ECCTYC Sessions, Conversations, and Materials
The ECCTYC conference offered many valuable benefits to those who attended. While some of us pointed to particular sessions that peaked our interests, scholarly and instructional, others pointed to the opportunity to build a sense of collegiality among colleagues, and still others discussed the thoughtful sharing of materials during the sessions in regard to the peer editing process, research paper, and decreasing the work load.
posted by Emalsam | 7:09 AM
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There were two sessions that I attended that offered interesting insights into my scholarly interests, as well as instructional pursuits:
“Etruscans, Romans, and Me—a Teacher Scholar” and “Bridging Cultures Electronically”
This session was my favorite because it provided excellent information on incorporating technology into a classroom, bridging classrooms across the world, and communicating between cultures. Further, the woman who presented the first presentation, Terry Ferguson, was very sincere and candid in her description of her experience with a NEH (National Endowment for the Humanities) grant she received. Her ideas on using visual cues for essay prompts were also quite interesting: while textual prompts can be somewhat limiting (judged according to the language contained within), visual prompts often leave more space for interpretation and evaluation of the topic.
“Composition after Democracy: Torture, Reference, and Responsibility” and “From McDonalds to Maquiladoras: Teaching a Critical Approach to Globalization”
Both of these sessions were interesting to me as a scholar, not so applicable in terms of teaching. However, the language analysis (especially in the first presentation) stimulated the idea that I would like to do further investigative work with my developmental students: why do we choose the arbitrary words we do? Why are most of the words we use in our essays, daily language, etc. so ambiguous? How do we move beyond ambiguity into a state of language that is more real, less phony and contrived? The conversation that ensued over the word torture in political documents circulated over the past couple of years was a little disturbing. It certainly opened my eyes to the thoughtlessness that often overrides our choices in political elections. If this information, the unfortunate and disturbing uses of this word—torture, would be further disseminated and widely read, I can only imagine how our humanity would be affected.
I attended a panel called "Standards and Expectations for Freshman Composition." I found it valuable as an introduction to the complexity of curriculum issues. Three English instructors spoke about Freshman Composition standards as they are defined by the Two-Year College English Association (or TYCA), Intersegmental Major Preparation Articulated Curriculum (or IMPAC)--a California grant project concerned with articulation between CCC, CSU and UC curricula--and California Articulation Number System (or the CAN system). Yikes. I still don’t know how all these organizations fit into my life, but I did walk away from this panel with some great handouts: one with a lot of statistics about the student population coming down the pike, and another with freshman comp standards (perhaps I should call them SLO’s?) that I can use.
One peer editing tip that interested me was the idea of setting up a “menu” and asking students to “order” things off it so that writers could be more selective in letting reviewers know what they wanted the most feedback on. In other words, instead of giving reviewers a standard checklist with, say, eight items to comment on, give the writers the checklist as a “menu” and ask them to order, say, three items off the “menu.” If students want to make substitutions, that’s ok. If students occasionally ask each other “do you want fries with that?” that’s ok too, for the goal is not only to make students feel more involved in the review process but to jazz it up a little and make it a bit more fun.
In regard to peer revision, I was excited to hear about “round-robin” peer editing. This is a practice that I have often employed in my classrooms, and I was re-invigorated to try it again this next time around for peer review. It’s a great practice, and, I believe, keeps students from getting off track with their responses, as well as keeps them accountable for what they’re writing.
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