After a brief explanation of the project and the site in the classroom, I turned my students loose to play with their pages. Now, the assignment was simple. They were asked to find a visual that demonstrated the opposition to the argument they were working with all semester. I asked them to place this in the center of their page and use the remainder of the space to refute that argument using any of the means available through PikiWiki. They did an excellent job.

But what I truly loved about PikiWiki was the fact that I did not have to hold any of my students’ hands through the experiment. Even those who are terrified of computers were able to do a great job with their page. And, it allowed those who knew more about technology to help out those who were struggling with the site.

But I think the biggest benefit to PikiWiki was to those who were not techno-savvy. They had the chance to work with technology and come to realize that if they experiment and try new ways of working with technology, it’s not as scary as they perceived. Even one of my less techno-savvy students has said that she will use the site in the future for visual presentations if her professors will let her.

In the end, I give PikiWiki two thumbs up. Below are pages created with PikiWiki by both a techno-savvy student and a techno-illiterate student. Take a look. I’ve rated them by the student’s technology capabilities over the course of the semester. You’ll notice that they’re both well done pages and without the identification of the student’s skills, you would never know which page was done by the techno-savvy student.

Benefits of Standardized Testing (a techno-illiterate by her own definition)

Legalizing Marijuana (a techno-savvy student)

I’ll be posting a few more times on this subject as we work through this. I firmly believe that keeping up with what’s going on in this unit will give some essential information to me about using PikiWiki in future semesters and I think that this information can help those who are considering using this technology. They’re going to spend only two class periods working on this assignment since it’s a brief assignment and I think that they can accomplish what is needed in the short two days of class. Normally, when I do an oral presentation I spend at least one full class period showing students how to use the technology (PowerPoint, Dream-Weaver, etc.). However, given the ease with which students have already begun picking up this technology, I’m going to see if we can get the discussion and brainstorm of their project done in the same day that I introduce them to the site. I think that this is possible, but we’re going to find out (I have a few “wiggle room” days if it doesn’t go successfully). So here’s the plan for this assignment.

Overview of the assignment

My students have spent the majority of the semester working on an argumentative essay on a specific topic and they will use this topic for their third writing assignment. I am asking them to find a visual aid (YouTube video, poster, visual on a website, etc) that takes the opposite view they argued in their paper. So, if a student wrote about being for abortion, then they can use an anti-abortion sign as their visual aid. I’ve already run each of their topics through the great Google Imager, so I know that finding an image will not be a problem. They are then going to use the sign as a basis for their pikiwiki. They are going to use the image to create a visual/oral response to the image. On their page, they are going to respond to the image using any means they can within the confines of pikiwiki. This gives them the option to:

• Talk about the weakness of the image in an audio
• add a second image to refute the first
• add comments to the image with post-it notes
• emphasize points in text

I’m not giving them an extreme amount of guidance on what to do. I’m telling them that based on the argument they presented in their essay, they need to demonstrate why the visual they chose is wrong. They need to argue, via PikiWiki, for a correct statement of the opposition. For example, if they are using the aforementioned anti-abortion ad, they should point out any fallacies in the argument and refute these through any means necessary. I’ve got a week to nail down the specifics and I want to detail the process and progress of this assignment as it plays out in the actual classroom (these are my favorite types of posts). So, before next Tuesday, I’ll post their official assignment and I’ll be posting on their progress all week (and through any extra time they need).

Stay tuned!

But one thing I have never done with my students is give them the link to my blog. I don’t require students to read my blog and I don’t usually talk about it in class. But this semester has been different. I’ve talked a lot about my blog, other blogs I’m reading, blogs my students might be interested in and I’ve talked about the blogs they do (and don’t) read. Through this, I’ve learned something interesting.

I gave my students an extra credit assignment. It was only worth one extra point on the midterm and I haven’t had a lot of response (though I have quite a few students who are still looking for the extra credit). The extra credit asked them to interact with Diigo and find the extra credit. This consisted of finding my blog, reading the latest post and adding a comment providing me feedback on what they thought about the post. When I mentioned this to my students, I had just posted the pikiwiki post. I wasn’t expecting anything “phenomenal” from my students. But, as usual, they surprise me.

I had one student who not only commented on the post, but made an excellent point about why I should implement this into our syllabus this semester. The other student, well, she didn’t follow the directions and post a comment, but I gave her the extra credit anyway. Why? She created her own pikiwiki and sent it to me. How can I not give credit for that? The fact that she took the extra step and played with the technology demonstrates that my students are willing to play with the technology without being required to do so. I had planned to postpone pikiwiki until next semester so that I had more time to play around with it, but I think they’ve persuaded me to use it this semester. But they’ve also persuaded me to do something else.

Next semester, I’m going to give students the link to my pedagogy blog. I think it’s good for students to see their teachers writing as much (if not more) than they are required to. But I also think that this might provide a new means of dialoging with my students about what will “work” in their class. I’m contemplating this because I just finished reading an interesting post on Educational Discourse. In her latest post, Kelly talks about “Losing That Tech-Edge Feeling” and he makes two very interesting points in this post that I want to address here.

