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Organization: Samford University Writing Programs
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Date:         Wed, 2 Sep 1992 11:36:45 CDT
From:         "David H. Roberts" <DHROBERT@SAMFORD.BITNET>
Subject:      Re: (Fwd: *C&CD*) Some classes w

On Wed, 2 Sep 1992 07:52:22 --500 <SLATIN@UTXVM> said:
>Why is Murphy Brown more interesting/important than Ice T?

Maybe it's because, among Republicans, feminist-bashing is accepted and,
while some Repubs are racists, black-bashing is not generally accepted.

David Roberts
Samford University
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Date:         Wed, 26 Aug 1992 14:45:00 EST
From:         BECKY RICKLY <00RJRICKLY@BSUVAX1.BITNET>
Subject:      Re: measuring change

I'm intrigued by the idea of "measuring change,"
but I can't help but wonder if by measuring change, we
lose the essence of change by making it a static statistic.
I think that was a problem with Perry and even with Belenky, et al,
who, at the end of a wonderful, fluid study ruined it by
generalizing outside of their very specific population.  But
since I, too, am unfamiliar with much of this kind of research,
I hope to learn a lot form this discussion.

Becky
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Date:         Fri, 4 Sep 1992 08:50:18 --500
From:         SLATIN@UTXVM.BITNET
Subject:      RE: small library

I used to like Lanham's _Style: An Anti-Textbook_ (1977, I think); it's been
quite a while since I read it.  And I don't know that it goes on my list of
essential books.  What about Bolter's _Writing Space: Computers, Hypertext,
and the History of Writing_ (1991)? or is that the wrong category?

John Slatin
UT Austin
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Date:         Mon, 31 Aug 1992 16:36:45 EDT
From:         rselfe@MTU.EDU
Subject:      comments

>Well, I think we can find ways to
>have their writing actually read by people who are interested in what it
>says (as opposed to interested in helping them with it) if we structure
>situations appropriately.

Absolutely.  They can/you can find readers/writers gallor via e-mail lists.

>They can write ten pages a day and it would
>be better than what they usually do now . . . but it would be even
>better if someone actually read it, and if both writer and reader cared
>whether the reader understood it.  But of course, given the kind of
>numbers writing teachers are talking about, there's just no possibility
>for that audience to be the teacher (even if the students really did
>believe we were interested in what they had to say -- a conclusion that
>marginal comments makes very unlikely).

Teachers can't and shouldn't be the audience for most real writing.  But
teachers can set up 'lists' of people with whom students should and/or will
want to converse.

>So why can't they be the
>audience for each other?  Just find a situation in which something
>depends on their finding something out and explaining it to somebody
>else.

Students can be the audience sometimes, but they may not be the passionate
(compassionate or oppositional) audience that our students need.  SEarch
the lists; an ardent audience awaits.

Interactive Distance CMC currently requires a you to be fully immersed in
the media.
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Date:         Thu, 3 Sep 1992 04:19:04 HST
From:         James Shimabukuro <JAMESS@UHUNIX.BITNET>
Subject:      Re: (Fwd: *C&CD*) Transferring r

Re John Slatin's question: "Is this a hopelessly naive position?"

The "this" refers to "real" or "open-ended questions," which John describes
as "things for which the instructor has no better answers than they
[students] do and about which the instructor clearly wants to talk and 'hear'
other people's ideas."

I don't think it's naive.  In fact, it's realistic.  When the student's
thoughts have as much weight as the teacher's, then the discussion is truly
open.  When students sense that the question is genuine for the instructor
(i.e., he/she doesn't have the "right" answer), they seem to come alive.
This is especially true when the students can tap into their own life
experiences for insights.

Jim Shimabukuro
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Date:         Wed, 2 Sep 1992 20:01:23 -0700
From:         allen@SONOMA.EDU
Subject:      small library

Wes--

     I would include the handbooks for the four or five citation systems most
used for academic and professional documents today.

