I agree with Bob that extensive comments are good for student's writing, especially if they read and take seriously the comments, if they think about their work. I really think that all these things we have been talking about on this blog, student centered learning, introducing satire and humor into the classroom, and getting students engaged and excited about their work is what Fox is fundamentally talking about in her article. She says the most important thing to her about being published is the responses she recieves after the fact. What we are after, fundamentally, is creating a response. We want responsive students. We want them to respond in class, respond to each other, and utimaltely to respond in writing. What we are after is not the response, however but the human connection.
Bob touched on this when he sayed that he wanted people to respond to his blogs; it is important to him to have that human connection-to know someone else is out there listening. Ultimately this is what we all want. Fox touched on it a little further when she talked about the different situations in which writing a letter was a very profound experience, that people can ache with a caring about their writing that have never encountered before. Like Ashely, I am sure we all have deep memories of a time when we wrote a letter that we felt was life-changing and nothing was more important at the time, I know I have.
The challenge then is to bring this to the classroom, somhow convey to the students that writing is about reaching out to others in a more profound way. When we are writing to reach out, to realy tell our story, or get people's attention, we do it with the ache of caring. Perhaps the trick is to get the students to think of their witing as responses to the world around them, to other humans, to what they read or see on the street. If we can make them feel like this is their opportunity to respond in their voice with their words, it will feel less didatic and more necessary.
2 comments:
Here's my theory about writing: I can write an article, and that'll pay my cable bill or something trivial like that. But ultimately, the economic value of my writing will be lost to time. The feedback, comments, and criticism I get when I write can be kept and remembered until my brain starts to decay. This is where I see value in writing.
The Fox article did have a different tone than others we’ve read—she was very excited, wasn’t she! Like Fox, Laurin, and Bob have said, comments on papers show the teacher’s care and connection. Not only does it show that you’re invested, but—hopefully—it will make them more invested too. And, I think it’s practical. Along with praise, comments are a way to discuss areas to improve. It’s a way to explain and contextualize marked areas on a page. I always appreciated teachers who wrote in the margins and had a kind of running commentary with my papers. Laurin was right: there’s an element of human contact and recognition that we all value, even in school papers. Graded papers don’t have to be about just judging or evaluating; I think they can also convey a teacher’s appreciation, humor, and insight.
As for how to students to “ache with caring,” well, I don’t know. Not to sound defeatist, but I have accepted that not everyone will care or like it or like me or bother to do the reading. Some will care automatically. And perhaps some not-so-typical readings and some intriguing assignments will make things more interesting and inspire some caring.
I do like the idea of publishing or using a public forum/exposure for class writing. This does seem to be a way to make students more invested and start to realize themselves as writers. Group work, blogs, and in-class paper readings follows this idea on a smaller scale. Laurin’s comment about getting students to view writing as their response to the world is a provoking way to think of it. I think sensitive, prodding well-thought out course themes can help initiate that process.
Post a Comment