First, Kelly talks about using technology less in the classroom so that it doesn’t overshadow the student-teacher connection. He writes:

As I work with the teachers in my building, looking for ways to involve students, I’m wondering if the time being put into technology wouldn’t be better used working WITH THE STUDENTS.

I think this is a valid point. We cannot let technology overshadow our own interaction with the students. We need to keep the focus on engaging our students in their learning, not on just finding new ways to use technology in the classroom. If we aren’t using the technology to engage students, then why are we considering this technology in our classroom? He got me thinking here. I taught my students to use Survey Monkey last Thursday. It wasn’t a planned technology workshop, but came up somewhat out of the blue. As we were working on their argumentative essays, one of the students asked if she could use a survey in class. I agreed and recommended the site. Then, after recommending the site to another student, I rethought the approach. I asked the entire class if they would be interested in incorporation a survey and they were wild about the idea. So, right there in class, I taught them how to use it. They loved the idea and are returning to class tomorrow with their final surveys and we’ll discuss who (outside of the class) they might want to send it too.

I did a similar thing on Tuesday, also without thinking about it. I had only one student show up with the required materials for the class. I’ll admit that I was upset; I had gone to the trouble to put the daily lesson plans on the Blackboard calendar and tell the students where to find it. They forgot. I understand that. So, instead of getting angry and lecturing them about responsibility, I pulled out my techno-teacher best. I gave a “pop” quiz (I use that term loosely) in which I instructed students on how to put the calendar on their Blackboard homepage. When they had completed it gave them credit for the quiz. They all showed up this afternoon with all the materials they needed for class. I felt gratified–they did not do this because I screamed at them on Tuesday, but because I gave them the resources to be prepared for class.

I think that what Kelly is saying about working with the students is right on target, but I want to add a twist to this. I don’t think we can stop keeping up with the latest trends in technology, but I do agree that they don’t need to overshadow what we’re doing in the classroom. If I had not learned to use these tools, I would not have been prepared to teach them when my students needed or wanted to use them.

This brings me to Kelly’s second point.

Never mind that the students are texting each other and that they like the technology. Even with all that, there is still a piece that is missing – the human contact. Someone who will listen to them, right next to them. Someone who is in the building that they know really cares whether they are successful or stumbling and helps to provide the means necessary for the them to pick themselves up. Yeah, I know all about embedding technology in the learning and capturing the students but it just seems to be missing something. Once the “Wow” factor is over, what do you have?

Again, Kelly is right. We need to make sure that students are still getting the human interaction they need. But I think that for a teacher who is not ready to give up the technology fight, this human contact can be combined with the use of technology. I think that I’m going to structure it this way.

• At the beginning of the semester, I’m going to start by introducing them to RSS feeds. These are helpful for students doing research or planning to follow a specific blog or page for the course of the semester. I want to see if there’s a way to link an RSS feed to Blackboard to put this in a central location for them, but I need to look into that further before I make promises.
• I’m asking students to subscribe to my blog and read all of the posts that I put into the technology section. I may ask them to read specific posts in other areas too, but I want them at least reading these.
• I’m asking them to post comments to any of the technology posts that they would like to learn to use in class. I’m hoping this will get a discussion started that can be continued in the classroom.
• I’m expanding the roundtable section of my class to include discussions about the comments they left on the blog and ways that we can consider incorporating the technologies in the classroom. As it stands, we use roundtable discussions at the beginning of every class to talk about recent developments in students’ lives (from getting a new puppy to their first fight with their roommate), interesting stories in the news (my students this semester voted in their first primary) to problems they’re having writing their essays (they get great feedback from their peers in these discussions). So, next semester, I’m going to start mentioning posts that I have coming up or posts that they have commented on. I want to use this as a means on listening to what my students want to learn about with their technology opportunities and get them thinking about their own learning.

The plan for the semester is to get students thinking about how technology works in their lives. I think that it’s one thing to tell students that a technology can be advantageous for them to learn. I know that this can be effective–it worked with Diigo and my students this semester. But in the upcoming semesters, I want this to be something that they have more input into. My theory is that if they have the desire to use technology in the class, they are more prone to use the technology later in life. Only time will tell, so check back in the fall to see how this is developing. I’ll keep you posted.

A history professor asks students to choose a specific aspect of World War II and write an informative essay over the topic. Now, consider two students (I’ll call them John and Shane) who both decide to write on the battle of Pearl Harbor. Let’s say, for sake of argument, that John had a composition teacher who stressed the importance of collaboration and introduced students to resources that would allow them to collaborate on the research portion of the essay. John introduces Shane to one of these resources. We’ll say that the students are using Diigo to share links. Now, during the research process, John and Shane create a Diigo group in which they both add links to collaborate for the paper. They both add annotations to the resources and use some of the same resources in their papers. The papers, when graded by the professor, vary in content, but contain several of the same quotes from the same sources. The professor thinks this is suspicious, so he compares the two documents and discovers these similarities:

• Three of the eight required sources on the papers are the same.
• Of these three sources, at least one quote from each source is in both papers.
• The organization of the papers is vastly different.
• None of the content is the same in either paper.

I would do a little happy dance if these two papers were from my students. Why? Because the content demonstrates that the students are not plagiarizing each other, but the sources indicate that they are in fact collaborating in their research (which means they were paying attention to what I said in class). But, it seems that some professors view this as cheating and will, in fact, give students a lower grade on the essay–if they don’t fail them–because they chose to collaborate.