Julie
allen@sonoma.edu
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Date:         Thu, 3 Sep 1992 14:11:49 --500
From:         "David E. Schwalm" <IACDES@ASUACAD.BITNET>
Subject:      Re: essential writing books

 *** Reply to note of 09/03/92 07:24
 Following up Mary Alm: The little pamphlet "Sharing and Responding" attached
 to Belanof and Elbow is a gem--maybe more useful than the text ultimately.
 Great for TA training vis a vis responding to papers.

 -- David E. Schwalm, Assoc. Provost for Academic Programs
 ___Arizona State University West
 ___4701 West Thunderbird Rd.
 ___Phoenix, AZ 85069-7100___(602) 543-4500
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Date:         Tue, 1 Sep 1992 20:20:57 -0400
From:         ENGMYLES@UBVMS.BITNET
Subject:      Re: EnfiLOG Addendum

OK.
Myles Slatin, Dept. of English, 306 Clemens Hall, State U. of NY at
Buffalo, Buffalo, NY 14260.
Myles
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Date:         Wed, 2 Sep 1992 17:11:00 EST
From:         BECKY RICKLY <00RJRICKLY@BSUVAX1.BITNET>
Subject:      Re: (Fwd: *C&CD*) Transferring r

John,
I hope your position isn't a "hopelessly naive" one.  One might argue
that the only reason students are so eager to discuss those open-
ended questions about 20th century poetry (or, in my experience,
Shakespeare) is that, ultimately, they KNOW they will be graded,
so they must constantly impress you with their ability to
create a reality you'll like.  But I don't think so.  And
even if such things (heaven forbid) DID occur, perhaps some
students might find that THEY like the reality they've
constructed after all.  Annie Dillard has a short story
to that effect ("Is There Really Such a Thing as Talent?").
What might have started out as a ploy to impress the
instructor can turn into a lifelong passion.  It did for me.

Becky Rickly
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Date:         Wed, 2 Sep 1992 18:44:06 -0400
From:         ENGMYLES@UBVMS.BITNET
Subject:      Re: (Fwd: *C&CD*) Transferring real life to Lit classes (7)

Jim: I've been over 30 so long I'm almost used to it.  I'd love to hear
what happens if you ask them how you can become real.  I'd be afraid to ask.
Myles
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Date:         Mon, 31 Aug 1992 08:21:20 -0400
From:         irwin@CARR.YORKU.CA
Subject:      orality, literacy and NeXTs

David: can you describe the research that indicates that extensive
teacher commenting on student papers is ineffective?   Is this
research based on laboratory or naturalistic settings?   Were papers
compared on analytic or global dimensions?   Did the research use pre
and post tests, or simply compare differently treated groups?

I'm concerned about this not only with respect to the discussion on
NeXTs and commenting but also with respect to some research we've
conducted here showing that our feedback had positive effects on
student papers.

					Ron

------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                        Snail Mail Address:
Ronald R. Irwin           		Graduate Program in Psychology
irwin@writer.yorku.ca			Behavioural Sciences Bldg., 306B,
(416) 250-7188           		York University,
Computer-Assisted Writing Centre	4700 Keele St., North York,
Department of Psychology		Ontario, Canada, M3J 1P3.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
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Date:         Fri, 4 Sep 1992 14:57:03 EDT
From:         rselfe@MTU.EDU
Subject:      audiences

>     So I think it's the same problem: we need to find audiences who
>want to know what our students have to say, and audiences that our
>students BELIEVE want to know what they have to say.  Email is surely
>one way, but I've got an awful lot of students who think of that huge
>world "out there" as just as irrelevant and inaccessible whether it's
>mediated by print or electronics.  If I structure the class so that
>people need to know what others have found out in order to get on with
>the immediate enterprise, and have people reading virtually in each
>others' presence, it creates a context where lots of people can believe
>others have an interest in what they're saying.  And, especially, lots
>of people who normally don't believe that.  Fluent, competent writers, I
>think, are mainly defined by having that confidence.
>
>                                    -- Russ
>                                _~|__


I agree.  Setting up a class where people are mutally dependent on each
other ensures that they listen carefully and in the end develop some
confidence in each other (if their interactions are successfull).

