturally, I was upset and defensive, but fortunately, was able to demonstrate that it was not intentional and also demonstrate how my ability to retain what I hear/read can blur the sense of what is mine or what is not. After long discussions, my professor and I agreed to allow me to have a zero on the assignment rather than expulsion from the program which was what would have happened. I have since been very cautious about what I retain, making notes of anything that I may have read that would be beneficial in papers, and noting whether it’s directly or indirectly attributed to any text I may read. I even go the extra mile to double check my writings against sources. I feel that the SOP created is critical to use especially with FYC students so that it’s clear up front the expectations and the need to be cautious when writing. I also have to note that the SOP says "At no point should the instructor accuse the student of plagiarizing. Instead, the instructor should consider the meeting a teachable moment, speak in terms of “incorrectly used or referenced writing,” and ask the student about ways to correctly reference sources." - given my experience this is an EXCELLENT way to approach this situation. In my situation, the professor came right out and said "you plagiarized this work." It shocked me and put me on a defensive immediately not knowing what she was talking about and then it took over two hours of going back and forth before she realized she should have approached it differently - her response at the end was that it appeared that I unintentionally failed to reference the writing. I think it wound up being a learning experience for us both.

FYC Collaborative Assignment

My goal with this assignment is to provide opportunities to learn to present a proposal, work with a partner to see things through from creation to presentation as well as putting a little bit of an oral presentation element into this.This is similar to past assignments I've had and I felt it's effective.

Team Assignment

There are two parts to this assignment. You will work with a partner to complete these parts. Each part has a different deadline and different modes of delivery. Your grade will be based on pre-presentation work, peer review (your partner), and overall setup of the proposal.

Part I: Proposal Writing

With your partner, you will work together to write/present a proposal for (pick one) creating a student group/organization, creating an event to be held on campus, or any topic to be approved by me in advance.

The proposal should include the elements discussed in class (shown below). Remember that not all proposals are created equal and not all these elements are necessary, depending on the type of proposal you and your partner are creating. 

             I.        Summary

           II.        Introduction or organizational information

          III.        Problem statement or needs assessment

          IV.        Project description

a.    Objectives

b.    Methods

c.    Staffing

d.    Evaluation

            V.        Future or other necessary funding

          VI.        Budget

        VII.        Conclusion

There will be several times over the next two months where you will be required to present information. All steps must be followed to receive full credit.

By (date), email me with your topic you've chosen and how you will approach this topic. While this email is sent by one person, be sure to include your partner's email address so that I may respond to both of you with questions and/or approval. (2 points)

By (date), provide a draft of your proposal for instructor feedback. Upon feedback, you will receive a date for your class presentation. (4 points)

On the day of your presentation, you must present this proposal to the class via Moodle for feedback. (5 points)

You and your partner will also submit, to me, your peer reviews (4 points).

Your final proposal is worth 10 points for a total of 25 points. 

Part II: Elevator Pitch

With your partner, create two-minute elevator pitch about a new product or service that may be helpful to your classmates. If you want some ideas, you can call on your peers for ideas. Be prepared to share with the class using Skype. The challenge will be how to get your message across in the short timeframe AND together. You will be graded on presentation and how you collaborate in the presentation. (10 points)

Defining Literacy

There are many definitions of “literacy” – a few I found online include, but are not limited to:

Literacy has been described as the ability to read for knowledge and write coherently and think critically about the written word. (Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literacy).

Literacy is the ability to use printed and written information to function in society, to achieve one's goals, and to develop one's knowledge and potential. (Task-based Literacy– National Assessment of Adult Literacy http://nces.ed.gov/naal/fr_definition.asp).

Successful use of printed material is a product of two classes of skills: (1) Word-level reading skills and (2) Higher level literacy skills (Skills-based literacy – National Assessment of Adult Literacy http://nces.ed.gov/naal/fr_definition.asp).

The quality or state of being literate, especially the ability to read and write. (Dictionary.com).

