The End of Composition

For me, the "end of composition" is producing students who can articulate their thoughts clearly and logically on paper while adhering to basics rules regarding grammar, style, and organization. They should also be able to analyze and, to some extent, use sources, which is the basic requirement for almost all college assignments. Freshman come into composition 1301 not knowing how to write in a way that shows they are articulate and intelligent, which they clearly are at least verbally because they were accepted to Texas Tech. Starting with the summary exercise, classroom instructors and document instructors work towards teaching skills that build upon each other and ideally lead to the student feeling confident enough in his/her skills to be able to produce research based papers in composition 1302. Teaching these kinds of generalized skills is also an "end of composition;" skills like being able to summarize and paraphrase can be applied to absolutely any discipline or occupation that the student chooses to pursue after composition class ends - even, heaven forbid, if the student decides to drop out of college on December 11th, he/she can apply those skills to secretarial work or whatever other occupation he/she chooses.

Teaching Philosophy

What is a philosophy of composition or a philosophy of teaching? Are there different types of philosophies? What teaching and learning strategies do you think might go into your philosophy?

A teaching philosophy should explain what a teacher intends to accomplish in the classroom, how he/she means to achieve those goals, and how he/she will measure his/her success. Every teacher’s teaching philosophy will be different, but since as composition teachers we will all have the same syllabus, we will have many of the same goals for our students. The major differences will lie in what exercises, activities, and lecture styles we employ to reach those goals.

In terms of composition, my teaching philosophy would explain how I plan to ensure that my students will become competent writers. Firstly, I would want to give the students a college entry level grasp of writing and grammar. The composition syllabus already specifies which type of writing exercises should be employed, so my part in this process will be giving good lectures that explain how to fulfill the requirements for the assignment of the week, closely monitoring group work, and giving useful feedback on those papers that I do end up grading and those that students bring to me in draft form during my office hours. My next goal would be to encourage critical thinking within the bounds of the assignments so that the students learn how to engage in the readings and come to their own conclusions about various issues. I would also make sure to provide readings and examples that come from different areas of interest and research so that the students will be better prepared for the reading and writing they will eventually do in whatever discipline they choose.

As a teacher I plan to very clearly articulate my expectations of my students and how they can excel in my class. This would involve a highly detailed syllabus with an explanation of the criteria by which the students will be graded. In my own experience, the less information that a teacher provides about an assignment, the more I panic, so I’d like to avoid having my students feel confused or resentful because I have not been clear. I will also be somewhat of a harsh grader. If students know that they will be held accountable for effectively demonstrating that they have learned the skills and information for the week, then they will be more likely to put in an effort to listen closely and write effectively. So far as group work, I intend to use it sparingly and only when I feel that the students have learned the skills that they need to thoughtfully and intelligently critique each other’s work.

Facilitation Through ICON

ICON teachers do a variety of things that make life easier for those who are teaching composition classes. The most significant of these functions is that we take pressure off of the professors by lightening their work load. It would be especially difficult for new classroom instructors if they had to both create lesson plans and grade all of the papers that their students turn in. With each of their students turning in increasingly larger assignments every week, grading everything would simply be too burdensome.

By using ICON, graders also gain an important degree of anonymity. When a student is not sure who graded their paper, they cannot claim that they received a poor grade or even a good one because of their relationship with their teacher. Thus, classroom interactions are not hampered by feelings of resentment towards the instructor.

Having a large pool of online graders brings diversity to the grading process. Each grader has his or her own strengths that make him or her particularly good at spotting certain errors and explaining how to fix different types of writing. As their various assignments go from grader to grader, students will learn how to fix a greater variety of issues than they would otherwise.

I suppose that what makes grading through ICON similar to critiquing a paper in a writing center is that in both cases the students receive hints on how to make their papers better rather than a complete explanation of everything that is wrong. Without the option of using a red pen and mercilessly noting every last mistake, ICON graders instead have to choose examples from the student’s work that exemplify a great number of errors. We then point the student in the right direction to find help on how to fix that type of error. As a result, the student has to really think about the writing process.

3 Important Concepts for Teaching Composition

The three major concepts that I plan to stress to my students are the importance of answering the right questions in their writing, thinking critically about the topic at hand, and the fact that learning to write well will positively impact every pursuit that they will make in the future, regardless of what field they enter into after the end of 1301.

One thing I plan to stress to my students is that when they are writing they need to think about the five W’s: who, what, when, where, and why. A work that does not answer each one of these is inevitably confusing and incomplete. When thinking in those terms, there is less room for common errors like passive voice; when you are actively thinking about the importance of saying who performed a given action, you are less likely to revert into passive voice and its inherent vagueness. I also like the inclusion of “how” in the Glenn and Goldthwaite reading. Answering how something was done can be critical to a reader’s understanding and can dispel questions about the credibility of the information provided by the writer.

Thinking about those question words will also hopefully open the gateway to critical thought. It is absolutely vital for a writer to be able to think for themselves, in part because without being able to think critically, it is impossible to make new and meaningful contributions to any field. In order to write good papers, let alone anything else, students have to be able to be able to discern what they believe to be the important parts of primary and secondary materials so that they can bring them together into a coherent work of their own. Most students enter college having accepted implicitly the information their parents and the media have given them. Even if they walk away from the class still believing everything that they did when they entered into it, I hope that they will at least have begun to think about why they believe what they do.

I also will use the concept of Writing in the Disciplines to make the class relevant for each student. In high school, English teachers expose their students to writing as a marginal part of their classes, wedged in after lessons on literary works. By showing how writing is a crucial element of not only scholarly pursuits in any discipline, but also any job that they might pursue after graduation, I will make it more likely that students will be engaged in the class. It is important that they understand that no matter how brilliant a scholar in the sciences is, if he or she is not able to document his or her findings effectively, no journal will be willing publish them. In the same vein, a businessman who cannot write clearly enough to produce a memo that is easy to understand will not be able to inform subordinates of important changes in company policy. Thus, no matter what path they plan to pursue, the students will understand that good writing is crucial to their success.