E-mail lists often leave people wondering why this particular piece of
information is relevant to them.  Often information is not relevant.
However, the strength of e-mail is that they (students) must make the
connection between information given and their own situation.  They create
the "context where lots of people can believe others have an interest in
what they're saying."  When students start making the connection between
themselves and others in a field of endeavor (mine happens to be in
electronic publishing) then they will also develop the "confidence"
required of fluent, competent writers.  E-mail list may give students the
opportunity to create their own relevant connections between material and
people.

prehaps I should describe my rather limited list attempts in more detail,
although MBU may be tired of hearing about them.


Dickie Selfe
Technical Communication Specialist-102 WAHC
Michigan Technological U.
Houghton, Michigan  49931
906-487-2447
<rselfe@mtu.edu>
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Date:         Sun, 30 Aug 1992 10:35:00 EDT
From:         "Composition Digest (Robert Royar,
              Moderator)" <R0MILL01@ULKYVX.BITNET>
Subject:      (Fwd: *C&CD*) Some classes where groups have worked (4)

$undigest -s="Some classes where groups have worked (4)" [.new_news]cmpd6248.mss

Date:         Sun, 30 Aug 1992 10:01:38 EDT
From:         IN%"RobertRoyar@Delphi.com" Robert Royar (C&CD Moderator)
Message-Id:   <1992Aug30.100138.1.Grendel.Lair@Cratylus>
Subject:      Some classes where groups have worked (4)
Reply-to:     IN%"R0MILL01@ULKYVX.LOUISVILLE.EDU"  C&CD
Organization: Cratylus Educational Software

I teach mostly non-lit courses (tech. writing, business writing, writing for
art and architecture are three).  In those courses I've found that most times
(certainly not all) having students to design projects to work on in small
groups throughout the semester leads to their developing their own per editing
techniques. Each group must design a business (or portion thereof) or redesign
an existing business (or department procedure etc.).  The writings they
produce are "real-world" documents such as employment reviews, job
descriptions, technical specifications, and "project proposals".  I think of
this as "junior achievement" writing.  Some of the projects have been quite
good. (This summer a group of restaurant majors presented an oriental dinner
as part of their final presentation.  The class loved that. Their speeches
were well designed also.)  At the end of the semester part of their grade
(about 15%) is determined by the confidential evaluations of their group and
the class's evaluation of the final group presentation.

I also teach modem courses.  In those courses the students also work on
projects, but they choose to work more independently.  They upload their
interim work to our Vax into a conferencing system (CoSy).  There the students
read and comment on each other's business plans.  In those classes (partly
because the members are mainly middle-level executives) the projects are very
detailed, and most could actually be carried out with little or no
modification. I write more extensive comments on those electronic papers
because in most cases I find commenting easier on computer than by hand.  But
those classes are small (generally 4-6 students).

I don't know how I could use these same techniques in a lit-based class.  When
I do teach lit, I tend to downplay technical and "correctness" issues in the
writing the students do and really push for in class discussion--which always
includes journal-based prompts.

 -- Robert Royar (RobertRoyar@Delphi.com) New York Institute of Technology

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Date:         Mon, 31 Aug 1992 06:30:00 EDT
From:         "Composition Digest (Robert Royar,
              Moderator)" <R0MILL01@ULKYVX.BITNET>
Subject:      (Fwd: *C&CD*) Transferring real life to Lit classes (7)

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Date:         Mon, 31 Aug 1992 04:52:20 EDT
From:         IN%"RobertRoyar@Delphi.com" Robert Royar (C&CD Moderator)
Message-Id:   <1992Aug31.045220.1.Grendel.Lair@Cratylus>
Subject:      Transferring real life to Lit classes (7)
Reply-to:     IN%"R0MILL01@ULKYVX.LOUISVILLE.EDU"  C&CD
Organization: Cratylus Educational Software

In yesterday's (MBU-L) messages Myles Slatin <ENGMYLES@UBVMS.BITNET>
Message-id: <01GO76F2KN1CGDC437@ulkyvx.bitnet> asks how we might transfer
real-world situations for writing to our Lit classes.