Now, I would be the first to turn in a student who was copying answers from another student’s paper during a test. I would turn in a student text messaging a friend for answers to a test during the test itself. But we have to realize that with the advances in technology that our students use, we need to change our definition of cheating. Or do we just need to reconsider exactly what comprises collaboration. As I said, if I were reading these two essay I would be happy that the students had thought to collaborate on their research. I can easily tell, based on organization and content when students are collaborating too much on their technology and when they are merely collaborating on the research. Testing is another story, so I won’t address that in this discussion because I want to keep the focus to collaboration and writing.

If we can think about the load of courses that our students have to take to meet the requirements for graduation (both in high school and college), it requires a LOT of writing. English teachers require between one and five essays per student each semester. In addition, many history, psychology, and even music or art classes are requiring papers of students. This is just brushing the surface of classes I can remember taking. Now, we also have to think about the friendships that we encourage our students to make in the classroom and how we encourage these students to create study groups for tests and to contact each other if they have to to miss class. So why do we not encourage the collaboration that helps them achieve the goals we want them to achieve?

To return to the history paper, think for a second about the number of sources–books, journals, and websites–devoted to the bombing of Pearl Harbor. Now, if we think that a traditional semester runs about 16 weeks and the paper is discussed on the first week of class, but not begun by students until around week four (and I’m being optimistic here) then they have fourteen weeks to complete the research and write the paper in order to turn it in during the final week. There is no way these students can get through all of that research. But, if they form study groups as they will have to do in advanced classes and careers, they can then begin to condense the amount of research that is done in the group. It doesn’t matter how they divide the research, but that they divide it. This allows two people to continue to research longer while gaining more information on the subject and, ultimately, be able to use better research. There is no need for both John and Shane to need to decide that a particular book is not useful to the research. If one can determine this and then notify the other then they cut out a portion of the research.

I doubt that this form of collaboration is new. What is new about it is the way students interact with the books. Using digital libraries and more online sources, students are able to access more sources than ever before. Because of this, I think, many professors are expecting a more diverse group of sources when they could be looking at the way that students are using their research networks to their advantage.

I’m not saying that if John and Shane each included the exact same sources, organized their paper the same way and had paragraphs that had similar wording, we should not consider this a potential cheating issue. However, if the only similarities between the two papers lies in the research of the paper, then the use of research networks should be taken into account.

But let’s say that John and Shane each have completely different sources. John, normally a “C” writer has written a “B” paper that is organized in exactly the same manner as Shane but has different content. Is it a bad idea to look back at John’s previous papers and see if he has encountered comments in the past that focus on his lack of organization? Is it too much to consider that perhaps John knows Shane is good at organization and asked for help with his own paper? Shane would likely tell him how his own paper was organized and John is likely to use this information to organize his own paper. Again, I don’t think that we should consider this cheating. We teach our students using examples. Why then, would we not allow them to use an example they had sought out on their own? It makes sense to me.

I am not saying that a teacher should completely rewrite their definition of cheating. What I am saying, instead, is that teachers need to look closely at what is going on in these situations and determine whether it is detrimental to the student to eliminate collaboration for the sake of keeping students from drawing ideas from other students. I, however, think that if students are using each other to further expand their education, we should encourage this. It could very well lead to a promotion in their future. Should we stand in the way of this?

But I’m curious. What do you consider the difference between collaboration and cheating? Am I living in a utopia where student collaboration is not cheating or am I actually being realistic about these collaborative endeavors? Do I need to explore this idea further?

This article is also featured on TheApple; join the conversation in TheApple’s article discussion

I followed a link from somewhere to pikiwiki the other day and I think I’ve found a new technology that would be great for student presentations. Let me explain.

I usually have students do a group presentation each semester and require them to incorporate some form of visual with their presentation. I’ve always asked them to consider creating a wiki or a website, yet I always end up with nothing more than a simple PowerPoint. I know that part of this is because some of them are not sure about how to create a website or a wiki. Unfortunately, this is a complex thing to teach in a class (believe it or not). I try to get my students to create visual aids that supplement their presentations instead of creating presentations they read. However, no matter how much I try, it seems that my students are always putting ALL of their information into the PowerPoint and then simply reading it to the class. So, I think this is one area where a website would benefit them. So, I’ve been pondering ways to teach them to create a visual aid where they can use the features of the aid as talking points without reading directly from it. I think pikiwiki can do this. Why? Read on.

Pikiwiki works like a wiki–but with NO programming (CSS or HTML) required. Students can type in text boxes and then drag these boxes around where they want. They can resize their text, color, it and change the font, all with the same forms of technology they use in their email, blogs, and MySpace pages. They can drag and drop pictures and move them around as they wish. They can record audio or link a YouTube video. They can add images and change the color of the background. It’s fabulous in my opinion. Why?

First, students are limited to create one page at a time, so they have to focus on putting the most important information on that one page. This means they have to think carefully about the specifically about the videos and images they upload. They also have to think about what specific text is on the page and how they arrange everything. I think that, in the classroom, this will allow me to spend more time focusing on creating a better visual aid (and thinking outside the box) than I spend trying to teach each individual group how to write a wiki in only a few ways. Instead, I can use a longer assignment later in the semester and have each one create a page for a wiki. This way, we can walk through this technology step by step.

