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.