I have had marginal success with a technique in a sohomore/junior-level
required course (students here (NYIT) may choose from a number of "lit"
courses in EITHER poetry, fiction, drama, or prose).  I've tried to develop
short writing prompts that attempt to tie the stories the students read into
their lives--prompts that allow them to show how some insight they found in a
story helped them reinterpret a past event or that allow them to develop their
own fiction based on their experience and the reading of the story.

I haven't found that any one level of student (i.e. the well prepared or the
under prepared) do well or poorly as a group on these assignments. Some very
poor writers can key into an important event in their past and show they've
digested the reading. And some very good writers can be extremely wooden in
their responses to this assignment.

 -- Robert Royar (RobertRoyar@Delphi.com) New York Institute of Technology

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Date:         Mon, 31 Aug 1992 09:55:00 EDT
From:         WWOOD@LUCY.WELLESLEY.EDU
Subject:      Re: orality, literacy and NeXTs

Ron--Can you tell us more about the research done on commenting at your
institution?  Type of research, type of comments?  Thanks,

Wini
wwood@lucy.wellesley.edu
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Date:         Mon, 31 Aug 1992 20:28:44 HST
From:         James Shimabukuro <JAMESS@UHUNIX.BITNET>
Subject:      Re: (Fwd: *C&CD*) Transferring real life to Lit classes (7)

Re Myles's "Our students know that class is not real life -- I know they're
wrong, but they don't."

I have no answers, either, on how to turn writing into "real life" efforts.
Perhaps it's the questions we're asking, the problems we're posing.  I
suppose the problems have to be real ones for the teacher, too.  Students
know when the teacher's faking it.  Others, in earlier posts, mentioned
selecting issues that concerned both them and their students.  In the end, I
guess it comes back to the person in front of the classroom.

Jim Shimabukuro
jamess@uhunix.uhcc.hawaii.edu
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Date:         Mon, 31 Aug 1992 16:20:18 CDT
From:         Eric Crump <C509379@MIZZOU1.BITNET>
Subject:      Re: comments

On Mon, 31 Aug 1992 16:36:45 EDT <rselfe@MTU.EDU> said:
>Absolutely.  They can/you can find readers/writers gallor via e-mail lists.
>
>Teachers can't and shouldn't be the audience for most real writing.  But
>teachers can set up 'lists' of people with whom students should and/or will
>want to converse.
>
>SEarch the lists; an ardent audience awaits.
>
Dickie--You radical fellow, you. What you're suggesting is that iron
doors of the classroom be opened a crack, that students be allowed to
peek out, maybe even sniff a little fresh air. But what happens if
they start demanding that you open the door and let them out? What
if they start clamoring for freedom? What if they decide that
netcommunities are more valuable to them than classroom communities.

Yeech! We could have insurrection in the schools.

If we're lucky.


--Eric Crump
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Date:         Fri, 28 Aug 1992 18:05:08 --500
From:         "David E. Schwalm" <IACDES@ASUACAD.BITNET>
Subject:      Re: literacy, orality, & NeXT

 *** Reply to note of 08/28/92 14:24
 I have to talk in the past tense for now, since I am a full-time administrator
 and am not currently teaching. I did not generally hold conferences with
 students as a regular activity. I was deterred from conferencing by two
 influences: I was a WPA in a big program, and I simply didn't have time or
 energy to do it. I was also convinced by my spouse's arguments that a writing
 course ought to privilege writing rather than speaking, that students often
 try to substitute their live personalities for their papers in conferences,
 and that the fact that students and teachers both enjoyed conferencing was
 often confused with a claim that conferenceing was an effective way to produce
 better writing. My abandonment of extensive written responses went in stages.
 THe first realization was that if I was going to respond in any way to a
 student's writing, I ought to respond to the rough draft (where the student
 can make use of the comments) rather than the final draft (I saw students toss
 45 minutes worth of incisive commentary in the wastebasket unread). That
 breakthrough lasted me for a couple of years until I got the sense that
 students weren't really doing much with my written comments on their rough
 drafts (other than notes on mechanics, grammar, u sage stuff). Why should I
 spend all that time for nothing? I wound up using a complicated procedure in
 which all students in a class wrote on a common assignment, were collectively
 involved in the elaboration of the assignment and the development of the
 criteria by which their papers would be judged. The criteria were translated
 into a criteria checklist which both I and they used to respond to rough
 drafts. Both the students and I were relatively pleased with this approach to
 responding to papers. I liked it because it was really fast but more effective
 (produced more revision) than other approaches. The student liked it because
 it led to clearer assignments, student involvement, and clarification of the
 criteria they wer supposed to aim at in their papers. I got none of those "I
 didn't know what you wanted" complaints.

