Visual Literacies: The Impact / Salience of Images vs. Words

In her chapter titled "Toward New Media Texts: Taking Up the Challenges of Visual Literacy," Cynthia Selfe discusses the discomfort many English teachers accustomed to tackling traditional print-based texts in the "traditional" way feel toward visual New Literacy texts:

Relatively few English teachers, however, feel as comfortable in approaching a visual text unless they have some training in art or design. Given this context, we remain unsure how to approach visual texts, how to explore them, how to understand them, and how to teach them. And we also feel less than competent about composing visual texts ourselves. (71)

Throughout this program so far, I feel as though I have learned enough to begin to consider how to engage at least the first part of Selfe's concerns; considering how to approach, explore, and teach visual / New Literacy texts. For example, after pairing what I've learned in the Center for Writing over the years with what we have discussed so far in the writing methods class, I feel as though a good way to approach, explore, and begin to teach / teach to New Literacy texts is to ask some of the same questions that apply to print-based texts such as:

• What is the "writer's" purpose / what are they trying to "do"?
  
• How / what elements of the piece are they using to do this?
• How does the "writer" organize these elements to support their purpose?
  
• What is the "writer's" audience?
  
• How / what elements of the piece tell us this? And so on.
  

However, here is where an enormous disconnect enters the equation at least for myself. With traditional print-based texts, I feel as though I am a "natural" at approaching, exploring, dissecting, understanding, AND finally re-creating the writer's elements / craft used in my own writing. In other words, when it comes to print-based texts, I feel completely comfortable with both teaching AND composing. However, the second part of this equation eludes me when considering visual New Literacy texts. Although I feel as though I can approach, explore, analyze, and teach visual New Literacy texts, I feel at a total loss for creating one of my own. Take what took me about 1 agonizing hour to create for this blog assignment (a mind-map illustrating the development of my own literacy) as an example:

Although I at least perceive that my visual mind map has a purpose and communicates some meaning(s) about my development as a literate person (from birth, a continuously developing combination of print, media, and education leading to my eventual drive to be a teacher myself), I would probably get a big fat "F" when it comes to the elements of visual impact and visual salience. As it sits, I feel as though my mind-map lacks any sense of visual impact / or salience. Although I feel as though I understand how to go about making things visually coherent and organized (the way I used arrows / structured the diagram in an upward trajectory to show the increasing complexity and development of my literacy through the various mediums of print, music, and the education system), the individual images that I picked, as well as the overall all image each creates when viewed holistically, are bland as hell. I feel ashamed when I compare my super bogus mind-map to a piece of visual text such as a scene from Art Spiegelman's Maus:

Just look at this one scene! The visual impact and salience are off of the charts. I feel as though there are more meanings in the single cell of this scene than all of the images in my super bogus mind-map put together. In short, a central concern that I'm trying to articulate throughout this posting is that I perceive the following disconnect: I understand the elements of print-based literacies (both the organization and emotional impact / salience of the words) AND can reproduce each myself; however, although I feel as though I understand the elements of visual New Literacies (again, both the organization and emotional impact / salience of the images), I can ONLY reproduce the organizational aspects of a visual piece. Again, take for example my mind-map; good organization, but absolutely no visual impact or salience, at least in my opinion.

Overall, this assignment really got me thinking back to my comment about the "square peg in a round hole" when it comes to using traditional print-based methods to teach New Literacies. It seems to me as though there are some carry over methods that help at least myself understand and perceive that I well be able to approach, explore, and at least teach / teach to visual New Literacies. However, there is a large piece that I feel doesn't carry over; the ability "write with" the same impact / salience in images that can be done in words. This piece seems like the missing link, at least for me, and it makes me wonder how this link can be filled in. Much like Selfe's concern, I feel as though because I have no training in art, design, and can't draw / manipulate digital drawing programs worth a damn, I have no clue where to begin with actually producing / creating / composing visual New Literacies. This discussion creates the following questions and concerns for me:

-Although we might be able to teach students how to approach, explore, and understand visual new literacy texts, how do we actually teach students to be producers of visual New Literacies?

-Or do students already know how to do this, and it is ourselves that need to be taught how to do this?

-How do can we close this gap between what appears to be our student's extreme comfort with producing visual New Literacy texts and our extreme discomfort with producing them?

-And finally, and perhaps most important to me, if we as educators can't actually reach the act of creation (the highest level of critical thinking) when it comes to visual New Literacies, what good are we as teachers of the medium? Is this not a disservice to our students?

