lit class baby: blog 5, my experience in a learner-centered graduate classroom

I’ve learned a lot in ENG-644: Early Twentieth Century American Literature, a class in which I am the only first-year MA student surrounded by experienced second-year MA and PhD students. I’ve learned that although Hemingway is still the icon of masculinity and male privilege I’ve believed him to be, I may have acquired a love-hate relationship with his writing. I’ve learned that Jean Toomer’s Cane exists in both realms of Modernism and the Harlem Renaissance (because that’s the way it should be considered). I’ve learned that what constitutes modernist literature are expansive and complex definitions, all of which seem to be in complete contrast with each other.

I could continue listing, but I wouldn’t know where to end. All of this is to say: I’ve really learned a lot. More than I ever thought my brain could be capable of. I’ve read more poems, novellas, short stories, and journal articles in the past two and a half months than I ever believed to be possible.

But, the most important thing I’ve learned thus far in my first graduate level literature class? I’m smart, and I’m capable of success in this field.

During a class discussion over Marianne Moore’s “An Octopus,” I presented an argument dealing with the meaning behind the layered metaphors in the first stanza. Before I spoke up, I doubted that what I was about to say would be impressive. But my professor looked at me differently than she ever had before, and said something like, “That’s really interesting and intuitive.” And then she kept looking at me with an expression of Wow, you’ve really impressed me. 

This gif accurately depicts how I felt in that moment. 

I felt so completely amazed and accomplished in this moment because my professor has continuously urged me to push through the boundaries of my mind. I’ve had to think deeper and harder about literature than ever before, and nothing has been handed over to me. I’ve put in the work, and I’m finally feeling the “reward.” (This reward being a feeling of empowerment in the classroom and within my own mind.)

And every week since, I’ve had enough confidence to say out loud the thoughts in my head I had never previously felt empowered to say. And my professor continues to look at me with that same expression of Wow, you’ve really impressed me.

In Learner-Centered Teaching: Five Key Changes to Practice, Maryellen Weimer maps out what kind of impact the teacher’s role has on the classroom climate and on the students’ success. My ENG 644 professor teaches from a learner-centered perspective, and because of this, I have been able to take control of my own learning and prove to myself that I am capable of doing the work (work that is INCREDIBLY challenging).

Here is a description of the classroom:

All nine of us sit in a tiny square-shaped room, at rectangular tables arranged so to create a sort of edged circle. We can see everyone’s face at all times. This arrangement allows for the climate of the classroom to be open: discussion is at the core of the class because the design of the room, along with the role of the professor, allows it.  She (the professor) makes it clear that we are all responsible for contributing to the discussion, and the power of knowledge and authority is shared among all of us. She is the ultimate facilitator/scribe/gardener (the metaphors in Weimer’s book are all perfect).

Because I have been forced into taking responsibility over my learning, I understand how hard I need to work in order to find success in the course. And trust me, I have been working laboriously to even feel slightly confident in my ability to contribute to the class. But because I understand my professor’s expectations, and understand how my success relies upon my own authority, I have been able to motivate myself to complete the work I need to, and at the level expected of me.

I’m still learning and gaining so much knowledge from ENG 644, but the most important thing, to me at least, is that I’ve learned what I’m capable of. And I would have never realized that if my professor hadn’t acted as the facilitator to my learning.

 

Mentioned above:

Learner-Centered Teaching: Five Key Changes to Practice, Maryellen Weimer, 2nd ed.

 

 

 

confidence with coffee: blog 4, find(maintain)ing my identity while teaching

Wednesday, October 3rd, was my first day of teaching.  The first day out of fourteen in which I would no longer wear the name-tag as “observer,” or “weird grad student who sits silently in the corner;” but instead, wear the title as “teacher.”

As I sat riding the bus Wednesday morning, regretting the decision not to grab a banana, I felt nothing.

No fear. No nerves. No excitement. No nothing.

I wondered if perhaps the previous night, in which I couldn’t have slept more than nineteen minutes between the bits of residual meltdown from the evening before, squeezed out any remaining emotional juice left in my body. I asked myself: Will my students, or mentor, notice my red and swollen eyes? Will they assume my eyes are an indicator of my fear for teaching? Will they look at me with pity?

I read somewhere once that college is fun, but grad school is pain. I agree with this statement. And to be honest, the previous evening’s meltdown had everything to do with grad school, and nothing to do with the next morning’s teaching obligations.

