Reflections on this assignment

Dear Dr. Jones,

I hope you are doing well. Since I will be presenting on letter writing in class next week, I thought it appropriate to continue to hone my letter writing skills through framing this blog as letter to you.

It’s wild to think that eight months ago I had no concept of how to teach (or develop) reading and writing skills in elementary level students. When we first met, you asked me what grade level I wanted to work with. Since my classes at Nazareth have been geared towards working with elementary students, my eyes have been opened to the possibilities of working with this age group. At this point, I see myself either in an elementary library or a middle school library. I believe there is a level of creative thinking and wonder in these age groups (as well as an excitement for hands-on projects!), that I don’t think I would find at the high school or college level. I also discovered how much I love children’s literature, and reading it means so much more to me now that I can view it from critical lens. I want to thank you for laying the groundwork for my future professional endeavors as I continue down this path.

You’ve asked me to reflect on how keeping a blog this semester helped me reach the student learning outcomes for this course. Looking at these outcomes, I believe my blog has helped me meet them all in different ways. Writing this blog has helped me realize that writing and reading are interconnected processes, as well as the role metacognition plays in reading and writing proficiency (outcomes 4 and 5). While talking in class about a reading is one way to learn, I found that taking the time to write about my takeaways from the readings and how to apply them to my own professional life was highly beneficial. Writing this blog has been my “medium to think,” and reflect on the readings, assignments, and discussions from this course.

My favorite part of this course was learning about the genres (outcome 1)! I loved reading mentor texts as I learned the key elements of each genre and how to teach them. Through this blog, I explored the journal genre, narrative genre, and poetry genre further. I believe my writings on these genres will be a useful resource for me in the future as I introduce these genres to students.

Another big takeaway for me was learning that ANYTHING can be a mentor text, both in print and digital formats. I learned to assess texts by looking for their purpose and form, as well as the elements of author’s craft (outcome 2) or Hicks’ M.A.P.S. criteria for digital texts. While I came into this class with a fairly strong understanding of composition strategies for digital texts (outcome 3) based on my professional work, I didn’t realize that the compositions themselves (ex: video, audio) are mentor texts.

Finally, I made tremendous strides this semester is learning how to help others revise their work, by understanding the role of assessment and evaluation in determining reading and writing proficiency (outcome 6). Prior to this course, I thought evaluating student/peer work meant looking for misspelled words and grammatical errors. Now, I realize that purpose, audience, and form should take first priority when assessing/evaluating student work. The writer’s workshops have helped me hone this skill, and I had the chance to write a little about what I learned on the topic of revising work in a previous post. Since learning about the genres, I can also help look for the hallmarks of the genre in the work. For example, I helped Anna with her argumentative genre piece this week by drawing on what I learned about the structure of arguments/counterarguments from Tompkins.

While this assignment was challenging at times, I’ve never had the opportunity to evaluate academic texts at a critical level on a regular basis like this. I think this was a fitting assignment for this course and I hope to continue using “writing as a medium to think” in the future!

Sincerely,

Michelle Shippers

Writing as a medium to think

"Writing is, after all, a medium for learning to think." - Donald Graves

Through the writing of this blog, I am making connections to our class readings and my own life experiences as a student. My writing will serve as a repository of information that I can refer to in my future endeavors (when teaching students about the journal genre for example), and my writing has allowed me to think critically about our class readings.

This week, we were asked to read Framework for Success in Postsecondary Writing by the Council of Writing Program Administrators, and Counterpart strategies: Fine tuning language with language by Stephen B. Kucer and Lynn K. Rhodes. Both emphasized that students need to learn how to write well for success in college and beyond, and that reading and writing are interconnected processes. 

In the first article, the authors emphasize that teachers need to develop rhetorical knowledge in their students, "the ability to analyze and act on understandings of audiences, purposes, and contexts in creating and comprehending texts" (p. 6). I feel that my teachers often taught context (for example, understanding the time and place for a historical fiction work), and also taught purpose, but we did not focus on audience. The books we read in school were part of the curriculum, so beyond thinking they were geared towards our reading level, I didn't take much consideration for the audience of the works. 

Today, I understand the importance of knowing your audience. For example, when I write marketing copy for my job in the Nazareth College Arts Center, I know my audience is likely to be college-educated, arts-minded, and local. It's crucial that I tailor my copy to my intended audience for success. If my audience doesn't enjoy/relate/understand my copy, then they won't be motivated to act and buy tickets to see a show. I completely agree that students need to understand the important of audience when reading/writing, and this is something I would emphasize when discussing books in my future library or when working with students on developing their own compositions.

Since understanding audience, purpose, and context is key to my professional writing, I believe that I do allow myself the time and rhetorical space to think when I write. I believe that I am an exception when it comes to approaching writing, but it's how I make my living and is necessary for success. Most professions require daily writing, even if it's just through the practice of frequent emails. While these individuals are aware of their audience, they may not consider the purpose for their writing, and seldom use writing to re-consider or clarify because we are in a fast-paced world. I think it's important to teach young people the value of taking time with their writing, even if it's just an email, so that they are effectively using the medium to question, clarify, or synthesize thoughts and ideas.

Through the writing of this blog, I am approaching learning with an active stance. In the Framework for Success article, the authors say that active learning occurs when the writer employs "habits of mind," which are ways of approaching learning that are both intellectual and practical (p.4). In order to fully engage with this assignment throughout the semester, I need to continually engage certain habits of mind.

Unlike my classmates, I am taking this course independent of a graduate program. Content can be challenging when I don't have current classroom experience that I can draw from and make connections to and from. I need to rely on the role of metacognition in my writing, which the authors of the Framework article describe as "the ability to reflect on one's own thinking as well as on the individual and cultural processes and systems used to structure knowledge" (p.5). I need to work harder to make connections to the weekly readings and class discussions, drawing on information from my own life experiences. I also need to remain persistent (another habit of mind) in my goal to succeed in this assignment. Luckily, my natural curiosity and interest in creative projects (two more habits of mind!) will help guide me along my path.

References
Council of Writing Program Administrators, National Council of Teachers of English, & National Writing Project. (2011). Framework for success in postsecondary writing. Retrieved from  http://wpacouncil.org/framework/

Kucer, S. B. & Rhodes, L. K. (1986). Counterpart strategies: Fine tuning language with language. The Reading Teacher, 40(2), 186-193.