This could be me.... or could it?

This is a picture I found on google images of a teacher and what appears to be her basketball team from Whatcom High School, Bellingham, WA. 1920.

url: http://www3.familyoldphotos.com/photo/washington/15370/whatcom-high-school-bellingham-washington-1920-girls-basketball-team

The Coming Together of It All

I still remember the lecture from the first day of class and the time line of notes we took that gave us a background to our historical figures, who we first became familiar with through hours of reading in Norton. But through the family tree it all makes sense.

Not necessarily the putting together of the family tree (or sky), but just the research and figuring out who fits with who really gave insight into the class as a whole. As I got deeper into my research, I was able to pin-point exactly when I came upon a major figure. I actually knew who these people were! Not only that, but I felt connected to these people and the field in a way that I have never felt before. It is amazing to see the connection between all these people, and actually find a trail that leads to me. To all the teachers, you are actually a part of the knowledge, because you are inspiring and influencing your students with your own knowledge that actually links back to Aristotle. Doesn't that make you feel smarter? It certainly makes me feel closer to this vast library of knowledge.

But I actually think this project started at the beginning of class, and has been continuing throughout the semester. I am refering back to the lecture, and talking about the presentations that could have been even more helpful for this project, had I been thinking about it at the time. The lecture gave us the link to Aristotle, but the presentations allowed us to gain knowledge on these people who have all inspired us in some way and all who have been inspired by "rock stars" before them. During my research I was able to connect a lot of the people we discussed in class together, which I thought was an important task because it directly related to the class.

I know a lot of our research was not put on the final project, but we just didn't have the time or space to include everything. A good project for the years to come would be to expand on the starts and make the connections between the ones we have already placed. I would like to see the tree expand, and I think it would be a valuable asset to the entire field. Great job everyone! Now, how about those papers...

There ain't no such thing as that

I'm going to try to make this as non-anecdotal as possible, but this topic of teaching black people proper English really makes me mad. Barbara Schneider starts her article by telling us how the different types of black people separate themselves based on clothes (economical standing). I immediately thought: where would I sit? Well, she placed me right, In the middle of the classroom, in the front, wishing I had sat closer to a cute guy who needed tutoring. Though interesting, this is not the main part that got my attention.

Further in the article she refers to something called "Black English." "In their reading of the 1979 Ann Arbor 'Black English' court case, Ball and Lardner explain that the plaintiffs succeeded in establishing that teachers' negative attitudes toward the children who spoke African American English created a nonstructural barrier that interfered with the education of African American English-speaking children" (925). Wow. When a Hispanic, Chinese, Italian, German, basically any other truly non-English speaking student makes a mistake with their English, a teacher would have every right and responsibility to correct them. But, since a black student is struggling, the negative attitudes are hindering their education in some way. I really do not understand.

What is worse is that there is no Black English. Since the beginning of my college career I have heard this term, describing the way some black people talk (and also most teens of all races) as a different type of English altogether, a whole new language. This is what irritates me. I have done no scholarly research on this subject, but being black, I think I can say with certainty that there is no Black language that other people can't speak, or wouldn't understand if I spoke it in front of them. This language is not a language at all, but slang, which in the world of academia should be stomped out and corrected immediately.

Lisa Delpit brushes on the same topic, but presents it in a different light. "There are two aspects of Gee's arguments which I find problematic. First is Gee's notion that people who have not been born into dominant discourses will find it exceedingly difficult, if not impossible, to acquire such a discourse, He argues strongly that discourses cannot be 'overtly' taught, particularly in a classroom, but can only be acquired by enculturation in the home or by 'apprenticeship' into social practices. Those who wish to gain access to the goods and status connected to a dominant discourse must have access to the social practices related to that discourse" (1312). She disagrees (and I'm thinking: "Yea, you tell him!) then she gives us some rare exceptions to a widely known norm (ugh). But, her point is still valid and brings up some interesting things to think about.

First, black students can learn English, regardless of their background before entering school. If children can learn English as a second language (which they do all the time) then, I can't buy that black students would have a harder time than second language learners, when they already speak (no matter how poorly) English.

But, I want to look at the language and apply it to the gender topic. "Dominant Discourse" this screams to me: Patriarchal. Right now I am basically arguing in my paper that classrooms need to be more concerned with female students' learning, because of patriarchal elements in the classroom. But, how can I say on one hand black students should be able to learn English, despite their disadvantages, but argue for time to be taken out of "dominant discourse" to teach female students?

