Teaching Phil

 

Under the Weight of Our Congregation:
A Teaching Philosophy

Thank you for letting me join your class and write with you.
–a former student

 

My Clean Blue Bowl on the Kitchen Counter, Broken

I have taught composition for nearly two decades, yet still, in the recesses of my mind, I wonder: Is it really possible to teach writing? Of course I don’t utter this question aloud, for I might find myself unemployed; however, it continues to haunt me. Nevertheless, I have come to the conclusion that the most useful thing I can do, as a writing instructor, is to create an environment conducive to writing. A houseplant placed in the right location needs very little to thrive. Similarly, a student in the proper environment can thrive as well. I envision the classroom as a large bowl, which holds and nourishes our students for the short time they’re with us and encourages them to grow at their own pace, in their own way. My favorite family story is about my grandmother, whom I was named after. It’s really more of an image than a story, about her bread making, or dough making, I can’t remember. But she would place all the ingredients in the center of the bowl, except for the flour, which she would place around the edges. Then, she would mix in the flour, as much as was needed, regardless of the recipe. Similarly, students will gain what they are ready for, and no prodding or prompting will force them to do more. My only hope is that they will depart the class better writers than they arrived.

As much as possible, considering the large number of students, I try to incorporate the whole-class workshop. The focus of a writing class should be student writing-in-progress, and the whole-class workshop, which is a staple in a creative writing classroom, allows us this focus. The student distributes her work, reads the work aloud, then classmates and instructor comment, focusing on improvement. This method allows us to discuss writing technique within a context. A safe context, for students are notoriously generous with each other. In fact, the most interesting discussions tend to occur with work that is clearly unfinished, or work that is causing the writer difficulty. What I find interesting about the unfinished work is its potential. What I find interesting about my students is their potential.

In addition to whole-class workshops, I assign collaborative writing to small groups. Although I don’t assign formal collaborative assignments, I find that allowing them to practice new skills within a group, before practicing them alone, is highly beneficial. Once they begin their formal work by themselves, they will have that initial group experience to reflect on. Most often, the collaborative work is a paragraph, a poem, a bibliographic citation, or a structural form in miniature.

Mabel, the Aspiring Rain Cloud,
Who Wants to Burst over the Ocean and Return as a Red Grape

On the back of my syllabus is a drawing by my youngest son, completed when he was in kindergarten. At the top are typed words pasted together to form a sentence. The sentence reads: “We are playing.” Below these words are two human figures, one large and one small. He tells me now that these figures represent the two of us. His drawings of people are the most adorable things! Of course they are always smiling. The noses are upside down U’s. The shoulders always very square, the hands and feet circular. The reason I love these drawings so much is that they express my son, who is pure joy incarnated. The reason this particular drawing appears on the back of my syllabus is that I consider the process of writing a form of play. Very serious play, for if I didn’t view writing as play, I couldn’t write. And if I didn’t consider my classroom a place of joy, I wouldn’t want to come to class.

I want my students to experiment, to try new things, to take risks. I don’t want them to continue writing the same paper they have always written, without thought, mindlessly following the same dull routine while they diligently study for their math exams. Students, I think, tend to take more risks when writing in creative forms. They also seem more aware of actually making choices, and they are able to discuss these choices in writing. At the same time, they are practicing various skills. They practice choosing the perfect word and placing the most important words in the most important places. They create effective titles. They practice beginnings and endings. They incorporate multiple voices. And they think about how they wish to affect their audiences and how best to achieve these effects. I hope that these skills will carry over into their more conventional academic writing. And I hope that they will be as proud of their academic writing as they are of their creative writing. Finally, I hope that their academic writing will demonstrate creativity, because then I know that they are actually thinking.

Whereas formerly I centered my class on Revision, I now place more emphasis on Invention. This shift in emphasis encourages me to prefer drafts of unfinished work in the whole-class workshop. Once the student considers a draft finished, it is very difficult to go back and make alterations. Most of my own revision occurs in my head before I even start drafting. Additional revision occurs while in the process of an initial draft. I rarely make significant changes after drafting, for my vision at this point is usually complete. I find it a bit hypocritical to force my students to do something that I rarely do myself. Furthermore, when a writer is able to envision a piece fully, revision seems to take care of itself. Invention itself is a vital component of Revision. Its absence results in mere editing and proofreading. In the whole-class workshop, I prefer to address the potential of a piece rather than dwell on its defects as much as I can.

The Dog with the Eyes
that Fall Out If You Hit Her on the Head Too Hard

This spring, one of my students, in his cover letter, addressed the use of humor in my classroom. In this letter, he says, “Sometimes I would be listening to you give us direction on how to write something and I would be in my seat frustrated because I was confused, and then you would burst out laughing at something and it would help ease the tension that I was feeling about the assignments.” Last fall, another student told me that she heard me in the hallway around the corner, and knew it was I, for she had recognized my laugh. Actually, I didn’t realize I laughed in class so much, but I do admit that my instructions are generally confusing.

I recently attended a seminar by Dr. Ben Bernstein, an educator and performance psychologist. He suggested that the purpose of education is to “embody and empower” our students. And he said that simply becoming aware of our breathing in a stressful situation helps to embody us. I believe that laughter provides a similar function, for when we are laughing, we are here, in the moment. I’ve also been hearing recently how stress can negatively affect our cognitive abilities. Processing information and performing intellectually are impossible tasks in a stressful environment. Now that I think about it, teaching writing is an impossible task, and one can only approach such an impossible task with humor.

The Deaf-mute Girl
Who Appeared One Day among the Sunflowers

When I returned to graduate school as a non-degree student, my goal was simply to not lose my own voice. The first thing I did was place a poem by H. D. (one of my favorite poets) about Helen of Troy (the course was the History of Rhetoric) in the front of my notebook. A poem in one’s notebook is quite comforting when one happens to be more poet than scholar. There’s something about academic writing that tends to steal our own voices. All that weight of authority, that omnipresent authoritarian stance. Surely my students are at least somewhat affected by this weight of authority, and I hope that after using their research in creative forms, they can continue to hear their own voices within academic forms.

Each voice in the classroom should be heard, so I require all my students to speak in class. On the front page of my syllabus is a verse from Raffi’s “Sharing Song.” Occasionally, we simply go around the circle, one student at a time, and share each student’s writing, experience, or opinions. This type of sharing prevents the classroom from being dominated by a few voices. And since everyone is required to speak, and there are no wrong answers, it becomes a less competitive, safe environment.

Some students require more time to think before they speak in class. The asynchronous classroom created by Blackboard allows them this option. Not only can they speak after they’ve had time to think, but they can modify or delete what they’ve said as well. They can read what their classmates have said also, at their own pace, without the distractions and impediments of a physical environment. Furthermore, they can comment intelligently on what others have said. The communication tools on Blackboard are fabulous. Students can very easily contact me or each other. I can post announcements, send emails to individual students or the entire class, and keep a running list of our daily assignments. I can also post course documents and my own biographical and contact information. The group pages allow us to share files of our own writing, so students have a real audience and an opportunity to read the work of their peers.

My middle son completed his first two years of schooling without uttering a sound on school property. Fortunately, he had very understanding teachers who worked with him. During kindergarten, his teacher and classmates learned to read his lips, for he eventually became comfortable enough to mouth the words he had to say. I was told about a third grade girl as the same school who suffered from selective mutism and had never spoken in school. By the beginning of first grade, my son was finally speaking in class, but though he is still rather quiet in school, he is extremely talkative at home. I wonder how much some of my more quiet students would be talking if they weren’t in a classroom.

Nettie Farris
Summer 2006

 

 


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