Vampires, Werewolves, and Appropriation

Although my heavily caffeinated state could be influencing my reaction to our reading at the moment, I found the Jenkins "white paper" to be an absolutely fascinating read. For this week's entry, I'd like to focus my discussion on the section of the paper where Jenkins talks about appropriation which he defines as "…the ability to meaningfully sample and remix media content… a process by which students learn by taking culture apart and putting it back together" (32). Rather than jumping straight into a lengthy, and potentially boring analysis of the article itself (after all, I haven't won BOTW yet!), I'd instead like to switch things up and SHOW you some salient examples of how this idea of appropriation is working with a particular artifact of current youth participatory culture – the fan fiction surrounding Stephenie Meyer's Twilight saga. The following video examples of individuals "manipulating" video trailers to the upcoming second installment in the Twilight Saga titled New Moon are exactly what Jenkins discusses – individuals creating meaning(s) by "taking culture apart and putting it back together" (32).

However, before I show you and walk you through these examples, I'd like to quickly touch on the means by which these video trailers where generated and the resulting implications that my use of these particular examples introduce while considering the idea of appropriation. Jenkins discusses the notion of piracy as he states, "Fan fiction (stories about characters or settings in original works written by fans of the original work, not by the original authors) clearly involves the transformative use of existing media content, yet it is often treated as if it were simply a new form of piracy" (32). Although these fans of the series are indeed appropriating the original content of the Twilight saga, this particular example of appropriation is an actual example of the piracy Jenkins describes as no official trailer or source material has been officially, or what we would call "legally," released to appropriate from. Instead, all of the appropriated content that you will view in the following videos has been somehow illegally "leaked" from the studio. Although I'll hold off commenting on my particular stance on the ethics of this issue until a little later, I would simply like to illuminate the idea that copyrighting as we now know it is a relatively new construction that bucks the past pattern of recreation from previous creation that Jenkins describes: "…Homer remixed Greek myths to construct the Iliad and The Odyssey; Shakespeare samples his plots and characters from other author's plays… Many core works of the western cannon emerged through a process of retelling and elaboration…" (32). Legalese aside, the following examples of appropriation illustrate intelligent close analysis and commentary on these texts, as well as a keen sense of audience and purpose, to create new meaning(s) for the viewer (Jenkins 33).

To frame your initial reaction to the following fan created trailers, the basic plot summary to New Moon is as follows:

-Edward (a vampire), falls forever in love with Bella (a mortal), and is concerned that he is robbing her of a "real," human life that he believes that she deserves.

-In reaction to his feelings, Edward decides to lie to Bella, telling her that he no longer wants and loves her, for her own good / so that she can lead a normal life.

-Edward disappears, and Bella falls into an extreme state of depression.

-While away, Bella begins spending time with and developing unique feelings for her friend Jacob, who has a crush on her. Also, he is a werewolf.

-Bella and Jacob form a special relationship. Jacob falls in love with Bella, and Bella doesn't know how she feels about Jacob. The reader may perceive that Bella is "stringing" him along.

-Bella goes cliff diving, and Edward's sister Alice who can see into the future, has a vision of Bella jumping off the cliff which she perceives as Bella trying to kill herself in response to Edward leaving her.

-Alice tells Edward, he thinks Bella is dead, and goes to Italy to provoke and be killed by a rival vampire clan called the Volturi.

-Alice goes to find Bella, discovering that she is not harmed. They then go to save Edward, and Bella ditches Jacob despite the concern he expresses. Jacob feels hurt, betrayed, and lapses into an extreme depression of his own.

-Bella saves Edward, he confesses his true feelings and the reason for his leaving, he promises never to leave her again, THE END.

In the following videos, try to draw your attention to how the "artists" combined and altered different leaked video and images with user-created text and music to emphasize the particular feelings and plot points as outlined above.

Look at how this user chose to emphasis Bella's depression and the slow passage of time that she most likely perceived during Edward's absense with short spurts of text ("He Left Her," the sequential naming of each month that had passed since Edward's departure) with images (Bella looking depressed and grabbing her face in sepia tone) and music (a gentle, depressing sound).

Look at how this video communicates a different set of emotions, as well as perspective, as the user combines an extremely harsh rock soundtrack with images of Jacob morphing violently and painfully into his werewolf self. All of this to potentially illustrate the inner pain that Jacob is feeling as he experiences feelings of loss and betrayal.

Finally, look at this actual student created video that I found posted on TeacherTube and how this student combines text, images, and music to communicate yet another set of meanings.

Overall, regardless of the fact that 2 out of 3 of these examples are technically appropriated by illegal means, I feel as though these particular examples do a wonderful job of showing that these users have a very deep understanding of New Media Literacy and how these elements can be analyzed, combined, and recombined together to intelligently achieve a certain purpose for a certain audience. From this educator's perspective, if this type of appropriation can be responsible for teaching students the skills that they will need to be competent in a world filled with New Literacies, I say to hell with copyright laws. If the appropriation of fan-fiction in youth participatory culture affords students a perceived sense of relevance, engagement, and overall purpose with what they are doing, I say we march on Washington to overturn this copyright bullshit tomorrow! If only it were that easy.