A Well Worth It Mess

How do we incorporate everything we have been discussing in class with our rhetorical family tree? Well, first I think we need a bigger area than the board outside Dr. Souder's office!

We should incorporate all of the people, both old and contemporary scholars, who we have been presenting on in class. I know most of them will be a part of the tree in some way, but we should make a conscious effort to include them all, therefore bring that aspect of our class into the tree. After all, after all the research we have done on them, they are definitely a part of us whether we agree with them or not.

Further than that we should have bits and pieces of what a pedagogy stands for on the "tree" as well. By this I mean technology, grammar, each part that Dr. Souder stated we should cover in our pedagogy statements. Since this tree is a representation of the people who have inspired some part of us dating back to Aristotle, we could include visual parts of a pedagogy statement. What is important to us as a class? For example, technology is something none of us can evade, and its use in the classroom is essential. Dr. Souder's idea of video taping definitely falls under this category. We could start a facebook group showing our work and how we are all connected so that students after us can add on and keep an ongoing record of the connection. Even visually on the board we can go from speech bubbles representing the past to digital designs and e-mail.

I think it will be a well worth it mess when we are done with the project. I can't wait for the enjoyment of sitting back and visually understanding how information derived from Aristotle all the way back to me.

Good Writing

Today I attended the writing workshop with Boudreau Freret who had some interesting things to say about writing in general, and writing on web 2.0 programs that are directly related to our class discussions about technology and its implementation in the classroom.



The first point he made that I want to mention is: All good writing is creative. Of course he claims he admits to having few sources to back-up his claim, but I agree with this point for some different reasons. Professors are continuously talking about providing and finding your own voice in your writing, and I think that directly relates to creativity. Anybody can make a claim, support it with evidence, and move on with their lives. But, it takes a real writer to take an academic argument and put a voice on it to make it somewhat entertaining. So, how do us writers find our voices? Well he had a suggestion. Pull up two applications. 1.Your paper that you must get done, but are having a hard time completing it. 2. A twitter link where you can post randomness that makes you laugh. Then alternate between writing between the two. His theory was great: use both sides of your brain (left is analytical right is creative) at the same time. It works for him... It might work for you. The problem that I had when we did the exercise is that I couldn't pull out my creative side because my mind was trying to wrap itself around the lawyer talk and I wasn't even sure I was reading English. However, I have been forming another idea. I started a journal (OK diary, but I can't stand that word) and inside all my complaining and randomness (twice in one blog!) I see myself, MY VOICE. Now, this is just a guess, but I think if I cut out the fluff in my journal I would have some pretty understandable, concise writing.

Which leads into Freret's second point. Good writing is concise writing. This is a point I have a hard time adjusting to. I have had three years of journalism training, where I wrote as little as possible as fast as possible. The longest paper I had to write was five pages, usually only for a final. Needless to say this transition to English and 12-15 page papers has been brutal. Freret says to write as much as possible, put down everything you can think of, then cut it down. It's a hard concept to get into. I'm still working on that.

The last and maybe the most important part of the workshop I want to mention is the use of Twitter and Facebook as educational tools. Freret refrains from the usual status updates: "Autumn Sanders went to the store for some bread." And instead uses the resources as a tool to give people (the world) interesting, creative information, sometimes just used to entertain himself. While I think these could be great tools that could bring a lot to education there are some questions we need to answer. How close should the teacher/student relationship be online? What age is too young? Do we really want to take away the student's freedom of social expression and make it into something they have to do? As technology progresses these among others are questions we must consider before jumping into these innovations.

"Isn't collaborative learning the blind leading the blind?"

In class I discussed Richard Whately's view on truth: There is an absolute truth, but men don't have access to it. God is the only possessor of absolute Truth and men have assess to it through the gospel, which they inevitably interpret wrong. Whately believes that men (and I have to include women) will always be imperfect, but that should not stop them from seeking out the truth. Raymie McKerrow states: "Whately argues that just because men reason imperfectly, even with logic training, that is no reason to abandon the attempt to generally improve the reasoning of individuals, and more than one would abandon the study of grammar even though applied imperfectly once studied" (178). So, how does Whately apply to Kenneth Bruffee's article "Collaborative Learning and the 'Conversation of Mankind'?" Well, let me tell you.

