Apostrophe's Facebook Page

Well, here is my poster. It's a piece of crap, and I would love to hear any opinions. Dr. Rice thinks it looks cheesy, and I completely agree. I am going to make it by inserting text boxes over a saved image of a Facebook page, but I'm so computer illiterate that I'm having a pretty hard time with it. Obviously I am missing Apostrophe's profile picture. I had thought about making an apostrophe out of colored paper and getting someone to wear it. Any volunteers? I really think the content is good. Rather than bold print, I'm going to highlight the usage rules in yellow. I also have to come up with some "ads" for the side of the poster. Just pull up someone's profile page (not your own though) to get a better idea of what it will eventually look like. Monday is my "finish the darn poster" day, so any opinions would be helpful! Oh and btw...all the ridiculous white space is just b/c I couldn't get it to save as a png unless I put it in paint...and I can't figure out how to get rid of all the extra nonsense. Can I emphasize how much I wish I had had time to present to Dr. Rice's class?!?!

Reflections on the "Writing Your Teaching Philosophy" Workshop

I feel like the workshop that I attended on Tuesday was (and will be) very valuable. We were provided with some interesting materials and excellent resources for creating a Teaching Philosophy which is personal, unique, and pertinent. We were given a handout with a sample Teaching Philosophy belonging to an individual from the field of Engineering, as well as a rubric for evaluating such a statement (created by a group of researchers from the University of Michigan). We were asked to read and evaluate the rubric. The rubric components focused on "goals for student learning," "teaching methods," "assessment," "creating an inclusive learning environment," and "stucture, rhetoric, and language." The sample Philosophy was filled with Engineering jargon, focused more on specific teaching instances rather than day-to-day pedagogical practice, and seemed to take little interest in the concept of inclusion. When polled, the majority of us in the large conference room felt that the sample lay on the border between "Needs work" and "Weak." The group of individual from Engineering, however, felt that it was an "Excellent" example, a philosophy which addressed the requirements outlined in rubric explicitly. This strange disagreement provided me with a very interesting learning moment. I realized how important a knowledge of audience is when writing a Teaching Philosophy. When applying for a first job in which the majority of my readers will be in my field, jargon might be acceptable and a more specificity may be appreciated. When adjusting my portfolio for tenure consideration, my audience may not consist of individuals specific to my field, thus changes should be made to make English-specific wording more generalized. Just as we emphasize in 5060 and to Freshman Composition students, audience is a very necessary consideration when writing. I am very glad that I chose to attend this workshop, and I have noticed as I read and research that I am finding components in articles which help me to better define my personal Philosophy and pedagogical stance.

In conclusion, I just want to share some questions-for-thought from the "Getting Started on Your Reflective Teaching Statement" handout (from the Center for Research on Learning and Teaching, University of Michigan, Chris O'Neal and Matt Kaplan):

a) What do you believe or value about teaching and student learning? What do you enjoy most about teaching? When I think about teaching, I value (believe)/get excited about (look forward to)...

b) If you had to choose a metaphor for teaching/learning what would it be?
Teaching is like...    Learning is like...    The process of teaching and learning is like...

c) How do your research and your disciplinary context influence your teaching?
For someone in my field (my discipline), teaching involves...

d) How do your identity/background and your students' identities/backgrounds affect teaching and learning in your classes? The identity and background of teachers and learners are important because...

e) How do you account for differences in student learning styles in your teaching? In order to accommodate different ways of learning among students I ...

f) What is your approach to evaluating and assessing students? Why? I believe the purpose of grading is...

g) How have you changed and developed as a teacher? What led to those changes?

The Importance of Finding Your Footing

Identity:
the actavating image of oneself; brings our circuit of cultural response practices back around to regulation, for identity can also be defined as the image we use to regulate our own practices in resistance to the cultural practices foistered upon us (Haswell 1278).

I love the Haswell's inclusion of this definition and the infusion of cultural concepts within his article. I believe that writing is a reflection of personal identity, or at least should be. Cultural constructs and cultural formations tend to define what and how we write. The Western world tells us to value time, to value a linear form of movement. Order, pattern, system. Problematically, teaching such formats often creates a gap between the actual written words and the author's voice. In Holcomb and Killingsworth's text Performing Prose: The Study and Practice of Style in Composition, the authors move away from the use of the term "voice," instead utilizing the term "footing:

"The concept of voice focuses on the performer, but footing always puts the performer in relation to someting else--or somebody else: the audience." (Holcomb 61)
"Footing is a metaphor derived from the physical act of gaining a stable placement of the feet, but when used to describe social interaction, it covers a range of behaviors--from the actual physical stance speakers take with respect to listeners, to the emotions and attitudes they express, to the social roles, languages, and dialects they adopt." (Holcomb 61)

I personally agree with these authors. I think that in many instances "footing" is a better descriptive term, especially for students who are learning to write effectively. The term itself places them in closer relation to their audience. I also beleive that there has to be a way to develop this idea of "footing," a concept of voice, and I believe that that concept of personal expression is more important than the develop of structural format. Perhaps that isn't very realistic...But it is very important for students to have an idea of their own position within society, the importance of their writing, and the recognition that what they say matters. Holcomb and Killingsworth believe that writers' style can "position them socially" (Holcomb 64).

Three segmentations of social footing:

1. Social standing between writer and reader, an analogue to physical distance that guages position along two axes: one ranging from high to low, the other from formal...to familiar.

2. Social roles take up be writers and assigned to readers: advisor-advisee, expert-novice, urbane wit-country bumpkin, employer-employee, politician-constituent, trickster-dupe, lover-beloved, and so on.

3. Social languages, dialects, or registers--that is, styles of writing or speaking characteristic of particular activities, groups, or professions. 
(Holcomb 64)

I think this analysis of authorial position within the social space provides an intersting correlation to Haswell's twelve categories of "teacher-responder[s]" (Haswell 275).

1. Distanced aesthetician or rhetorician
2. Involved co-creator
3. Demanding coach
4. Persuasive motivator
5. Experienced modelor
6. Prompting dialoguer
7. Judicious lawgiver
8. Supportive parent
9. Expert reader
10. Sharp-eyed editor
11. Experienced diagnostician
12. Real reader

I often wonder whether or not teachers even have a real grasp on their writing identity, and Haswell's list remarks upon the idea that we need understand our roles as readers as well. How do we effectively comment on our student's work when we don't comprehend our own footing?

I find myself coming back, once again, to Brannon's Thinking Out Loud on Paper: The Student Daybook as a Tool to Foster Learning. The author's describe the daybook as "that drawer in the kitchen where we stick everything that does not yet have a place, but we know we might need someday" (Brannon 11). The daybook is a place for thinking, for developing ideas, for identifying one's self, not only in relation to classroom material, but also relation to audience. Students improve their reading and critical thinking skills, their writing and analytical skills, their ability to connect information from class to class, from classroom to real world. This tool is helping students to discover that identity. Brannon and her fellow authors are adamant, however, that the daybook won't work if it isn't modeled by the teacher. The daybook becomes a communicative tool in which students and teachers develop together, assess their footing, and find a sense of identity which they might not have otherwise discovered. As a teacher, I have to be aware of my footing if I want to comment efficiently on my students' work. I'm excited to eventually see how well this technique actually function within the classroom.