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Resource

http://writing.umn.edu/sws/quicktips/quicktips.htm

Because we have been talking about integrating grammar instruction into our writing instruction in both CI 5644 and CI 5661, this is a link to the Center for Wrting's "Quick Tips." To briefly summarize, they are free, short documents that you can download in both .doc and .pdf form that focus on the three following categories:

• Documentation
  
• Writing process
• Style and grammar
• Punctuation

Believe me when I say that these are EXTREMELY HELPFUL. Not a day goes by that I don't turn to this resource during my own practice. Check it out!

Young Writer’s Conference Day 2: Kao Kalia Yang

So today was another ridiculously inspiring day at the Young Writer's Conference. Kao Kalia Yang, author of The Latehomecomer: A Hmong Family Memoir, opened up the morning with a wonderful discussion about her book where she engaged and explored questions including: What does it mean to be a writer? What does it mean to be a "good" writer? What is identity? And so on.

As Kao Kalia Yang spoke, I could not write fast enough to capture all of the inspiring words that were flowing out of her. However, the following are paraphrases to what I found the most influential and to be honest, applicable to our own teaching practice:

• We write because the world doesn't see inside of us.
  
• Good writing is never about disagreeing or agreeing, but understanding.
  
• Why write?
  
  • Because people's lives are never really understood. Writing is necessary to truly understand ourselves or someone else.
    
  • There is always more time on the page. Provided you have the right teacher, the page is much more patient.
    
  • To discover something new about yourself and the world around you.
    
  • You have to feel something before the reader ever will. Great writing comes from feeling.
    
• Identity isn't who you want to be, but seeing who you are and being comfortable with that.
  
• Good writing is…
  
  • Teaching your reader something new.
    
  • Always personal and always about the human experience.
    
  • Not regurgitation. Write what things mean to you.
    
• To become a good writer:
  
  • Fall in love with language.
    
  • Find a favorite word and use it in a powerful way.
    
  • Always look for meaning.
    
  • Spill a body of words to choose from.
    
  • Don't be afraid to throw away those words.
    
  • Throw away the words that don't reveal "emotional truth," and don't feel bad about it.
    
• We are the words we think and write.
  

The act of listing these points does not do justice. The thing that struck me most about the author was how large of a presence she had for being such a small and meek sounding young woman. However, despite her size and the volume of her voice, this discussion grabbed every listener in the audience and moved them to what at certain points looked like tears. In the end, this is the lesson and most valuable thing that I took from her discussion: that all writing comes from feeling, even the most boring report-like crap that we force ourselves to write. When we write, if we don't evoke an emotional response in ourselves, whether writing about the loved ones that we have lost, or a research project on the Hoover Damn, the reader will be equally empty. As writers, we can't be afraid to explore and should seek to find the "emotional truths" behind our lives; the words that truly define the essence of where we came from, who we are, and what we can become.

See Kao Kalia Yang discuss her book:

Visit her website:

http://www.kaokaliayang.com/home.html

CI 5481 Discussion Leader Questions: Like Trying to Fit a Square Peg in a Round Hole?

In "Finding Space and Time for the Visual in K-12 Literary Instruction," Hasset and Schieble state:

One implication is that we need to understand and teach how images and printed text work together in multiple ways. Following Carolyn Handa, who states that 'finding space for the visual in the curriculum is possible without sacrificing the course goals of developing careful thinkers and thoughtful writers" (9), we suggest ways to find space for the visual within existing methods of literacy instruction so that new literacies and new texts can be used in the classroom without sacrificing curricular goals. Specifically, we look at accepted reading strategies for the purpose of updating them with visual texts and new literacies in mind. (62)

If it is true that the integration of images and text communicate meaning(s) in ways that traditional print-based based methods of decoding are insufficient for, why are educators so fixated on integrating, revising, and otherwise using current "accepted reading strategies" during the instruction of new literacies? If new literacies require a different means of decoding to derive meaning, shouldn't we be figuring out for ourselves and teaching these new decoding strategies vs. relying on current strategies that are "meant" for print? What if the current/accepted reading strategies are "not enough" / cannot be adjusted to decode the complex meanings created by the integration of images and text in new literacies? Would focusing time and energy on researching, understanding, and teaching decoding strategies for new literacies really be considered "sacrificing curricular goals"? Given the changing nature of communication and influx of new literacies, why do individuals insist on fitting new literacy instruction into current curricular paradigms vs. revising current curricular paradigms to reflect new literacies?

Critical Literacies and The Space/Time Continuum: A Good Star Trek Episode Title?