Second, pikiwiki makes students collaborate on a higher level than other formats do. Powerpoint, wikis and even websites all allow each group member to create their own slides or pages. However, I think that asking each group to create only one pikiwiki page will require them to collaborate on a more complex level. This means that students returning to their personal computer to do “their part” and then come together to only discuss the background and order of the pages is a thing of the past. With pikiwiki, each group member is required to talk about all aspects of the page to make sure that the page has the best impact for the presentation. They will have to decide which of the flicker images or YouTube videos they want to use instead of using each of them.

Finally, I think that using pikiwiki can help students learn to collaborate on the level they will need in the real world. By asking students to collaborate on every aspect of the page, they will gain experiences that can be used far beyond the classroom. So, I think that it would be a good idea to ask students to keep a journal of their experiences as they go. This way, they can reflect back on the big decisions that came with the collaboration. In this journal they can discuss the choices for video and image layouts. They can discuss the way the group collaborated on the text that was included with the page and how decisions were made on the final product. It might even be a good idea to have students write a reflective essay (if you teach an English class, this is another good way to get students an essay credit while further talking about their use of technology) in which they discuss their journals and their collaborative projects in a more detailed, organized manner.

For more on pikiwiki (and a brief discussion) see the short video below. It’s brief, but a simple preview. Just remember, the rest of the post is below the video

Now, since I fully believe that we should all try out the technology before considering it in the class, I decided to make my own page. The great thing is, not only does the page allow me to share it with you, but it allows you to edit it as you wish (a setting that can be turned off, but please don’t). So here’s what I’m proposing. For all of you reading this who are considering using pikiwiki in your classes, check out the page and edit it. Then, post a picture of the updated page on your blog and talk about it. Make sure to send me a link.

Here’s the link to the page I created.

Here’s a visual of the page. So, what are you waiting for? Try it and post it. Let me know what you think.

I gave a presentation to a class on Wednesday. The class focuses on using electronic texts in First Year Composition. I took the course last spring and it opened my eyes to the things that I could do in my own classes. This was the class that set me on my path to a potential dissertation topic. So, when the current professor of the course asked me to present on blogs in the classroom, I jumped on the chance. Honestly, I did this for three reasons. It gave me a chance to further show off my research to a professor who I want to be on my dissertation committee (she now is). It also gave me the chance to try out some new things in presentations; I got to use a YouTube video in my presentation for the first time. But most importantly, it gave me a chance to present a good idea to a group of new teachers. This last one was the most important.

I spend a lot of time in the office working with our first year teachers and helping them along as a mentor would. I never would have thought of this role developing into anything else when I took on my first mentoring role. But now, I have three teachers who come to me for guidance when they need it (and two more who call from out of state on occasion).

Yesterday, I sat down and had a conversation with these first year teachers. They were all saying the same thing–they loved the presentation, but they still weren’t comfortable using blogs in their classroom. Now, keep in mind that these are the same people who are the core of the technology workshops that I am starting in the office. I reminded them that once we cover blogs, they’ll begin to see how they can use them in their classes. But then I began to listen–really listen–to what they had to say and think about this from a broader perspective.

I know that what I am trying to do with the technology workshops will help the teachers that I work with. I also know that a good number of people are doing the same thing in their own schools and districts. But deep down, my plans for a dissertation have been bothering me over the last few days. I can’t seem to justify to myself what good it will do to write 200 pages on how effective social medias can be when used in the classroom when at least half of my general audience may not know how to use these mediums when they’re through reading the book. If I really want to make a difference in the way that teachers engage their students, I need to make them tech-literate on their own. I cannot expect them to read my work and say “oh, Diigo. I’ll just go sign up and figure it out.” Not all teachers are prepared to just get an account and figure these things out on their own. This is already a question that I can see having to defend in my prospectus defense. Which brings me to my first “dissertation coffee break” as I shall call it.

I want to use these random thoughts to converse with my readers and get feedback on some ideas I’m having for coming up with the ideas that will drive my thinking to a fuller idea for a dissertation. I want to consider not only the use of Web 2.0 and social media in the classroom, but I want to expand that to look at how teachers can be taught to (a) learn to use 2.0 (specifically social medias) in their personal lives (b) use current 2.0 tools in their classroom (c) assess and learn new tools as they become available.

Now, I have a background in literature which I have realized is not as conducive to working with educators as, say a degree in education or curriculum could be. However, I’m relatively good at learning as I go. But I could use some feedback. Since many of you are teachers or work with teachers on a regular basis, take a minute and comment to this post to let me know what the one thing you think a curriculum for teachers should include to help teachers accomplish these goals. What is the one thing you wish somebody had taught you about using these tools.

The good news is, my prospectus is over a year away (I still have coursework to finish and comps to take). So, you have plenty of time to think this through and let me know of good leads that you have along the way. I’m looking for links to sites that help, stories, ideas–anything you’re willing to provide. Also, I’m starting the technology workshops in mid-April, so you’ll be seeing more in-depth ideas on this same topic as we undertake these.