 

Recently, I’ve been hearing about “multimodal literacies” and that’s a new term for me. Literacy, by definition, always meant, to me, the ability to read and write. I understand in this new “digital age,” this is probably an “old-school” definition. Research on the internet brought forth some examples of literacies – visual, media, technological, information, multicultural, etc. Multimodal literacy has become a rather interesting topic for me. I particularly was interested in NCTE’s statement found at: http://www.ncte.org/governance/MultimodalLiteracies/.

A couple key things that stand out for me are:

“In digital forms, students, even very young students, are often more literate in the technical aspects of digital production than many of their teachers.” (NCTE)

This is the effect of the current digital age. It’s almost scary because when I was learning to read and write, printed books or media were the sources of my literacy development. Children today are exposed to computers, blogs, text-speak and when I have tried to work with them, I find myself taken aback by their ability to whip through such modalities with ease and expertise that I do not have. Also, because of this, children may become bored which is what NCTE indicates in this statement – students may find school instruction irrelevant.

“With the development of multi-modal literacy tools, writers are increasingly expected to be responsible for many aspects of the writing, design, and distribution processes that were formerly apportioned to other experts.” (NCTE)

I found this statement interesting, but have to agree. As technology is continuously improved the accountability of writers increases. NCTE’s statement says that this development will cause writers to “…lose control over the work and its potential audience in a way that wasn’t as true in print publishing.” The statement further indicates that there are ethical issues that may arise. I believe this is true because the Internet is making it easy for people to publish with ease; however, it also brings more potential for plagiarism, more complicated “issues of ownership.”

I think to really define literacy is to look at the mode of literacy that is being used. The common link is the ability to read, write – to learn to communicate or convey your message through the modalities that are being used. However, I probably will remain “old school” and say personally, my definition is “Ability to read and write for both an increase in knowledge and ability to put both reading and writing to practice.” I think this is achievable when using any modality providing we do not lose sight of the importance of literacy in our lives.

Review of Tricia's AES Essay & Presentation

I chose to review Tricia’s paper on assessment tools in writing instruction for two reasons: 1) assessment tools are constantly changing over time and 2) I work in the assessment publishing field and of course, am interested in what other tools are out there and how they might work. 

Thoughts on Paper

Overall, it’s a great piece on automated scoring. Just have a few thoughts/questions.

The outcomes released by CCC, WPA and NCTE: Are there any differentiating opinions that might be elaborated upon or are they pretty similar as it appears? I’m very interested in knowing more, especially when groups such as these release positions on key issues related to teaching.

Great information about Intellimetric. What other AES systems out there are similar to Intellimetric? Are there any that stand out? Suggest providing a summary of these.  Sometimes it’s helpful to see something for comparison. 

Tricia – I recently saw this white paper and thought you might find this interesting – there is a mention of paper in the third paragraph. http://www.pearsonassessments.com/pai/ai/about/news/NewsItem/newsrelease060111.htm

Thoughts on Presentation

• Great examples given in the first few slides. Nice to see how traditional scoring and automated scoring differ. I do not think most of us would have even had a picture of it without examples so it’s very helpful. I suggest that font is changed for the feedback (italics and blue font) to make it stand out (this is just the editor in me-used to edit PowerPoint presentations at work).
• It’s nice to see the differences between traditional and automated methods in table form. It reallymakes a case for AES.
• For the slide with pearsoned – recommend titling it with a title rather than web address to introduce it to the reader.
• Loved the last slide – sad to say I came across someone who asked me what a typewriter was. :-)

Great job! Thanks for the opportunity to read a different perspective on digital technologies!

The “Woof” Behind MOO vs. Skype in Online Classes

The use of online modalities such as blogs, forums, chatroom, and other similar venues have increasingly played a strong role in teaching writing the last decade. This is a result of the use of computers and the Internet in distance learning. 

The cartoon featured at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Internet,_nobody_knows_you%27re_a_dog has the caption “On the Internet, nobody knows you’re a dog.” The context of this cartoon is related to Internet anonymity – computer users on the internet are able to traverse the net in anonymity. For distance learners, I believe the use of MOO and Skype does not afford them 100% anonymity. 

This brings up some thoughts related to the Internet that I would like to share. 