Across pages 117 and 118 of the chapter titled "Dialects and Writing," Adger et. al. propose a rather extensive list of what they emphasize as "key factors in writing instruction for secondary school students from vernacular dialect backgrounds:"

Although I completely agree with, as well as plan to implement each and every one of these "factors" as a practicing teacher throughout my career, I believe that this lists leaves out an important, if not the mostimportant, factor for teaching writing instruction to non-Standard American English and/or otherwise culturally/linguistically diverse students – explicitly discussing the "whys," "how comes," and "wtfs" behind why certain language forms are valued over others. In other words, although I found the Adger et. al. article to be very fascinating and useful, I feel it is missing an extremely critical piece to writing instruction – the critical literacy piece.

The closest that Adger et. al. get to discussing this critical literacy piece regarding vernacular's relationship to Standard American English occurs as they state,

"Although errors in writing stemming from dialect features may be minor in terms of the communicative goal of writing, they often are accorded major importance in formal evaluation. Points of mechanics and Standard English usage are sometimes used as a measure of writing ability… putting the speakers of vernacular dialects at a disadvantage… Such items privilege Standard English speakers and discriminate against speakers of vernacular dialects." (122)

The key words in this passage for me are of course the dichotomy between "privilege" and "discriminate." However, instead of problematizing the overall issue of writing instruction to non-Standard American English dialect speakers (and perhaps the entire range of linguistic cultural diversity) around these underlying
privileges and discriminations as afforded by language, I feel as though Adger et. al. stop short, accepting vs. challenging these privileges and discriminations as natural/matter of fact/ just the way it is requirements for being part of this society. Although Adger et. al. make a good case of their own, I feel that their stopping short of explicitly engaging the underlying "whys," "how comes," and "wtfs" behind the extremely overt privileges and discriminations as afforded by language renders the remainder of their other instructional strategies as completely useless/pointless. For example, looking at "key" instructional factor number 1, how are teachers and students supposed to "understand and appreciate basic linguistic competence" and have "positive expectations for students' achievement" if they don't begin to begin to question and understand how and why certain language forms/dialects are not appreciated and connote low expectations in the first place? In other words, I feel as though this very underlying, critical foundation to support the remainder of their "key" instructional factors is not present.

In her book "Other People's Children Cultural Conflict in the Classroom," Lisa Delpit engages this missing link as she discusses Martha Demientieff's instruction of Standard American English to Athabaskan Indian students:

"…her students, who live in a small, isolated, rural village… are not aware that there are different codes in English. She takes their writing which and analyzes it for features of what has been referred to… as "Village English," and then covers half a bulletin board with words or phrases from the students' writing, which she labels "Our Heritage Language." She and students spend a long time on the "Heritage Language" section, savoring words… She tells the students "That's the way we say things…" Then she turns to the other side of the board. She tells the students that there are people, not like those in the village, who judge people by the way they talk or write." (41)

Delpit then continues with Demientieff's own words:

"We're going to learn two ways to say things… One way will be our heritage way. The other will be Formal English. Then, when we go to get jobs, we'll be able to talk like those people who only know and can only really listen to one way… We'll talk like them when we have to…" (41)

Although this lesson is of course geared toward much younger students, I feel as though both Delpit and Demientieff hit on an extremely important factor when teaching Standard American English to culturally/linguistically diverse students – explicitness. Explicitly telling it like it IS. Explicitly saying that students WILL be judged based on the language they use. Explicitly telling them why they are learning a language that may not feel natural, but instead extremely uncomfortable. However, as educators, I definitely don't think that we should stop here. Although this baseline explicitness may be as far as we could go considering the cognitive development for these younger students, we should strive to "push" older, more cognitively developed students, further. For example, after explicitly laying bare what things are they way they are, dive straight in to analyzing and uncovering why and how things are they way they are. Analyze why language can afford either privileges or discriminations by critically looking into things such as power and prejudice and the history behind them. Overall, language needs to be taken apart during not only writing instruction, but education as a whole, to give access and opportunity to ALL students, regardless of their baseline familiarity or lack thereof with Standard American English. However, this entire discussion of course raises some more, trickier questions for me including perhaps:

-At what age/level of cognitive development should these issues be engaged? At what age/level of cognitive development can they be engaged?

-Should they be engaged before students even enter schools? Can they be engaged before students even enter school?

-Depending on their cultural relationship to Standard American English, do parents have more power than perhaps teachers to explicitly "lay bare" underlying power issues concerning language?

-Would a "team effort" between teachers AND parents do this best? Would it even be possible?

-The list goes on and on…

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Ok, now I'd like to take a break from today's readings and discuss something else… Last Friday, Friday the 13^th creepily enough, I taught my cooperating teacher's class all day, pretty much on my own, four back to back lessons concerning looking at The Yellow Paper through the feminist/gender lens. Although I feel that my first "real" time leading a set of lessons went extremely well, I would like to take a moment to comment on how surreal it felt like to do the same thing, back to back, 4 times in a row.

