Notes, Friday, April 4, 2008
F3 (Re)Charting the (Dis)Courses of Faith and Politics: Burke’s Pentad, Crowley’s Toward a Civil Discourse, and Obama’s “Pentecost 2006” Keynote Address. - The handle on this one almost has enough stimuli to make Japanese school children vomit, but it was actually very interesting.
- I went because of the “civil discourse” piece – which I somehow associated with “civic engagement,” though it’s clearly a different horse all together. In the political season, I was also interested in the Obama piece.
- What happened was a surprisingly interesting discussion of how the academy intersects with Christian evangelicals, using Kenneth Burke’s ideas as a touchstone, and then viewing the work of Crowley and Obama through a Burkean lens.
- I can’t explain any more than that because most of the time I was thinking, like, “This is really cool. I wish I understood it.” I definitely plan to read some Kenneth Burke, who I am completely ignorant of. Throughout the rest of the conference, I kept hearing people refer to their “Burkean parlors” and other Burkean references. It was like learning a new word and suddenly hearing it everywhere on the wind. Burke, Burke, Burke… He da man!
G2 Not Just a Bullet on an Outcome Statement: Taking Civic Literacy Seriously - I only stayed for the first presentation here. It was Patricia Roberts-Miller talking about Civic Literacy, and my notes are pretty sketchy. Somehow, she followed the theme of my previous session, though, and ended up talking a lot about James Dobson’s Focus on the Family and what constitutes “research” in that sector, compared to how the academy sees “research.” Must not have been too compelling, though, since I remember so little.
- I snuck out to go to the Neighborhood Story Project presentation.
G1 Neighborhood Story Project - This is where I got inspired. There were six presenters from various parts of the country talking about the community literacy projects they direct. First and foremost is the Neighborhood Story Project of New Orleans, directed by Abram Himelstein and Rachel Breunlin, who I got to know better later when Sherry and I took their tour of post-Katrina New Orleans.
- Most of the projects were low income students and community members writing about their communities. In various ways, this writing gets published. In the NSP’s case, they’ve produces several books since 2004, one of which I purchased.
- It got me thinking about what could be done in Duluth related to the homeless and low income populations here, and how this could be connected to writing instruction at LSC. My ideas are not concrete yet, but they’re percolating.
H3 Activist Spaces for Civic Engagement - I only stayed for the first part of this one (perhaps to get a lunch break), but I really liked Anne Stockdell-Giesler’s opening question, “Can first year writing change the world?”
- She opened with an anecdote about how a student came to her for help on a paper on what was important about Dashboard Confessionals, sort of an Emo band my daughter likes (so it got my attention).
- Basically, she was arguing that student spaces are valuable (MySpace, Facebook). To understand them, we can’t ignore this cultural phenomenon. Regardless of our texts, we have to use pop culture as a text, too.
I2 Writing Off-campus Realities: Four Service Learning Courses - I was excited about this session because it looked very practical, and Melody Bowden from UCF was presenting. I’d met her at the SL SIG the night before, and she seemed like a fountain of ideas.
- It turned out to be a good session, but not a practical as I had imagined. Forgive me for imagining the moon!
- Holmes discussed most the course re-design of her writing course partnerships where 20 hours of SL are required. Interesting, but not too many “how to” details.
- McLaughlin was a dean from Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design. Institution wide, they’re doing some amazing things. Again, not exactly practical, but inspiring.
- Abney and Rougeon brought up Thomas Deans and his basic SL principals of writing for, about, and with the community. They had their students involved in a variety of ways.
- Finally, Bowden spoke from the perspective of someone involved at the Florida Campus Compact level who’d recently done a statewide study of SL. Here are some of the findings:
- Partners often want to seen as Co-Teachers
- Partners want to debrief
- Service Learning inherently teaches problem solving
- Some personal characteristics that make for good service learners:
- Enthusiasm
- Relevant field
- Interest in course material
- Communication skills
- Work related
- Maturity
- Organizational skills
- Initiative
- Flexibility
- Family background
- That last list doesn’t make too much sense. Blame in on the note taker.
JFeature Why Critical Thinking Needs the Believing Game - This was a rock star session. Peter Elbow and Pat Bizzell, anyway. It pretty much lived up to the hype, too.
- Elbow expanded upon his notion of the believing game, something he apparently has been talking about for several decades now, but it’s essentially this:
- Critical thinking is the doubting game. We teach students to look at everything and find the weaknesses so we can tear it apart.
- Elbow argues that and equally important Yang to doubting’s Ying is the believing game. In other words, when we encounter an idea or argument that appears faulty or wrong, to avoid jumping off that cliff. Instead, to say, “That sounds really wrong to me; now help me get more inside your idea so that I can understand better why you feel so strongly about it.”
- We can’t reject an idea unless we really dwell in it for awhile.
- That was enough for me to see how valuable the believing game might be in my marriage, for example.
- The other three speakers played with the Believing Game in various ways, but I was so taken with the original notion that I frankly didn’t pay too much attention.
- Marie Rose O’Rielly’s piece did make me laugh, though. She related two funny anecdotes:
- While pressing a male, rural student to provide more support for his ideas, he dug in his heals, saying, “You shouldn’t ask that. You gotta trust that a man has his reasons.”
- I can’t remember the other one.
- Bizzell’s was about the intersection of academia and religious fundamentalism again, and the role of the believing game. She talked specifically about the roles of emotion and imagination, but I can’t explain any more.
K4 Global AIDS: What can an English Teacher Do? - This was more personal than pedagogical. I was just going to stay for the first presentation, but because of its compelling and intimate nature, I stayed for the whole thing.
- Corey, Walker, Wasamba, and Stephens all talked about AIDES orphans in Kenya. Corey, Walker, and Stephens have all adopted orphans, and I think Wasamba has, too. Wasamba is a professor from Nairobi, and he told some pretty frightening stories.
- The world is full of so much pain. We each can only take up so many burdens.
That was my last session. Any questions? |