My Composition Theory class at Texas A&M was conducted in the computer lab where we all chatted online in the same room, both the lab and the chatroom. It was a new type of delivery and experience that the department was trying to introduce to the students (around 1992-1993). There was no anonymity because our chat was linked to our name. There may have been some anonymity in terms of what we shared and our emotions were not shown unless we described them in our words. Some people did not know who others were in spite of seeing them in class, we did not have much opportunity to introduce ourselves verbally by name to make connections to the online text. It was a bit odd now that I think more about this. We rarely had verbal f2f conversation, most were online.

My first semester at Texas Tech was my first experience with MOO. I had to join in the class as a guest which made it cumbersome because other students were identified by name and I as well as one other student had to identify ourselves every time we “spoke.” Eventually, I got my username straightened out. Interestingly, since the MOO was connected to Moodle, we were able to get everyone’s background information. That itself was intimidating for this first-year MATC student. This intimidation diminished after a few MOO sessions – getting to know fellow students a bit more, getting a sense of personality by how they type, etc. 

This semester is my first experience using Skype. There is some anonymity in the Skype sessions in such we can utilize chat or we can speak. In some ways, we can be anonymous just chatting – no sense of revealing emotion in what we say as we would speaking. There’s also anonymity in the sense no one seems to know what we all look like since Skype is chat/voice, no video.

Of course these experiences do not reflect the gist of the cartoon in question. But taking that context, I feel that there is something to be said for anonymity – many students may reveal more of their knowledge without the intimidation of being known. I know I do when I’m anonymous – there’s a feeling of freedom to share thoughts and opinions without fear of being known outside of that anonymity. However, there is a need to know who they are, as an instructor, to effectively teach and grade performance. If I had to choose between MOO and Skype, I’d choose MOO simply because I feel that more is shared that way than just by voice/chat. Also the plus side of MOO is receiving transcripts as notes. 

By the way, my dogs, Sarah (5) and Foxy (14), do not think they are dogs. 

FYC…What types of assignments would I consider implementing, based on my philosophy of teaching?

As I mentioned, my philosophy is enhanced by three thoughts: (1) Effective teaching involves reflection and action, (2) The learning environment should be collaborative and, (3) Learning styles are diverse and should be recognized and nurtured. Although, I’ve never taught FYC, I believe these thoughts, while representative of my teaching philosophy, can be used within a first-year composition course. In addition, I reviewed and took to heart the outcomes set forth by the WPA ((http://wpacouncil.org/positions/outcomes.html/).

Reflection and action can be conducive for students in a FYC course. This can be in the form of a journal assignment where each student receives a prompt each week and writes in response to the prompt, utilizing reflection in their responses. In addition, I would likely be inclined to assign various writing practices to reflect understanding of different modes of discourse such as argumentation, narration, description, and expository. Through these assignments, students can utilize their reflective skills into their writings when providing arguments for/against a situation, a narrative about a past event, description of a task that is important to complete, and providing information about a subject close to their heart. In addition, this would meet one of the WPA outcomes of critical thinking, reading, and writing where students should “use writing and reading for inquiry, learning, thinking, and communicating." In addition, WPA notes that for the rhetorical knowledge aspect of writing, students should “respond to the needs of different audiences” and “respond appropriately to different kinds of rhetorical situations… understand[ing] how genres shape reading and writing.” Of course, a knowledge of conventions where students “learn common formats for different kinds of text” and use proper “syntax, grammar, punctuation, and spelling” is very important in the development of the writer.

I believe the learning environment should be collaborative. Teaming students to work together on a given assignment and present to the class is an excellent way to promote teamwork or collaboration. Such assignments would be researching a problem, finding solutions, presenting these solutions to an audience (classmates) that is persuasive in nature. Another assignment could be working together to sell a product/services and present to the class. When implementing these assignments, I would be promoting collaborative learning – working together, learning individually…in other words, as I mentioned in my philosophy, bringing about the healthy exchange of ideas, experiences, and opinions can nurture these different styles. This teaming method would utilize one of the WPA outcomes where students integrate their ideas with those of others.”  