To keep a long story short, I thought that it was going to feel like like I was caught in some type of never ending loop in the space/time continuum, like I was doing the same exact thing over and over again. However, I quickly figured out that this was not the case. During my first delivery of the lesson, although overall it ended well, things got off to a rocky start. I was posing questions that the kids couldn't answer right away without first getting some more help getting there. In response to this, one of the girls said something along the lines of "well, that's a good question, but don't we need to ask 'why' she is depressed in the first place to get there?" I was dumbfounded by this question. "Very good idea, let's start there," I replied. I adjusted on my feet, and things shaped up to be awesome. Between delivery 1 and 2 I quickly made a note on my lesson plan regarding the change to implement it the next time around. With each delivery of the lesson something similar happened, causing me to change things up, think on my feet, revise, and re implement. By the end of the day, the lesson that I originally had was completely different, and a TON better.

I guess that my main message to everyone is just to keep open and really LISTEN to your different groups of students. At least for myself, mine gave me some extremely good advice to really tailor the lesson to their thinking.

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Resources:

http://www.adlit.org/

• This site looks like it is a resource for all things adolescent literature. On the left of the page are links to topics in adolescent lit including, but not limited to: libraries, motivation, achievement, learning disabilities, and so on. Also, there are links to classroom strategies for teaching students to comprehend. Lastly, the site offers literature recommendations and discussion prompts to go with each recommendation.
  
• If teachers are running into problems in their classrooms with things such as student achievement and motivation in regards to reading, they could navigate to these links to see what other teachers and experts have to say about the issue. Furthermore, teachers could use this site as a resource to generate book lists and discussion questions.
  

Fun "resource" that I spent way too much time with

http://www.addletters.com/bart-simpson-generator.htm

Alright everyone, this "resource" is called the "Bart Simpson Chalkboard Generator." You guessed it... you can edit the doc box, type whatever kind of crap that you want Bart to repeat on the chalkboard, and then download the image to your computer. Although the Simpsons are more "our time," (my God I feel ridiculous saying that), this "resource" could be used to introduce topics, concepts, and whatever else with a little bit of humor.

Please enjoy the chalkboards that I have generated.

Required/Assigned Revision… Bwah ha ha!

At the very start of Toby Fulwiler's study on the revision process appropriately titled "A Lesson in Revision," I was asked as the reader to think about my own attitudes toward "required revision." After being prompted to think about this, I immediately thought of the undergraduate course that I was required to take when beginning my job at the Center for Writing during my junior year of my undergrad experience. Carrying the intimidating title EngL 3751W "The Theory and Practice of Writing Consultancy," and weighing in at a heavy 4 credits, my instructor (who was also my new boss as assistant director at the Center for Writing) required something of her new employees and students that was completely new to me at the time: what she termed "radical revision." As I sat in Day 1 of this class, more or less meeting my boss and colleagues for the first time, considering the intense 4 credit work load, and considering that my success in the course would greatly influence my success with my new job, I remember shaking in my boots. To make matters worse, there was this new term that I've never really heard of, let alone have been expected to learn, understand, and apply before. "Radical revision? What the hell does that mean?" I remember stressing out about to myself. "I don't really revise to begin with, let alone radically revise! If normal revision is so intense for me, how intense is radical revision going to be? Help me Tom Cruise!" (If you don't get the reference, watch Talladega Nights).

This is when I began to scheme. "I could write a crappy first draft," I remember pondering to myself. "Or, I could just go through, change some word choices around, very some sentence structures, and done." As Harper cites in her article "The Writer's Toolbox: Five Tools for Active Revision Instruction," until taught, many, if not all, students understand "the revision process as a rewording activity" (193). She goes on to state that students "lacked a set of strategies to help them identify the 'something larger' that they sensed was 'wrong' with their writing" (193). Prior to entering EngL 3751W, this is exactly where my understanding of revision stood. My concept of revision was to either 1.) half-ass the first draft so that it looked like I changed a bunch of stuff around by the final draft and/or 2.) make simple, surface level changes to the wording, sentence structures, and so on to the text. However, by radical revision, both my instructor/boss, as well as most likely Harper, have much more than simply attending to the surface level in mind.

Harper continues to discuss that the writer's/reviser's toolbox consists of creating a "common language" of "easily accessible options for getting their jobs done in writing" (193). Similarly, throughout his book titled After THE END: Teaching and Learning Creative Revision (where Harper borrows the majority of her article's material from), Barry Lane discusses creating a "shared language of craft" and finding a "commonality of language" to enable students to revise (129). In other words, just as engineers, machinists, carpenters, and other professions have their shared languages of crafts, or what we might call "jargon," that other "insiders/experts" in the industry immediately understand and apply between each other, English classrooms need to create, understand, and apply their own writing process jargons to teach effective revision. Although Barry Lane and Harper spend a large amount of energy discussing their shared languages of craft consisting of questioning, snapshots, thoughtshots, exploding/shrinking a moment, and making a scene, it is our duties as English/writing teachers to consistently revise, add to, and teach this shared language of craft.