In “Online Literacies and Learning,” Robin Goodfellow argues that online environments provide immense ways of improving the social literacies of todays students and examines a manner of research which explores the variation in relationships between teacher and student both online and face to face. Using the three dimensional theory of Lankshear,Snyder and Green Goodfellow examines the potential of this method of social learning research in relation to potential pedagogy and uses this method to examines two situations where social learning has been practiced. Goodfellow demonstrates the advantages of social learning as it relates to her fellow teachers and puts forth methods of research that benefit this audience in comprehending the benefits of social learning. Goodfellow’s purpose in writing this article is to motivate peers to begin exploring social learning online and to incorporate the usage of this medium of education into their pedagogy.

Goodfellow’s study exemplifies the benefits of social learning in a strictly academic setting, and much of what she examines in her article pertains to non-academic settings as well. Her examination of the three dimensional study and links to other methodologies aids the researcher in understanding how these methods may be combined and used to examine any social network regardless of its discipline. For the work I am doing with wedding planning message boards, the theories that Goodfellow examines can easily be seen as a base method for engaging in research in this area.

• grand style
  • smooth and ornate arrangements of impressive words
• middle style
  • lower yet not the lowest and most colloquial class of words
• plain style
  • brought down to the most current idiom of standard speech

Virtues of Speech

Correctness

• Quality of style by which one speaks or writes in a manner consistent with a given language’s norms

Clarity

• Clarity is measured in terms of how clear our speech seems to our audience or how well it appeals logically to the understanding (logos).

Evidence

• Evidence measures how well language reaches the emotions through vivid depiction. (pathos)

Decorum

A central rhetorical principle requiring one’s words and subject matter be aptly fit to each other, to the circumstances and occasion (kairos), the audience, and the speaker.
Ornateness

Ornateness aims at producing delight or admiration in the audience, and may thereby jeopardize clarity.

Like clarity, ornateness is a quality of both single words and groups of words, and some of the same choices that might threaten clarity may improve ornateness—for example, the use of old, coined, or metaphorical words.

Scope of the Lesson

Demonstrate to students how to write in each of the three styles. Demonstrate the nuances that vary between each of the styles and how to focus on the virtues of speech in each of these styles and how the virtues change for each of the styles.

This lesson should come early in the semester-either preparing students for their first essay or culminating in their first essay, depending on the class. This way, students become more aware of audience influence on style at a much earlier time than they often do.

Lesson Design

Lesson One-Writing in the Plain Style

• Students draft an email on why the cafeteria food needs to be improved.

• For this email they are told that they are writing this letter to a close friend attending another university.

Worthiness

Many students feel that writing is something they can’t do well. They see writing as a task to be completed within a classroom setting. To begin an assignment by going over all of the technical terms and then asking them to write while keeping all the rules and guidelines in mind can overwhelm students. Therefore, to open a class by asking them to write an email assuages some of their fear since they are already familiar with this medium of writing.

• Discuss the attributes of the plain style. Place the emphasis on the style being the one we use most often without thinking about it. The goal here is to prove to students that they can write in the plain style.

Worthiness

To discuss the attributes of the style after students have written an essay in that style allows them to see their writing as belonging to the style, instead of something they must work to create so that it fits the style. This way, students feel they have an advantage when working with styles; since they already use one of these styles, they feel more comfortable writing in the other styles.

• In class, examine a sample email for the virtues of style. As this email is discussed and color coded in the class exercise, answers to the questions would be discussed so that students have a better idea of how to look for these virtues in their own writing. During this time we would discuss why each of the selected passages are attributed to each virtue and how some, though they work in multiple places fit better into one specific virtue for a certain reason.

• • Correctness
    • How is this email a sample of how you write your friends on a regular basis?
    • What traits distinguish this email as one written to a friend?
    • Look closely at your arrangement, content and word choice
    • Mark these places by changing the font color to green
  • Clarity
    • How well will the recipient understand the reasons cafeteria food should be improved?
    • Will the recipient see the logic in your argument? How specifically will they see this?
    • • Mark these places by changing the font color to red
  • Evidence
    • What emotions are you appealing to in the email?
    • How have you conveyed this plea in your email?
    • • Mark these places by changing the font color to blue
  • Decorum
    • What words have you used that you would not use when speaking to a stranger?
    • What evidence is contained in your word choice that acknowledges you are writing to a friend?
    • How can we tell that this is a casual email sent to a friend?
    • • Mark these places by changing the font color to purple
  • Ornateness
    • Are you using clichés?
    • Do you use metaphors that only your friend will understand?
    • • Mark these places by changing the font color to pink

At this point, a sample email would likely look like this

Maria,
OMG! I just came back from the cafeteria and there was nothing to eat! They have hamburgers there that are greasier than Jack Walker’s hair was! The salad bar had the limpest, brownest lettuce I have ever seen. They definitely need to fix this food.
Seriously, I am paying so much for food that I don’t eat here. If I could save that money I could buy a new pair of shoes every month. But no, they have to make us get this retarded meal plan and we have to eat on campus whenever we’re hungry. Yuck! The apple I tried to eat actually had a worm in it! I have never eaten such crappy food. Can you imagine? How’s the food at A&M? Do you have good food? Maybe I should transfer in the spring.
Jackie

Worthiness
As with discussing the attributes to the plain style after asking students to create the email, discussing the virtues of the style after students have seen how these are already present in their own writing aids students in seeing what they already know about writing in the plain style. Words like decorum and ornateness can intimidate students when they are attached to somewhat ambiguous rules that students feel they don’t comprehend. Yet attaching these words and rules to tangible areas in a student’s writing helps them to understand the rules by making them more coherent to the student.

