Narrative Inquiry: Measuring Student Progress Through Narrative Teaching-Focused Observation Being at the helm of a college classroom, especially an English classroom, affords teachers the unique opportunity to interact with varied personal narratives. As academia, and the world at large, strives, in the words of Sharon McGee, “to put front and center […]
Author: murphyi
Shifting Forms
If I am completely honest, I’m not sure exactly who I want to be as a teacher yet. It’s probably an unsatisfying answer, but it is the one that immediately rings true in my own mind. I feel as though I just haven’t had enough time in the classroom to get a grasp on the […]
Addison on Narrative Inquiry
Citation Addison, Joanne. “Narrative As Method and Methodology in Socially Progressive Research.” Practicing Research in Writing Studies: Reflexive and Ethically Responsible Research, edited by Katrina Powell and Pamela Takayoshi, Hampton Press Inc., 2012, 373-383 Summary Joanne Addison starts her article with a reflection on her experiences as a foster parent. This theme weaves throughout her […]
Pedagogical Discovery
Research Motivation As I sit here pondering and designing a pedagogical research proposal, I find myself wrestling with my (so far) limited experience within English 101 classrooms on our campus. Or, perhaps, a better way of putting it, I struggle approaching this without the experience of a static English 101 class roster to provide […]
The Opponent
Perhaps it is all the theory, but I can’t help but look at this through an Hegelian lens — a modified Hegelian lens, perhaps. I think that the dialectic can be troublesome, and the synthesis promised in the process does not always account for every eventuality. That being said, I think that this adversarial relationship […]
Environmental Toxins
So far, I can only think of this in theoretical terms, outside of one instance that I will highlight, as I haven’t gotten to fully see the types of toxic behaviors that current undergraduate college students bring to the classroom. I am very curious for my full session next quarter, and I imagine that some […]
A Possible Response
Student Writing Response: Student C, Project 1 Student C — Great work — thanks for the thoughtful response! I can tell that you put time and effort into understanding Rose’s work, and, as well, into thinking critically about how it relates to yourself as a writer. It is no small task to synthesize multiple pieces […]
Imposter Syndrome
My first instinct is that students often feel like imposters when they sit down to write. From every angle, they are receiving information about writing and its processes. Whether that means they are getting reinforcement and praise in regards to their writing that they honed in K-12 or they are reforming their whole conception of […]
An Idealistic Microcosm
Many possibilities present themselves as I consider an idealistic imagination of the impact of a first-year writing course on any given student. I think, necessarily, my ideals will differ from others in my position, and I am constantly reminded of the various issues present when labeling anything as “good” or “bad”, especially, when it comes […]
My Disjointed View (So Far)
As I don’t get to see the outcomes or the written work of students, this is a little bit of a difficult question to engage with. On the other hand, I have seen many students across several classes throughout my subbing experience so far, and it has been interesting to see what they all seem […]
An Ever Present Fracturing
I think, as with many questions in this area, it is at once a simple and complicated answer. The more I think about the differences between all of us, and, more specifically, the difference between myself and my students, I am faced increasingly with the realization of the ways in which we are so similar. […]
“Using Digital Rhetoric in a Multimodal Assignment to Disrupt Traditional Academic Writing: Conventions in a First-Year Writing Classroom” – Melanie Gagich, Cleveland State University
Citation: Gagich, Melanie. “Using Digital Rhetoric in a Multimodal Assignment to Disrupt Traditional Academic Writing: Conventions in a First-Year Writing Classroom /.” The Journal of Interactive Technology and Pedagogy, 11 June 2018, https://jitp.commons.gc.cuny.edu/using-digital-rhetoric-in-a-multimodal-assignment-to-disrupt-traditional-academic-writing-conventions-in-a-first-year-writing-classroom/. Summary: Melanie Gagich, proposes a new way of integrating multimodal, digital rhetoric into the first-year writing classroom. Gagich argues that […]
Let’s Talk Consequences
I think, naturally, my mind is stuck on the article that I covered for the reflective bibliography entry that was due recently. The article was concerned with educational aims in particular, and the author, Chris W. Gallagher, centered the article around the pitfalls of assessing outcomes rather than consequences or potentiality. With this in mind, […]
“The Trouble with Outcomes: Pragmatic Inquiry and Educational Aims”
Gallagher, Chris W. “The Trouble with Outcomes: Pragmatic Inquiry and Educational Aims.” College English, vol. 75, no. 1, 2012, pp. 42–60. JSTOR, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/24238306. Summary: Gallagher discusses issues surrounding “Outcome Assessment (OA)” based educational aims, and the construction of those aims in regards to the measurement of students work. He begins by conceding that, regardless […]
On the Question of the Institution
It seems like the longer I look at this question, the question of what English 101 is to the academic institution and Western as a whole, the more fractured my response towards it becomes. I feel my own desires and ideas squaring off against the issues that Crowley raises, and, If I am honest, I […]
Bad Ideas
For my portion outside of the collective reading, I focused in on the sections titled: “You’re Going to Need This for College” and “Anyone Can Teach Writing”. Both of these sections are interesting reads, and I think that they illuminate a couple of interesting points to keep in mind as we move forward. Starting with […]
Ecosystem or Solar System?
At the outset, the word ecosystem, especially in regards to a classroom setting where there are power dynamics at play, brings to my mind images of the forest or the ocean. I mean this in the sense that there is a hierarchy of animals with the goal of survival in mind. Necessarily, in this scenario, […]
An Open Experiment: Honing in on the learning process
I expected a lot more attention being focused on the nitty-gritty details. I think, for better of for worse, I had made the false assumption that English 101 would be geared towards creative writing and not this focus on the much more broad idea of literacy in general. I assumed that time would be spent […]