Although EngL 3751 didn't introduce me to the exact tools as discussed by Harper and Lane, I quickly realized that I needed to radically revise my own concept of revision in order to grow as a writer and teacher. Where I previously restricted my revisions to the surface most levels of my writing, I quickly realized that this is not what my new instructor/boss was after. Instead, by radical revision, she expected our writing to evolve on the deep, meaning level. Although she didn't introduce us to the tools/jargon of snapshots and thoughtshots, we did begin to build our own shared language of craft within the class. For example, when radically revising either our own work or our students' work, we were taught to always start with "global concerns/issues" (meaning, clarity, structure…), and then gradually move on to "local concerns/issues" (spelling, grammar, punctuation…). After learning this shared language of craft, my concept of revision was completely turned on its head as I had previously started with local issues, and then rarely, if ever, moved on to the global issues that actually influenced the meaning and purpose of my writing. As I began to learn this new language of craft and jargon, the idea of radical revision that scared the hell out of me at the begging of the class seemed completely manageable. "So this is it?" I thought to myself. "This is all? This is what I was so worried about?" Although learning how to start with the global and move to the local felt extremely awkward and difficult at first, through continued practiced it has become part of my natural process; the goal of any writing instruction.

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To jump out of my personal anecdote surrounding the idea of required revision, I feel as though my personal experience with this concept has given me the ability to truly understand and empathize with students who fear revision and do not yet understand its creative/uncovering possibilities. To ease their stress and make revision an effective process and tool for them to learn, use, and carry with them for the rest of their lives, it is absolutely essential that we as teachers continue to use, build, and revise a shared language of craft in our classroom communities. Doing so completely demystifies the process and eventually renders such a daunting, awkward, and difficult task as a second nature skill transferable to ALL other writing.

However, I have some rather large questions/concerns surrounding creating this shared language of craft in and across our classrooms:

• Because the concept of revision, as well as the writing process as a whole, is so idiocentric, varying from student to student, teacher to teacher, classroom to classroom, school to school, and so on…
  
  • How can we possibly create a unified, universally understandable language of craft? I
    
  • If this were possible, is this what we would even want to do?
    
  • Although potentially beneficial, would creative that unified of language, similar to the unified and universal jargons of other professions/institutions, be dangerous?
    
  • Would it "kill" and/or stifle writing?
    
• Similarly, how, do we create, contribute to, and revise this language of craft without "institutionalizing" the writing process, as well as writing in general?
  

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Resources

• English Companion: where English teachers meet to help each other.
  
  • The title of this resource literally speaks for itself. Jumping on the social networking bandwagon, this is a social networking sight dedicated to English teachers. Once you create a profile and log in, you are exposed to a huge number of resources including, but not limited to lesson plans/planning, examples of students' multimedia projects, news related to upcoming ed. events from across the country, access to education blogs and forums, employment opportunities, and the list goes on and on… I'm still exploring it myself. Have fun making friends with other teachers!
    
    • http://englishcompanion.ning.com/

It's strange how connected the bits and pieces of our world feel at times...

As you guys all know, today was the first day of the Young Writer's Conference that myself, Joe, Adam, Emily, Kristen, Molly, and Erin volunteered our time at. Although I went into this experience thinking that it was going to be exactly the same as the last two Young Writer's Conferences that I volunteered at, life threw me an extremely interesting coincidence that I'd like to take a moment to share with everyone.

To keep a long story short (Joe mentioned some extremely good detail about the day in his blog, so if you want a more complete explanation of the day itself check it out), after we met our group, introduced ourselves, and had a snack, we were led into the Weisman's main auditorium where we were treated to an extremely engaging presentation by Wing Young Huie, a self-taught professional photographer. As an artist, Wing Young Huie uses his camera and photography skills to capture individuals in their everyday lives, in the everyday places where they live, doing everyday things. In relation to the Weisman's current exhibit's theme of "identity," Wing Young Huie explained that he tries to represent individual's identities through his photography by making and presenting an imprint of their neighborhoods, activities, traditions, and so on; their very selves.

As Wing Young Huie clicked through slides of his pictures, he stopped on the photograph displayed at the top of this entry that completely grabbed my attention, and at first, I had no idea why. (The above picture is property of Wing Young Huie, and has been acquired from his website for purposes of academic discussion).

I knew this man, and these two children, but at first I couldn't figure out how, and from where. Then, Wing Young Huie described a conversation that he had with this man and everything suddenly became extremely clear to me. While talking with Wing Young Huie this man said that he made the "conscious" decision to walk down alley ways with his children as they can find art to use for everything, in particular, making puppets. He then went on to describe that we can find art everywhere. He concluded by giving tribute to the "raw, mechanical creativity" of another man by the name of Fred Polnau… my Grandfather on my mom's side of the family. At this point, I was able to recall who these people were. This was my cousin Dan Polnau who I haven't seen since my Grandmother Mae Polnau's death back in 2005, and scarcely ever before that.