 -- David E. Schwalm, Assoc. Provost for Academic Programs
 ___Arizona State University West
 ___4701 West Thunderbird Rd.
 ___Phoenix, AZ 85069-7100___(602) 543-4500
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Date:         Tue, 1 Sep 1992 13:14:27 -0500
From:         "Joe Amato" <jamato@UX1.CSO.UIUC.EDU>
Subject:      Re: comments

Yeah, I third Eric C's thoughts re students forming their own virtual
communities.

A related observation:  that they've virtually formed such communities
already, that they're most certainly living on a different planet than many
(most?) of their instructors, and that this has in effect compromised the
BigEducational process right along.  Not a generational gap, but a teaching
environs that (in many places/ classrooms) has fallen woefully out of step
with the times, rendering it a bit---shall we say---irrelevant?  Or mebbe
just ineffective.

Here here to the jack to jack *everybody* in.
Let's mix it up but good...

Joe
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Date:         Sun, 23 Aug 1992 14:32:19 --500
From:         "David E. Schwalm" <IACDES@ASUACAD.BITNET>
Subject:      (Fwd: *C&CD*) Computers under glass (11)

 *** Reply to note of 08/22/92 06:50
 I'll second what Royer says about computer stations with recessed monitors.
 Our classrooms are brand new. There isn't a chalkboard in the building, and
 the windows in our buildings do not open. Dust level are as low as you can get
 in the desert. THe design of the workstations is such that many of the
 problems with kicking stuff or with falling monitors are unlikely (the
 stations are of a very high quality--metal rather than particle board, etc.).
 The light reflection problems has been handled effectively in one room by some
 low hoods attached to the desk top (sight lines still open) and in another
 room by keeping room light levels low while providing focused work light at
 each station. We used the hoods in the classroom, the worklights in the lab.
 Before you buy any workstation, you should try it out on site for a little
 while, especially if you are planning to buy zillions of them.

 -- David E. Schwalm, Assoc. Provost for Academic Programs
 ___Arizona State University West
 ___4701 West Thunderbird Rd.
 ___Phoenix, AZ 85069-7100___(602) 543-4500
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Date:         Mon, 31 Aug 1992 19:00:28 -0400
From:         ENGMYLES@UBVMS.BITNET
Subject:      Re: (Fwd: *C&CD*) Transferring real life to Lit classes (7)

Bob:  I guess I meant by "real life situation" one in which somebody's
rear end depends on the success of a document in doing what it is supposed
to do, whatever that is.  Our students know that class is not life --
I know they're wrong, but they don't.  And I don't want them writing job
application letters for composition.
I have no solutions to my problem.  I suppose that's why I talk so much.
Myles
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Date:         Thu, 3 Sep 1992 13:13:16 CDT
From:         "David H. Roberts" <DHROBERT@SAMFORD.BITNET>
Subject:      Re: essential writing books

Wes:
I think two Donald Murray books are essential:
_The Craft of Revision_, 1991, Holt
_Write to Learn, 3rd Ed._, 1990, Holt

   David H. Roberts
   Director of University Writing Programs
   Samford University
   Birmingham, AL 35229-2207 USA
   Voice: (205) 870-2964; Fax: (205) 870-2384
   Bitnet:  DHROBERT@SAMFORD
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