Homework Day One

Rewrite the email as a letter to the student body that will be published in the school newspaper.

Worthiness

Asking students to write to a community they belong to makes them consider their audience carefully while also helping them to continue to feel comfortable in their writing. Again, the audience provides little pressure and though students are aware how this fits in with the lesson, the familiar audience aids in continuing to take a good bit of the pressure off the writing anxiety.

Lesson Two–Middle Style

• Discuss the attributes of the middle style. Place the emphasis on this style being used occasionally in our life writing. This forum can allow students to come up with various ways they would use the middle style (i.e. emails to their parents, emails to professors to ask a question, letters to the newspaper). The goal here is to prove to students that they can write in the middle style just by paying some attention to the virtues of this style.

Worthiness

As with the discussion after the email on day one, this discussion serves as a means of proving to students that they are capable of writing in the middle style. This continues to build their confidence in their writing ability, which makes preparation for the final stage of this group of lessons more effective.

• In class we examine a student’s letter for the virtues of style. As this letter is discussed and students color code their own homework, answers to the same questions posed on the first assignment are reassessed. Questions would be discussed so that students have a better idea of how to look for these virtues in their own writing. During this time we would discuss why each of the selected passages are attributed to each virtue and how some, though they work in multiple places fit better into one specific virtue for a certain reason.

• Once the essay is color coded and the virtues have been reiterated, the remainder of the class period is spent discussing the differences in the two writing styles. During this session questions are directed to aid students in seeing the differences between the plain style and the medium style. This should aid in their comprehension of not only the two styles, but also how they vary their writing to fit each of these styles.
  • Correctness
    • How did you write the letter differently than the email?
    • What aspects of arrangement, content and word choice changed?
    • How did these aspects change?
    • What sets the letter apart, in general, from the email?
    • How did constructing the letter differ from constructing the email?
    • What traits distinguish this as the medium style?
    • Did you spell check this letter more?
    • Did you grammar check this letter?
  • Clarity
    • Did you add additional information that other students would relate to?
    • Did you add information that only your fellow students would comprehend?
  • Evidence
    • What emotions are you appealing to in the letter?
    • Have these emotions changed from those in the email?
    • Do you use different methods of pathos to create your appeals?
  • Decorum
    • What effect did the audience have on your word choice?
    • How did you choose specific words for this letter?
    • Why did you choose to use these words here but not in your email?
    • What evidence is contained in your word choice that acknowledges you are writing to the student body?
  • Ornateness
    • Do you use more educated metaphors?
    • Why did you choose to use the metaphors you used this time as opposed to those in your email?

Worthiness

With the discussion of variations of the virtues of style between the plain and medium style, students have the chance to begin making connections between audience and style that will apply to future writings. This discussion also aids students in inferring the specific rules that accompany the virtues of style.

Homework Day Two
Rewrite the letter. This time you will want to address the letter to the President of the college. Remember to follow the style virtues carefully.

Worthiness

This homework assignment, coupled with the subsequent lecture, demonstrates to students the need to write more eloquently for a more formal audience. Generally, students are asked to write essays with no guide as to the audience. Therefore, the students tend to write essays in the middle style and address these specifically to their instructors. Since they are familiar with this audience, they feel the middle style is appropriate. However, this assignment forces students to think about how they would write to a more sophisticated, unfamiliar audience. When discussed during the Lesson Three lecture, this allows for a further discussion of the grand style in a manner that students can relate to.

Lesson Three–Grand Style

• Discuss the attributes of the grand style. Place the emphasis on this style being used for all formal writing and make sure students understand that this style is the most difficult to write.

Worthiness

This forum can allow students to come up with various ways they would use the grand style so they have concrete audiences for each of the three styles. The goal here is to demonstrate to students that they need to be fully aware of how to write in the grand style so that they are prepared for the majority of their college career and their future in the workforce.

• In class we examine a different student’s letter for the virtues of style. As this letter is discussed and students color code their own homework, answers to the same questions posed on the first assignments are reassessed and students return to the comparison created in the previous class, only this time they compare the medium and grand styles.

Worthiness

As with the comparison between the plain and the medium style, this comparison allows students to see the nature of the differences while also demonstrating that as long as students take care in their writing, there is not much that differs between the medium and the grand style.

• Now that student have had a chance to look specifically at each of the styles and have been provided with a chance to write in each of the styles, they are more familiar with the audience’s impact on the style used. Now, in my opinion, is the best time to provide them with the more concrete rules for the lesson. The best way to do this, however is not to actually provide them with the rules for each style, but to create a chart that exemplifies this.