Dan himself fit wonderfully with the exhibit's theme of identity. From his youth, he was always interested in art, and went into professional puppet making. After recalling this detail, I recall a vague memory of him doing a puppet show, animating a large, black crow, during one of my childhood birthday parties. As a matter of fact, I google searched Dan Polnau and learned that he runs a successful puppet performing business (I know there is a word for this, but I can't recall it right now) in the cities. Here is a link to an article that MPR ran on Dan and his puppet and other art business:

http://news.minnesota.publicradio.org/features/2004/01/23_robertsc_puppetepic/?refid=0

In our family, nobody really ever "understood" Dan, and I always got the sense, even as a child, that nobody really wanted to. As opposed to the rest of our family, Dan was very "earthy," didn't like to shower, use mass produced chemicals (deodorant), and just loved to live off of the earth. He loved to truly be "one with the earth." I remember it bugging my Grandma Mae to death. I remember that she would give him some money with a note wrapped around it that said something like, "Dan, here is some money. Go take a bath." I recall Dan recalling this same story during my Grandma's funeral back in 2005; she loved him so much that she made him promise her to give her eulogy. The day she died Dan was camping up in Duluth. I recall nobody was able to reach him. Finally, someone was able to reach his camping outpost, and as he rushed down from superior he composed her eulogy while he drove. When he delivered it, there was not a dry eye in the house. It was one of the most moving things I've literally ever heard. For as much sarcasm and disapproval of Dan that I recall being given to him, I feel as though he is one of the most creative souls I have ever met. Dan's identity is truly unique, and truly beautiful. He is a puppet maker. He walks down alleys to find crap to make puppets out of. And he loves every minute of it. So many of us would kill to be so happy with who we are.

Until this morning, I had forgotten many of these memories ever existed. My Grandma Mae suffered in a nursing home with severe dementia for the last 5 years of her life. An absolute living hell for her. I remember her begging to die. Since then, I haven't really thought of her. I guess I was too afraid. But my Grandma Mae was one of the most loving people I have ever known, and I truly miss her. I remember that she used to pick me up when I was a child, take me to McDonalds, and we would spend time together all day. Time and money were no object when it came to me in her eyes. Even though she had nothing, if I had my eye on something in a story, my mother had to beg her not to buy it for me. "He has enough stuff," my mother would say. "Roxanne, he's my little Ricky and it's my money, I'll do what I please with it," my Grandma Mae would shoot back. I actually have tears in my eyes as I sit here and write this, I haven't thought about these things in a long time. It really hits me hard now that it all came back so quick, all this morning.

To connect this to the class in some way, depending on what the nature of the assignment is, I would like to continue with this for my multigenre paper. As I've read Romano and Barry Lane, I really didn't believe in much of this creative writing stuff. Like my other blog post, I thought it was kind of all bullshit. But now as I sit here remembering my Grandma Mae in such strong, pretty painful detail, I'm literally dumbfounded. In this vivid flash of memory I finally understand how much she means to me, and how hard it is that she's gone. And it's not like it just happened, it's been 4 years. More on this, thank you for reading.

The Multigenre Paper: Other Ways of Thinking and Knowing

During the first semester of our Senior year as undergrads, Jamie and I were in the English department's introductory creative writing class. Do you remember that action Jamie? At least for myself, I was there for no other reason than because it was one of the last of what I perceived at the time to be totally bullshit pre-requisites for the English Ed. program. I can recall my bitching (after all, I'm a professional at it) like it was yesterday. "Why the hell do we have to take this? I have no interest in teaching creative writing! This feels absolutely useless to me! Isn't creative writing more or less useless anyways?" Just like the teacher in the above cartoon, I perceived no actual / "real" purpose for learning, practicing, and enjoying creative writing. At least from my perspective as a smug, 22 year old punk who already thought I was an "expert" in expository from my work as a then Undergraduate Writing consultant at the Center for Writing, I perceived no value in creative writing as a human being or future teacher. To be completely honest, until finishing Romano's Blending Genre, Altering Style: Writing Multi Genre Papers, I continued to maintain this attitude as I progressed in my expository experience as a now Graduate vs. Undergraduate Writing Consultant. As I finished and began to think about Roman's work with the multigenre paper, my smugness and perception of myself as a sort of "expert" with writing was confronted and perhaps more accurately shattered. Although I owe a great deal to what I have learned, and am of course still learning, in my past and current role at the Center for Writing, I realize that I'm not quite the expert I imagined myself to be. Although I have had, and continue to gain, much experience with expository writing, Romano has shown me that the expository is not the only, let alone even the best, way of constructing, constructing, and demonstrating meaning and knowledge. As I sit here, I wish I had a time machine to go back to Creative Writing 1001, shake myself awake, slap myself in the face, and tell myself to shut the hell up and instead listen as some of this stuff will be extremely important in the future. Knutson, it looks like you and I have work to do. Where do you think we can get ourselves a flux capacitor?