Grad school has been incredibly difficult in many ways; however, the hardest challenge I have experienced is the questioning of my own identity. All of the confidence and autonomy I had established at my undergraduate institution completely disappeared as I entered into my new graduate degree program. For reasons unknown to me, I felt an intense need to re-establish myself. And because of this, I spent the first month and a half of grad school trying to present the “best” version of myself at all times. The “academic” Bailey. The “shining star” Bailey (I take this from my encouraging mentor, Dr. Julie Goodspeed-Chadwick; I’m not cocky enough to call myself a “shining star”). The “perfect” Bailey. All the while, I had never defined “academic,” “shining star,” or “perfect” in terms related to me.  Maybe my “shining star” qualities are in my awkwardness, or my ability to keep talking and talking without actually getting my point across. Or maybe my “perfection” is when I am able to finish all of my work with still time in the night to watch an episode of Supergirl (self-care is important, and I’m trying to be better at it.) I had never considered that maybe I didn’t need to present myself in any way other than how I would outside of my new grad program. Maybe I am versions of these idealistic Baileys even when I’m not consciously, and obsessively, thinking about it. Here’s an interesting thought: maybe I can just be my true, authentic self without trying to present myself as anything else. (I promise this rambling is going somewhere; stay with me.)

As though the universe had timed it herself, and I believe she probably did, I did indeed experience a minor meltdown the evening before my first morning of teaching. And during this sob-fest, I realized: I don’t need to keep up with this show anymore. I don’t need to walk into that classroom and pretend to be a brilliant expert on rhetoric and composition (I most definitely am not). I don’t need to pretend to be this authoritative figure who demands control and focus. And I don’t need to worry about which version of Bailey I will choose to put on each Monday, Wednesday, and Friday (the days I will be teaching).

I will just be me.

So, Wednesday morning, several hours after my clichéd and emotional awakening (breakdown), I chose my outfit for the day. I would wear my forest green dress that I bought from the maternity section of Target because the ruching on the sides seemed to flatter my butt and pudge nicely without drawing too much attention to the actual shape of my body. Because, you know, if students were to see the actual shape of my body [GASP!] maybe they’d be too distracted and unable to listen to the knowledge of my mind. (Ahem…patriarchal binary of the female body and mind…ahem….bull****). Anyway…I would also wear my cream-colored Mary Janes, for comfort purposes. I considered the new loafer heals I recently bought from Macy’s, but chose happiness over “professionalism.” And, finally, I would wear my 90s-style blue jean jacket. The blue jean jacket, in my mind, made a statement. The statement being: I will just be me.

(Photo cred: Dr. Laura Romano, my amazing teaching mentor)

Remember earlier, when I said I hadn’t felt anything during the hour or two leading up to my first day of teaching? Well, that was true. However, once I stepped into the classroom, set up my things at the front of the room, and watched as the students trickled in, I began to feel confident and excited. And I tell you, in all honesty, that confidence came into my system by way of that coffee cup you see in the above picture.

COFFEE MAKES ME CONFIDENT.

And coffee is me. And that blue jean jacket is me. And that red lipstick is me. And the woman you see in those pictures: she’s me. She’s not wearing a mask; she’s not pretending to be anything she’s not. She’s holding that coffee like it’s a goddamn sword.

I began class with a brief explanation of what they may expect from me for the next fourteen class sessions. I told them, that although I think of myself as very knowledgeable on the topic of writing, I am not an expert on rhetoric and composition. I told them I will learn from them just as much as they will learn from me. And I told them that I don’t buy into this idea of hierarchy in the classroom; or, at least in terms of my own classroom. I am simply a person who may have knowledge these students need or desire, and they are people who are there to listen and absorb. And sometimes those roles may switch. And that’s okay. I told them I will probably always be holding a cup of coffee in my hand because it makes me feel like we are all colleagues sitting in a coffee shop talking about the things that interest us (or don’t interest us). I told them that they should expect my own authenticity, and I hope to see that authenticity reflected in them as well.

 

 

 

from learning to teaching: blog 2, a discussion on implementing threshold concepts into the fyc classroom

For the purpose of this post, I’ve chosen to think critically about the first major threshold concept taken from Naming What We Know and how I’d like to (idealistically and optimistically) incorporate the associated ideologies into my FYC classroom. With my background in creative writing as a field of study, I’m always thinking of ways to incorporate a more artistic approach to writing, while still keeping within the structure of a composition and rhetoric course.

While typing the previous statement, I had a thought (which is an example of concept 1.1 “Writing is a Knowledge-Making Activity” that I will discuss in a minute; cool, huh?) about how wanting to incorporate a more artistic approach to writing is a superfluous desire. Writing is an artistic act, no matter the content of the writing.

So really, what I should say is I’d like to find ways to show my students how writing is art, and by writing, they are creating a machine (1.9: “Writing is a Technology through Which Writer’s Create and Recreate Meaning”) that runs on knowledge, history, context, ideologies, emotion, and so much more.