Worthiness

Asking students to aid in the creation of the chart allows for a chance to gauge the students’ individual knowledge of the rules. This also aids students in their own realization that they can distinguish between the three styles and that they do know the virtues that go along with these styles. Also, creating the chart in class, through the use of a Word table projected on an overhead allows students to see the chart being created and allows the instructor to post this chart to the course webpage once it has been completed. By waiting until the end of the unit to establish the rules for the styles, students have had a chance to become accustomed with writing in the styles without feeling overwhelmed by the rules associated with the style and, therefore, not creating assignments that will aid in their understanding of these styles.

Homework Day Three

Begin Revisions to your letters, making sure that both letters adhere specifically to the virtues of their specific style.

Worthiness

Asking students to revise the two letters while paying attention to the virtues should finally solidify any ambiguity between style differences. Additionally, this assignment asks students to look at the styles in relation to their virtues as they complete the revisions. Therefore, the specific virtues associated with each style are internalized as students continue to connect the virtues with traits of their own writing.

1. Rhetoric in secondary composition education
2. Rhetoric in post-secondary composition education

Within each of those divisions, I will focus on four specific points

1. Facets of rhetoric that should be taught (rhetorical concepts)
2. Why it would be taught at this level
3. Benefit to the student if this material was taught at this level
4. Benefit to society at large (why this matters to the “real world”)

Now on to the organized brainstorm

Rhetoric in secondary composition education

Facets of rhetoric that should be taught (rhetorical concepts)

Antiphon’s philosophy

Canons of Rhetoric

Six Parts of a Speech

kairos

Why it would be taught at this level

Antiphon’s philosophy: To teach Antiphon’s philosophy in secondary schools allows students to begin understanding why they are writing and how this will ultimately connect to their lives. This philosophy should not be taught only at the secondary level, but should continue to be stressed in the teachings of the post-secondary instruction. This can be done by asking students to write essays on real topics that apply to their daily lives and communities they are involved in. This way they can see how writing in their real life will always be important.

Canons of Rhetoric: To begin teaching the canons of rhetoric at the secondary level provides students a chance to begin learning how the writing process works. As with anything taught in schools, repetition would aid in retention and students would soon internalize this method as the “standard” for writing. Therefore, when they reach their college composition classes, they would be able to gain more important information since college instructors would not need to teach the canons in-depth, but would only need to review these and enforce this method in their own lesson plans.

Six Parts of a Speech: This should be taught at the secondary level in order to prevent students from entering college courses with the ability and mindset that a five-paragraph essay is the only way to create an essay. Using the parts of a speech/composition as the way to write allows students to maintain the structure of an outline, while teaching them something more useful than the five paragraph essay. I’m not asserting that the five-paragraph essay should be completely eliminated, but it should be taught alongside this method so that when students begin writing more complex material, they have a better structure.

kairos: Kairos should be taught at the secondary level as students are learning to write various types of essays. In today’s college classroom, students enter into an essay with the belief that they are writing to “their teacher” and that the end means for an essay is to “get a good grade.” By asking students to consider other audiences during their secondary education, they can begin to grasp this concept much earlier in their education and begin to internalize this for future use.

Benefit to the student if this material was taught at this level

To begin teaching the more general material at the secondary level means that college instruction is open to teach more information in the span of a semester. Since many students do not enter college knowing anything about these aspects of rhetoric, college composition instructors must devote a large portion of the first semester of composition to teaching this material. Therefore, the student spends more time learning material that could have been taught in their secondary classes instead of using this time to learn new information that would make them better, more focused writers. Additionally, since this material is only covered in two semesters at the most, there is little chance that students will actually retain and internalize this material.

Benefit to society at large (why this matters to the “real world”)

When secondary instructors begin teaching these general principles of rhetoric at a younger age, there is more time for students to internalize this material. Teaching these principles at the secondary level could, ultimately, allow for a revised composition curriculum in post-secondary education. This revised curriculum would allow instructors to focus on more specific material that becomes applicable when students enter their career fields. Potentially, students would learn general rhetorical concepts in their secondary classrooms, then spend a semester in post-secondary working with more specific principles. This would mean that composition programs could then create discipline specific classes for all areas of post-secondary instruction. This second semester composition class could be postponed until the student had decided upon a major and then base the instruction on writing for the career field (e.g. Business Writing, Composition for Nurses). This would allow students to enter the work force, if not their advanced major courses, with a basic knowledge of how to write for their discipline. Therefore, the work force would find new graduates who had a more in-depth knowledge of how to write for the discipline they were working in and companies would not have to spend additional resources teaching new employees what they should have learned in college.

Rhetoric in post-secondary composition education

Facets of rhetoric that should be taught (rhetorical concepts)

Three Types of Rhetoric

Syllogisms, Enthymemes and Logical Problems

Antiphon’s method of teaching

Plato’s Phaedrus

Corax’s Doctrine of General Probability

Why it would be taught at this level

Three Types of Rhetoric: This should be taught at the post-secondary level since in my mind, the material students are being taught at the secondary level prepares them to write in general. With the amount of rhetoric that should be taught at the secondary level there can be a more specific focus on teaching argumentation at the post-secondary level. Therefore, while students can be taught to research and argue a point, the specifics of argumentation should be saved for the post-secondary level so that students have mastered some of the more general rhetorical lessons (much as they would in the Greek and Roman periods) and can now move into the more specific aspects of writing and argumentation.