Near the beginning of his work, Romano points out the distinction between paradigmatic thinking / knowing and narrative thinking / knowing as he juxtaposes the encyclopedia entry of "Count" William Basie with the Brathwaite poem about the same musician. While the encyclopedia entry is concerned with constructing thought / knowledge via reportage, facts, analysis, chronology, and logic, the poem is concerned with constructing thought / knowledge via visceral senses as afforded by stories, poetry, drama, art, and motion (18-22). Although Romano acknowledges the importance of both paradigmatic AND narrative ways of thinking / knowing
depending on the writer's purpose, audience, and so on, he argues that there is a NEED for narrative as:

"Genres of narrative thinking require writers to be concrete and precise. They can't just tell in abstract language. They must show. They must make their topics palpable. They must penetrate. And that is what multigenre papers enable their authors to do" (26).

In other words, there are more than just facts to knowing and understanding. There is feeling. There is actually experiencing the piece. And, as Romano implies, incorporating narrative WITH, and after getting all fired up about his book I might even argue MORE than, paradigmatic information will lead to the greatest, richest, most "human" understandings as possible.

Now, although Romano's book introduced a new and exhilarating way of viewing my future career that has been previously unrealized, as well as made me extremely eager to teach multigenre writing and even try it myself (perhaps for the final project), I have a number of extremely fierce concerns and questions…

-Q1: As I talked about above, I feel as though I've been "stuck" in expository / paradigmatic mode with considering writing in my educational development thus far. In addition to only being able to count on one hand how many non-expository / creative pieces I've worked with in the Center for Writing, I've pretty much ignorantly shunned getting anywhere close to learning anything about creative writing since. To be honest, both the definitions and deeper purposes regarding some of the creative writing golden nuggets that Romano suggests in his book such as repends where brand new to me, never having heard of, let alone used myself, before. To put it simply, whereas I feel as though I know a ton about paradigmatic / expository writing, I feel as though I don't know a thing (outside of what I just learned from Romano's book), about creative writing.

• How can I possibly teach such writing if I know so little about it? If I have such little experience writing narrative myself? If I am such a "newcomer" to studying, learning, let alone actually using creative writing?
  
• If I hope to teach and use multigenre papers, how can I possibly learn and gain the experience I need with both the discipline, as well as actually writing creatively myself?
  

But, then again, perhaps this will be an advantage as neither myself nor my students will be the "expert." Instead, we will be forced to explore the multigenre paper truly collaboratively and learn from each other. I'm sure Paulo Freire would give me a high five, but the discussion of both teachers and students as co-learners will have to wait for another time…

-Q2: Again, although Romano sparked a passion for the multi genre paper within me, I am very concerned about how the process of writing the multigenre paper prepares students for higher academia where they are so heavily assessed on their expository writing. Although I don't agree with it, it feels as though just like I was, and probably still am, "stuck" on paradigmatic / expository writing, higher academia is as well.

• Will the process of writing the multigenre paper teach students the skills they will need to be successful outside of my classroom in higher academia where paradigmatic / expository writing is frequently accepted as the "only" way of knowing?
  
• If not inherent to the multigenre paper, could I figure out a way to still use it, but teach these skills?
  
• Do I need to be explicit about this and not keep any secrets with my students? (e.g. explicitly sharing with them the state of higher academia and where the multigenre paper "fits")?
  

Overall, Romano's book was an extremely interesting, as well as humbling read. In addition to giving me the opportunity to explore the multigenre paper and its possibilities, I understand that I am not quite the expert that I imagined myself to be. Although generating its own amount of worry, I feel that this was important lesson to learn. After all, as we have discussed across our classes, we are always "unfinished" as both teachers and human beings. Romano's read showed me that I am extremely unfinished, too.

Useful Resource:

http://www.wordle.net/

"Wordle is a toy for generating 'word clouds' from text that you provide. The clouds give greater prominence to words that appear more frequently in the source text" (Wordle.net).

-This resource could be used in the reading and / or writing processes to import electronic texts and / or student papers into to perhaps uncover prominent ideas, themes, topics, vocabulary, and so on.

-Reading process. Potential tool to "frame" text:

• Uncover / explore most prominent potentially unknown / difficult to understand vocabulary before teaching.
  
• Uncover most prominent ideas, themes, and topics.
  

-Writing process:

• Students could import their own texts to explore the most prominent ideas, themes, topics, and vocabulary operating in their papers.
  
• Students / teachers could import free-writes and other pre-writing text (either individual students or the entire class at once depending on the circumstance) to generate ideas, themes, and topics.