“Writing Is a Social and Rhetorical Activity”

Within this first major threshold concept, there is one sub-concept that I’d like to focus on here that I feel really resonates with my desire to instill a sense of courage and ownership within each of my students, in regard to their writing. And in turn, this ownership of their own writing will, hopefully, lead them into accepting their typed or written words as something valuable and artistic.

1.1: “Writing is a Knowledge-Making Activity”

As Heidi Estrem suggests in Naming What We Know, common misunderstandings of writing is that we must think and know before we write. We must, supposedly, be the knowledge master of any given topic before we even consider writing about it. Or, we must know what we want to write about before we start writing. (Note: It is obviously helpful to have prepared in knowledge making prior to writing specific types of assignments. But anyway, back to the post.) This misconception is something I often remind my sister of; she sometimes needs a boost of confidence in order to catapult herself into the anxiety-induced journey of writing. And she’s not alone.

Even I find myself feeling apprehensive to begin writing something if I haven’t first finished my planning, researching, and/or explicating. And I have also believed, on an individual level, that writing is something I do to “unearth” something within myself. Which I do still believe, in certain circumstances. When I write a confessional poem, I do feel as though I’m uncovering emotions within myself, as though the writing itself is a way to dig for the emotion. I think the important element of writing to grasp onto, though, is that writing is not only a way to uncover something, but a way to generate something as well.

A lot of the magic happens when we write while we are still searching for answers.

I don’t mean to say this “magic” will uncover a hidden truth that we need to unleash; rather, this “magic” is the exhilarating feeling we get as writers when, as we are writing, we create connections, ideas, and knowledge.

In order for me to help my own students in experiencing the magic of creating within their writing, I think an important writing activity to incorporate is journaling. Yes, journaling is something most people have done at some point in their life. But it is a valuable writing activity to partake in, especially in the FYC classroom where perhaps some of the students are apprehensive and believe writing to be a barrier. If there are students who have internalized this misconception of writing as some kind of treasure hunt, and when there is no gold found at the end of the excursion, then they must not be a successful writer.

For me, I journaled the most during my puberty-driven middle school years when I felt as though I knew everything and nothing all at the same time. Retrospectively, I can see now how I, then, turned to journaling as a way to understand the world in which I found myself in during a time when nothing made sense. And as a result from journaling, I was able to create a better understanding of that world that seemed so confusing.

Within these journals, which can be assigned every class session as a free-write opportunity, students can:

• reflect on course content for the week in connection to their next major writing assignment
• reflect on other classes in order to establish connections between disciplines
• reflect on a personal topic, relevant to the course or not
• or whatever their big hearts desire

Whether I choose to designate a specific topic for the journaling activity, or students are given the liberty to free-write whatever they choose, knowledge making will take place in some shape or form.

“As an activity undertaken to bring new understandings, writing in this sense is not about crafting a sentence or perfecting a text but about mulling over a problem, thinking with others, and exploring new ideas or bringing disparate ideas together.” –Heidi Estrem, Naming What We Know (19)

I’m sure some students will look at these journals as tedious busy work, but my hope is that eventually they begin to see the gold they are creating within their writing. Not only do these journal activities provide students with an outlet to make and express, but they also give students the opportunity to practice and improve upon the artistry of writing through a low-stakes approach.

 

Mentioned above:

Naming What We Know, edited by Linda Adler-Kassner & Elizabeth Wardle

 

 

an initial impression: blog 1, an open discussion preceding graduate assistantship work

I like to think I decently understand the concepts of teaching.

I’ve had my fair share of diverse instructors and professors, each with their own unique sense of authority and style. From what I’ve gathered, a good teacher is one who humbly, but intellectually, approaches the content of the course, with passion and charisma, while also incorporating a collaborative environment in which both the teacher and the students are learning and adapting. Now, of course there are plenty of other qualities that make up a good teacher; I am not claiming that my previous statement is the definitive description of “good” teaching pedagogy. What I am saying though, is that the teacher I’ve described above is the one who I crave to be, based upon my own experiences as both student and supplemental instructor (SI).

Three years into my undergraduate pursuit, I was asked to be the SI for two sections of my university’s freshman composition course. My eagerness, along with my annoying intuition to “break off more than I can chew” (apologies for the cringe-worthy cliche) in order to prove myself, I accepted the challenge. Two sections of SI work along with my own full course load, ten hours of tutoring in the writing center, and fulfilling my role as managing editor of the campus literary magazine all led to my impending exhaustion. However, I learned a lot that semester.