I feel that all of these are reflective of my philosophy of teaching. Several aspects of the WPA outcomes seem to fit within this philosophy and these are some good examples of assignments I would implement in my FYC course.

My Philosophy of Teaching

The following is my philosophy of teaching that I created several years ago during my first MA studies. I, over time, would reflect on it, and then revised it considerably last semester here at Texas Tech. While this is primarily a philosophy of teaching, parts are supplemented with some references to Fulkerson’s article “Four Philosophies of Composition.”

As an adult educator, my philosophy of teaching has evolved through my experiences with students in the classroom as well as outside the classroom. My philosophy is enhanced by three thoughts that I carry with me.

1. Effective teaching involves reflection and action.
2. The learning environment should be collaborative.
3. Learning styles are diverse and should be recognized and nurtured.

In order for me to determine if my teaching is effective, I employ two of the four modes of reflection when teaching and put reflection into action. Lana Danielson, in her article “Fostering Reflection” (Educational Leadership 66.5), lists the modes of reflection as technological, situational, deliberate, and dialectical. My reflections tend to fall under the deliberate and dialectical modes, depending on the teaching situation. In terms of deliberate reflection, I take the time to seek out more information about the effectiveness of my teaching by reviewing material presented to the students, talking with other subject matter experts, obtaining feedback from students and colleagues, and review student performance on work to seek out patters, if any. The results I glean from this type of reflection would be used to improve or enhance my future teaching. The dialectical mode of reflection is a more enhanced method of deliberate thinking where I take the results of my reflection and implement them as solutions, often changing methods of teaching to effect change in student learning outcomes. While I may employ two specific modes of thinking, my reflective time is ongoing and as a result, I am striving to constantly learn what “clicks” for the student, and how I can best be an effective educator.

The learning environment should be collaborative. Adult learners are a different group from traditional K-12 students in such they have life experiences or prior knowledge and skills that can be beneficial to a collaborative situation such as a group project. As an adult educator, my goal is to empower students to strive to enhance that knowledge and the skills they have attained and to carry them through life and work experiences. By implementing a collaborative learning environment, I promote working together toward a common goal, learning from one another, sharing knowledge, and enhancing critical thinking skills. The collaborative environment also brings outs the different learning styles that can be challenging.

In addition to promoting a collaborative learning environment, I lean toward the formalist philosophy of teaching where, as Fulkerson shares in his article, I tend to “judge a paper a failure if it contains on comma splice or five spelling errors.” The one comma splice is a little extreme, but it is my opinion that a good paper should not have many spelling errors. Fulkerson quotes Janet Emig’s (The Composing Processes of Twelfth Graders) conclusion “most of the criteria by which students’ school-sponsored writing is evaluated concern the accidents rather than the essences of discourse – that is, spelling, punctuation, penmanship, and length” which are the four formalists criteria. For most, this may seem a little harsh for a teaching philosophy, but as society continues to change in terms of the digital media, it is of utmost importance for each student to possess good basic writing skills.

Learning styles are diverse and should be recognized and nurtured. As an adult educator, I am aware that there are diverse learning styles and as I teach, I am cognizant of each student’s knowledge, skills, and abilities, and try to enhance the desire to learn through recognition of these differences. Differences in learning may be auditory, visual, or kinesthetic. It is important to keep these three styles in mind when observing each student. The recognition and nurturing of diverse learning styles is also representative of what Fulkerson calls “Expressionism” as a philosophy. My formalist philosophy is peppered with expressionism where I strive to encourage students to learn about themselves, how they best learn. Fulkerson shares that expressionists strive for “interesting, credible, honest, and personal voice” and this is part of what I consider in the recognition of learning styles and encouraging students to learn about themselves through their writings. In addition, Malcolm Knowles stated that adult learners learn best when they understand why something is important, have the freedom to learn in their own way, learning is experiential, the time is right for them to learn, and the process is positive and encouraging. By implementing the collaborative learning environment where adult learners can work together, learning in their own way, and at the right time, the healthy exchange of ideas, experiences, and opinions can nurture these different styles.