Syllogisms, Enthymemes and Logical Problems: At the current time, the logic that arguments need to follow tend to become a brief discussion of the fallacies students should avoid when they write. However, this alone is not enough and college composition instructors should focus also on teaching logic and logical styles when they teach fallacies. At the post-secondary level students are more prepared to comprehend these ideas. Also, since I feel teaching at the college level should turn more to argumentation and less to review of secondary school skills, teachers would have more time in classes to devote to these styles and methods.

Antiphon’s method of teaching: While this is not a style of rhetorical writing, it is a method that should be used in post-secondary education. In asking students to write an argument from both points of view aids in teaching them the necessity of counterarguments in their writing.

Plato’s Phaedrus: The point that Plato makes within the dialogue–that a good argument, regardless of the position it takes, can sway an argument would work well when taught in conjunction with argumentation units so that students could see the need to include both sides of the argument and the need for strong refutation in their writing. Also, Plato’s demonstration that rhetoric aids a person in comprehension as well as persuading his listeners. These are both skills that a writer needs to comprehend before they enter the “real world” but they are a bit too complex to be taught at the secondary level where students should be fine tuning their more general writing skills.

Corax’s Doctrine of General Probability: Once more, this is a method that needs to be taught with argumentation so that students understand more of the logic required within a paper as well as how they must support their side of the argument so that readers are accepting that as the proper side to take.

Benefit to the student if this material was taught at this level

By focusing post-secondary instruction on these more specific rhetorical concepts, students would have a chance to better their writing in areas more applicable to the workforce. The current layout of college composition has students working to write essays that range from personal narratives to expositions on random topics throughout the range of their entire first semester. Then, during the second semester, students begin to focus on argumentation. Therefore, for the student it seems that the entire first semester is nothing but a waste of time. If composition were redesigned so that college composition focused solely on writing argumentation and writing for an audience, students would have a chance to begin understanding how writing relates to their lives in general as well as to their chosen career. This, ultimately, would allow students the chance to take more interest in their courses since they would not be putting little effort into a “useless” course.

Benefit to society at large (why this matters to the “real world”)

When society begins to create better writers in school, they are creating better citizens. College graduates enter the workforce with a better idea of how to write. However, they also enter society with a better ability to comprehend and analyze important matters. Aristotle’s four advantages to studying rhetoric in a democratic society are still valid in our modern society. Aristotle posits that rhetoric teaches us how to:

1. perceive the difference between truth and falsehood
2. understand how people are moved to action
3. see both sides of an issue
4. defend ourselves against the arguments of others

When graduates enter society with these abilities, they are able to make better decisions throughout their lives. These students would have the ability to choose the better political or job candidate because they would have the ability to see through the pathos appeals in the speeches. They would be able to sway people to join a cause once they had analyzed it to determine that the cause was just and noble. Finally, they would have the background to see the weaknesses in arguments against themselves and protect themselves from slander or faulty arguments through refutation instead of through lawsuits.

Originally, the progymnasmata was used in Ancient Greece to imbue students with the knowledge they needed to become effective orators. It consisted of fourteen specific exercises:

1. fable
2. tale
3. saying
4. proverb
5. refutation
6. confirmation
7. commonplace
8. encomium
9. invective
10. comparison
11. characterization
12. description
13. thesis
14. law

Now, it is easy to see how these exercises build upon one another in difficulty, but they were designed to do much more than that. Students began with these exercises at home working with a private tutor (about the equivalent age of grammar school students) and worked with the exercises through their college years. But it’s much more difficult than it looks; students were not just told to write a fable and then left to write that (as some teachers tend to do in this day and age), but it was rather a process that built slowly to the student’s writing of fable.

First, the student was presented with the genre which had to then be named, defined and divided into subtypes by the student. This section of the assignment allowed students to gain a better grasp on the genre they were working with (such as fable).

Once the student had a grasp on the full span of this genre, they were provided with an “art” for invention of this genre to study. Much as today’s students are taught clustering, mapping and outlining, ancient scholars were taught ways to invent specifically for the genre they were working with.

Once students had a grasp on the genre and the invention, they were taught criteria for evaluating sample productions of the genre. Here, in my opinion, lies the beginning of the most important steps of the progymnasmata. Students need to comprehend the aspects of good writing in any genre, so for me, this is one of the most important steps in the process.

After teaching students how to analyze genre writing to determine good from bad examples, students were provided with a model from the genre they were working with.So, continuing with the fable genre, we could say that students were assigned a reading of one of Aesop’s fables. With this model, students studied the model through a variety of exercises including:

1. Reading
2. Paraphrasing
3. Transliteration (translating into a second language)
4. Memorization and recitation
5. Correction of the paraphrasing and recitation

Only once the students could prove their understanding of the model and demonstrate their ability to complete the exercises were the students allowed to delve into writing their own version of the genre.

So, the key to these exercises was not merely to have students write within the genre, but to have students pay close attention to the details and nuances of the genre so that each genre made a lasting impression on their rhetorical and oratory abilities.

Again, special thanks to the BYU Silva Rhetoricae and J. David Fleming’s “The Very Idea of a Progymnasmata”