Course Discussions: Group #5 Humaira, Natasha, Garri (3)

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While the multi-step process is a great tool for learning how to better develop ideas and ultimately a better paper, the author visiting the writing center often is not receptive to any process being implemented that looks at the paper as a long-term project and not as a finished product that only needs some polishing. To try and correct such thinking the writing consultant often finds himself assuming a more adversarial role where he must identify his purpose as a tutor--often chanting the axiom "we work to build better writers not better texts"--which usually quells resistance, but it certainly does not change students' minds about what it means to write or about when a finished product is produced. Professor Gleason is right in saying the idea of a process is revolutionary for many students, but like Judith Summerfield says in Writing Centers a Long View, making the process "institutionalized" is also a bad idea which will disconnects the steps from each other and disconnects the writer from the fluidness of revision.

Course Discussions: Group #5 Humaira, Natasha, Garri (2)

Well there is a solution to being stuck, but it's not one that anyone wants to take because it requires work and time, and who wants to spend a week on a paper? This is especially problematic for those who feel they are good writers; they think--and I'm not an exception to this--that because past showings have produced wanted results, there is no need to change the approach to writing the paper. I wish teachers graded harder. That would force us to rethink our strategy and hopefully push us to return to the drawing board. For a strong writer this method might work, especially since many such writers already can sense that a quality paper is a longer engagement, or maybe its just I who feels that way. But I don't think that I am the only writer who gets back a paper and sees that given more time spent writing it the quality would have been far better.

I mean I look at this post and I see that given more time it could have been better...

Course Discussions: Group #5 Humaira, Natasha, Garri

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I hope that students realize that there really is no final product. That the product is in fact a work that one can revisit at any given time in the future and rework given new information and insight. Obviously many will never look at what they have written for a class they will never take again, or one that they wish they never took in the first place. But it would be nice to instill in their minds the sense of ownership. That the work is theirs and that forever will they have have the opportunity to alter it. Maybe they would cherish their product more if they knew it is theirs and maybe they would put it in more effort if they knew it is a reflection of themselves.

Composition is suspect?

would think research into composition would be one of the most well-funded areas of study, especially with the high school diploma less capable of providing its recipient a living-wage,and society making the four-year college experience seem like a key component of social mobility. Recent trends show an increase in overall enrollment in non-vocational higher education and with that there has been an increase of students into the college classroom who lack an understanding of grammar and mechanics, and whose rhetorical understanding is underdeveloped, hampered (among other things) by well-meaning, but misguided instruction of five paragraph writing . One would think that given such a state of things, a legitimate, concerted effort supported by the academic community would be given to the process of composing and the method of teaching that process to students; yet North in his defense of writing centers, notes that "composition," and I'm not sure if he means the process or the study of here, is suspect in the eyes of the academic community (76). I'm not sure how to interpret this comment. The article was published in 1984, and so maybe the 20 something years of scholarship since the increased focus on composition was yet to be accepted as authoritative; yet even if I say the scholarship is suspect (and at the time of this writing it was still in its infancy), to say composition, which has been practiced for hundreds of years, is suspect does not make sense. Or maybe it does and I'm missing something. Any thoughts?

Literacy and Technology

What does Clark mean by the dynamic relationship between literacy and technology? Yes reading and writing can take place now without the involvement of either pen or paper, but that does not explain a dynamic relationship. So then how is literacy shaped by technology, and how is technology shaped by literacy? I am not going to write a dissertation here but I am interested to at least begin to give an answer with the hope of later revisiting this subject, maybe in a paper and further elaborating on the topic. For now I will focus on the reading component of literacy and its interchange with technology.

As active readers we can make notes and refer to sections of a text just as easily using technology as we can using a physical copy. But unlike a book, access to the internet gives us the opportunity to go in a myriad of directions when posing a question in response to a text, when meeting new facts and vocabulary, or when forming our own ideas about a text. We are not limited to merely jotting down a question or comment, which often is revisited after the fact, when our mindset is no longer the same and our opinions no longer directly aligned with the train of thought that we were on. With internet at our finger tips, we turn our reading experience on its head. No longer is the work our only text, but with a click, information flows from various channels, and the linear path of reading begins to branch out and connect with the incoming information, which is contextualized by the primary text and becomes more than a data with no connective tissue, but rather data connected to a larger system; data transformed into knowledge (565).

At the same time, the lack of understanding of information ownership, or rather the current understanding of such ownership can impact interpretation and critical analysis in a way that was less likely before. (to be continued...)

Reflection on the Class

Dear Professor Gleason,

I thought I knew about writing centers. I had worked at one for six semesters. However, I did not know much about theory and my understanding of practice came purely from the experience I had of working as a writing consultant. In Writing Center Theory and Practice, I was introduced to history that I was not aware of and schools of thought that I had come across while studying literary theory, but which were re-contextualized in discussion of basic writing and writing centers.

My experience at the writing center and in the classroom interconnected well. Experience helped me understand theory even when it had no direct application; and discussion of method in class proved valuable, because I was able to take what I learned and apply it to my job, where I began to prioritize more effectively, making my sessions more student driven and more student focused.

Probably the most interesting aspect to the class extended beyond the immediate applicability of the information in my tutorials. The presentations and accompanying research informed my understanding of current theories and methods, and also provided a better sense of how a university’s mission and distribution of resources plays into the operation of the writing center. This bigger picture stuff has given me fresh insight and appreciation for the writing center that’s at City, while also giving me ideas of where there can be realistic improvements.

I’m glad I took the class!

Thank you,

Garri Rivkin

Information Literacy Workshop in Cohen Library

Professor Gibbons presentation on information literacy showed that there are many different information sources available online. However he did not touch on the conversion of information into knowledge, even though he had mentioned the process at the beginning of his presentation. As I had mentioned when commenting on Irene Clarke’s essay, we have a great opportunity to engage in the information-to-knowledge process and we do that by turning our reading experience on its head. No longer is the text our only text, but with a click, information flows from various channels, and the linear path of reading begins to branch out and connect with the incoming information, which is contextualized by the primary text and becomes more than a data with no connective tissue, but rather data connected to a larger system; data transformed into knowledge (565).

September 29, 2010 3:33 PM