Adult learners come into adult education with the foundation of life experiences and knowledge that is accompanied by a mutual need for respect. As an adult educator, it is my goal to meet this need through the method of teaching in a collaborative environment, the implementation of reflectivity in my work to ensure my teaching is effective, and through the recognition of learning differences, further enhance the knowledge and skills these learners bring with them.

Teaching to Practice

For this week, the questions for thought are: What is the most difficult thing to teach in the teaching of writing, and how do you go about teaching that? For me, I find that everyone has their own way of learning. In my graduate studies at UT San Antonio, I learned about adult learning and how it was important to know each learner’s style. These questions bring up a time where I had the opportunity to work with a friend who was having so much trouble with her English class. She came to my house several times over the semester to go over her papers. The hardest thing for me to teach her was transitions and concision, but that was not the hardest thing to TEACH…It was HOW to teach it.

After several tries, I found myself providing a series of demos where I created paragraphs about any subject and some of them had no transitions, some transitions with too much detail, too much detail and a transition here and there. I had her review them and tell me what she sees wrong. She got it right on the second try. I was able to demonstrate how transitions help with the flow of information and how being concise can keep the reader on the information you are trying to convey. For my friend, it helped to have concrete information in front of her to demonstrate the lesson rather than just simply explaining. I then had her put it to paper, rewriting what she wrote and as a result, she was able to realize how the paper flows better. Her response to me when she had her “ah-ha” moment was “my professor is all talk, no action so I cannot understand what he’s talking about.” The issue I had was I kept explaining the issues to her and she wasn’t getting it. When I put it to practice and she put what she learned to practice, she got it.
This situation is similar to what Janet Emig details in her article “Writing as a Mode of Learning.” She writes of self-pacing and references Luria on page 12, “writing is self-rhythmed” or self-paced. By understanding my friend’s way of learning and allowing her to learn a little more on her time, I was able to effectively show her how to better writing her paper. Emig also references Bruner who supported that we learn by doing which is exactly what I had to get into my mind when tutoring my friend on her writing. Putting to practice my demos as well as encouraging her to rewrite, it helped make the connection between learning and writing.

What is Rhetoric?

A mere oversight on my part about the question of the day for last week's class...what is rhetoric? There are so many definitions out there. To me it's two things -- (1) the study of words or communication that involves persuading, informing, entertaining, etc. or (2) the art of persuasion, conveying information to elicit interest, effect change, or entertain. My definition of rhetoric seems to be in line with Andrea Lunsford's definition: "Rhetoric is the art, practice, and study of human communication."

Here's a list of various definitions of rhetoric from Stanford University's English department at: http://www.stanford.edu/dept/english/courses/sites/lunsford/pages/defs.htm 

A Texas Aggie in Red Raider Country…An Introduction

Born and raised in the Dallas area, I received my BA in English from Texas A&M University and my MA in Education from the University of Texas at San Antonio. This is my third semester in the MATC program here at Texas Tech. I am currently a Project Manager for Pearson Education, an assessment test publisher. Prior to this position (held only a month), I was a Senior Editor, overseeing the development of assessment tests, including editing various pieces such as poetry, short stories, passages, and more. My current position allows me to work with various internal and external groups to ensure that the development goes smoothly and on schedule. It is my goal to take this MATC degree and put it to use as an instructor at the college/university level in the near future.  

I always had a desire to help others, whether it was through teaching, volunteering, or mentoring. I have a particular interest in disabilities and literacy, more specifically deafness and literacy. As a hearing-impaired person who loves to write and read, it always burdened me when I would encounter a deaf person who hated to read and over the years, I learned that literacy is an obstacle for them because of the use of sign language which, in syntax, is very different from English. My goal, as an English instructor, is to work with those with hearing losses on their writing and reading skills either within a college’s English program or a program dedicated to those with hearing losses. 

What is composition? I believe composition is the art or the making of creative work. It is the bringing together of words to form a work such as an essay, paper, book, etc. Composition integrates thinking, writing, and reading skills that can be transferred to everyday life.