Transformations
While I was unfamiliar with Linda Flower's term Writer-Based prose on a theoretical level, I am quite acquainted with it on a practical level. Often students arrive at the writing lab where I tutor (this one, not this one), with really great content still in their heads, rather than written on paper. Flowers call this content “uncommunicated content” and says it’s vital to acknowledge its legitimacy, “especially [for] inexperienced writers, [because acknowedgement gives beginning writers] the confidence and motivation to go on" (330). Just going on and trying again is important. Teachers and tutors can serve a vital role by encouraging beginning writers to just keep writing.
The transformation of Writer-Based prose to Reader-Based prose occurs when writers move from giving readers a narrative tour to analysis and explanation of concepts. Often instructors describe this transformational step in the writing process as answering the “so what” question or by requiring that students’ writing “do” something and both of these questions can sometimes be hard for students to grasp. Flowers offers a worthwhile suggestion in the transformation process when she advises “[t]he most general transformation is simply to try to take into account the reader’s purpose in reading” (329). While this statement is somewhat obvious, reading and comprehending this suggestion was quite profound for me. I realized that the question I most often have in mind relative to my audience is “can a reader understand what I have written?” On the other hand, asking the alternative (or additional) question regarding ‘the reader’s purpose in reading’ is quite likely to have a transformational outcome in my own writing and is a question I’ll most likely take to my students.
My question for us to consider is this: What have you discovered as either a teacher or tutor that you absolutely want to share with your students? That is, when students leave your classes, what is the one thing (or top 3 things) you want them to remember? Further, (if you know) are these issues grounded in theory and/or practice?
The transformation of Writer-Based prose to Reader-Based prose occurs when writers move from giving readers a narrative tour to analysis and explanation of concepts. Often instructors describe this transformational step in the writing process as answering the “so what” question or by requiring that students’ writing “do” something and both of these questions can sometimes be hard for students to grasp. Flowers offers a worthwhile suggestion in the transformation process when she advises “[t]he most general transformation is simply to try to take into account the reader’s purpose in reading” (329). While this statement is somewhat obvious, reading and comprehending this suggestion was quite profound for me. I realized that the question I most often have in mind relative to my audience is “can a reader understand what I have written?” On the other hand, asking the alternative (or additional) question regarding ‘the reader’s purpose in reading’ is quite likely to have a transformational outcome in my own writing and is a question I’ll most likely take to my students.
My question for us to consider is this: What have you discovered as either a teacher or tutor that you absolutely want to share with your students? That is, when students leave your classes, what is the one thing (or top 3 things) you want them to remember? Further, (if you know) are these issues grounded in theory and/or practice?
posted by Marcia | 7:52 PM
3 Comments:
This is a great question. I like what Brittany said about giving students "the dirty facts" about writing. What makes those things exciting is that it's not something students will get anywhere else, which is exactly the sort of teacher that I want to be. I was really only partially joking when I said in class that I think of my students as "co-conspirators." I feel like there's this big, angry, confusing world out there and we are going to sit nobly in our classroom and try to impose and order and structure on it, whether by furious notebook-scribbling, impassioned classroom discussion (if people don't leave crying, you haven't said anything) and papers covered in blood, sweat, and tears.
Well, not that exactly. I guess what I'm really looking for is a way to fire up my students. I want them to remember me as the girl who cared about writing so much it was obscene.
This is THE question, but here is one idea (and I agree with Brittany's suggestions too). If I'm tutoring writers, then it's only fair to look at what is being asked of them and help them fulfill the expectations, whether it's the conventions of the writing task, the organization, the development of ideas - it's based on what the writer needs (that means I need to first listen and read). As a teacher I guess I need to begin there as well - know my students, their needs, but also their interests. Mem Fox (writer and teacher from Australia), sees power in writing when the writing matters to the writer. That is THE OTHER question - how do we help writers find what matters? Find topics that matter to them? Find ways to communicate and audiences they care to communicate with? How can we set this up in an English 1000 course, and should we? Ch. 19 of A & B notes the limits of "Engfish"--canned writing that constrains writers, formulaic writing that shuts down thinking. Too often students (and teachers) are so worried that they need to follow certain rules of composition that they forget they have a message to communicate and an argument to develop. I would want to create writing assignments (opportunities) that move students into exploring topics that matter (perhaps found first through writer-based prose?). The writing events in class on Wed. provided possible topics that would matter to students.
Brittany,
You know, I'm a big fan of what Elaine calls the Dance of Discourse. That's not what my FYC instructor called it, but that's how he taught me to write.
Faith,
If you liked the Sirc article, then "Cool Studies" might be interesting to you. There are lots of links on rhetcomp.com to poke around in and "Cool Studies" is a link under "fields." Plus, under "journals," you might find an idea you're searching for in Critical Pedagogy or Radical Pedagogy.
Amy,
I am struggling with this concept of helping students to find topics that matter to them. Is this what I really need to do as a teacher of FYC?
At this point, I think I would argue that I need to help students find their voices so they can write more persuasively on topics I assign.
Are you saying that they need to first find their voices on their own topics?
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