In a general summary, here are key concepts I took away from my experience:

1. Teaching style is just as diverse and indiosyncratic as the person doing the teaching. Depending upon the specific intersectional experiences, personalities, and identities of any given teacher, pedagogy will be unique to that individual.
2. No matter how prepared a teacher may be prior to entering the classroom on the first day, the dynamics of the classroom are largely dependent upon the students in the seats.
3. Passion and excitement are both often contagious. If the teacher is excited, a lot of the students will be too. (I do realize this is not 100% the case all of the time.) Here is a TED Talk that indirectly coincides with this notion.
4. And finally, on more of a personal note: Teaching writing is, indeed, something I find exhilarating, challenging, rewarding, and fun.

The point of this reflective-style post is to think about what I am bringing in with me as I enter into my first classroom of students, a classroom in which I am the sole instructor, responsible for affecting the minds of the undergraduate writers.

And although, as I previously mentioned, I like to think I decently understand the concepts of teaching, I am scared.

I’m hoping others share my concerns so I no longer feel alone in this new world of graduate study and work; and if Dethier is correct, we all probably do feel similarly.

“Most new writing teachers share very similar worries, yet often they feel alone with their worries and silly for having them.” –First Time Up, Brock Dethier

His words, although quite reassuring, obviously do not erase the worries from existence. I’ll include a list of my own concerns, in an attempt to confess and throw them out into the universe so they can, hopefully, lose their power.

1. Imposter Syndrome: By now, we have all heard of this so many times we are probably sick of it, but it rings very true for me. What if my students figure out I don’t really know what I’m doing? What if they yell out at me during a lecture in which I’m attempting to explain some obscure grammatical concept? “She’s a fraud!” Please, do understand that I recognize my own irrational thoughts just as quickly as I give birth to them; however, these are the fears I have as I sit on my couch typing this post. Obviously, I deeply identified with the section in First Time Up, in which Dethier explains how Imposter Syndrome is something that creeps its way into our minds. But he instilled a small sense of comfort in me with his claim: “I’m not sure I’d trust someone who has never wrestled with the imposter feeling, and no one can seriously claim to know everything about teaching writing.”
2. As a young woman entering into a professional teaching role, I am concerned with finding confidence in my own sense of authority. Will my students listen to what I have to say? Will they respect me? If I show too much authority will I come off as an aggressive you-know-what? Or, if I present myself as easy-going and fun, will they think I’m not qualified to teach them?
3. DO I EVEN KNOW ENOUGH ABOUT COMPOSITION TO CLAIM EXPERTISE? My relationship with composition, as it currently stands, is this: I know it, understand it, and have internalized it, but I’m not entirely sure I know how to teach it.
4. What if my students fail because of me?
5. How do I actually feel about the racist, sexist, and overall exclusive history of freshman composition courses? What do my conflicted feelings surrounding this topic mean for how I approach teaching in a composition classroom?

All of these concerns, as pressing as they may be, have obviously not squashed my intense desire to be here, doing the thing that I find exhilarating, challenging, rewarding, and fun. But these concerns do exist, and I know I’m not the only one who shares at least one, if not all, of them. Or, at least, this is my hope.

A response to my own fears:

As someone who experiences multiple levels of anxiety daily, I have learned to research topics surrounding the object of my anxiety in an attempt to combat the panic and “irrational brain” (as I like to call it) that comes along with being an anxious individual. Luckily for me, and all of us, we have had an immense amount of readings to either damper our anxieties, or potentially coax them further.

The other night I literally typed into Google: how to be a successful female grad assistant. I’m not sure what my expectations were with this seemingly silly Google search. As humans, I think most of us want the easy answers, especially when we are feeling apprehensive. We want an all-knowing source to tell us exactly how to do this, achieve that, be this. But there is no clean-cut final answer to most things, especially teaching composition. And I know this because of all the readings we have had explaining all the different theories, pedagogical approaches, and styles surrounding the field of composition.

The last couple of nights I have wrestled with all of the reading material we have encountered so far and what those readings have shown me. There is not one way to do this thing we call teaching, especially in the case of teaching composition. And while this concept may at times feel daunting, as I will have to figure out my own unique way of doing things, it also alleviates some of the initial pressure to be perfect. And I don’t know about any of you, but striving for perfection is something I deal with on a daily basis.

I’d like to leave you all with a quote that I often refer to when I’m approaching upon a transition in life. For those who know me will not be surprised by this at all.

“Remember, remember, this is now, and now, and now.  Live it, feel it, cling to it. 
I want to become acutely aware of all I’ve taken for granted.”  – Sylvia Plath

 

 

Mentioned above:

Grit: the power of passion and perseverance

First Time Up: An Insider’s Guide for New Composition Teachers, by Brock Dethier