Brufee argues that class discussion, especially in English classes, is effective in getting the students involved as well as generating new ideas, and promoting individual learning. But, he questions it's use for three reasons. One, the teacher is usually the one doing the discussing, all the while randomly calling on inattentive students to respond to a question and usually sitting in silence waiting/wishing for a student to say something (at this point anything!!). The second shortfall he mentions is the lack of actual discussing. Bruffee states that in most cases there are two arguments: a pro and a con, no real discussion of an in between, a completely different solution, or any other creative ideas.

But, the main point he focuses on, and the connection to Whately is his link to Thomas Kuhn, who focuses on knowledge. He states: "To say that knowledge is indeterminate is to say that there is no fixed and certain point of reference, no Arnoldian 'touchstone' against which we can measure truth. If there is no such absolute referent, then knowledge must be a thing people make and remake" (554-555). Though Kuhn and Whately have some major connections, they also have a difference in opinion as to how they get there. Just because Whately believes that knowledge is "indeterminate" doesn't mean that there is no fixed point. For Whately God and the gospel are the unreachable fixed points of knowledge/truth. Yet, the two scholars actually come to the same overall conclusion that knowledge is what man decides it to be.

Whately argues that man gets his truths from the bible, while Kuhn argues that collectively men come up with it on their own. In a classroom setting (and probably in any setting) it is the concept of the blind leading the blind. Richard Rorty calls it socially justifying belief. Bruffee continues: "Knowledge must be a social artifact. But to call knowledge a social artifact, Kuhn argues, is not to say that knowledge is merely relative, that knowledge is what any one of us says it is. Knowledge is maintained and established by communities of knowledgeable peers" (555). OK, so not any random person can make up their own knowledge and expect people to go along with it, it is the job of "knowledgeable people" (how they became knowledgeable in the first place is questionable) to decide what our absolute truths can be. Of course, this is a perfect seg-way to bell hooks.

"Knowledgeable people" are clearly the educated white man, or in bell hooks' terms: the white supremacy, racist, sexist, capitalist, patriarchal society. The head leaders in this society she hates so much. Well no wonder the world is dysfunctional, we are lead by a bunch of idiots who think they are smart, but who can only learn something if it's collaboratively agreeable. But, is there any other alternative? How could we possibly know, because none of us really know the true answer to anything. Even laws are just mere theories.

Mary Astell: The Good and the Bad

Mary Astell's devotion to her gender is extraordinary; it is what starts revolutions. It's too bad the people of her time weren't ready for all she had to offer.

"This work (later known as A Serious Proposal, Part I), is in fact a plea to women to take seriously the life of the mind, and to make it possible for girls to be taught to use their intellectual talents" (147). She knew that women were capable of being more than just the silent companions of men. She was educated and had the crazy notion that all women should be educated as well. She is the epitome of what we would call an independent woman. Not married, supporting herself the best way she could, today this is the norm, back then that was not the role of a women. She "reproaches women for wasting their talents in lives of trivial self-indulgence" (148).

The problem, I think, is with her approach. She was mad at her sex. I think we can relate: Women are still looking for a man, if not to support them, then to complete them. The idea that a women needs a man in her life has not died out by any means. But, not only is she scolding women to step up and take control of their lives, but she is rejecting the way society worked, seemingly alone. The reading argues that she focused on her audience, and placed themselves in her shoes. "Astell puts herself in the place of her audience of women and takes into account not only the many deficiencies of their education but also its single strength: whatever the failures and omissions in women's education, it always included a thorough grounding in Christian morals" (153). In this respect, she succeeds. Including religion in her argument allows her to connect with her audience in a way they will understand. But, to a point she is insulting them. For example: "Mary Astell was incensed: 'Why won't you begin to think, and no longer dream away your lives in a wretched incogitancy? Can you be in love with servitude and folly? Can you dote on a mean, ignorant and ignoble life?'" (149) Instead of yelling at women to do something with their lives, she should have worked with them and society to promote change.

I admire her passion and dedication to the betterment of her gender, but think her approach could have been better in that she shouldn't degrade women for following their role in society, but encourage them to do better. After all, you can only lead someone to water...