I really appreciate the approach of the this course. Specifically, I agree with the authors' viewpoint that "remedial" students need to be exposed to college-level texts and encouraged/shown how to interact with text rather than simply decoding for meaning. I further like the position of the instructor in a Facts, Artifacts and Counterfacts class. Here, the professor functions as facilitator of class discussion. She keeps records, writes discussion notes on the board and asks questions to prompt additional discussion. She does NOT tell students what to see, what to think, what to say, how to react. In a way, she doesn't do a whole lot because the "teaching" comes from the students' own observations, critiques and analyses. In reality, of course, the instructor isn't a bump on a log but a very active participant by way of choosing texts, asking the right questions, moving discussion and metacognition forward, assigning and responding to prompts, etc. From the students perspective, however, the instructor will appear quite hands off. Much like Prof Roberge, eh?
Perhaps I haven't fully digested the material, but for the most part I was really on board with this class. At least, I didn't have some of the early and serious reservations as I had (and still have) with Discovery of Competence. Some initial concerns are how these instructors would tackle the issue of students who really aren't prepared to respond in writing to their reading. If they are teaching the bottom 5% of all students, I would expect some students in each class who turn in writing that is jumbled/difficult to decipher. Is grammar and sentence-level practice provided at all? I just don't know if, at the remedial level, you can *really, truly* get rid of "this is a sentence" instruction entirely. I'm willing to be convinced, though. Anyone want to convince me? (Update: I wrote this entry before finishing Ch 3, which does explain that the instructors tackle grammar head-on, they just wait until later in the semester to do so. Their reasoning is that students first need to care about what they are writing before they can care about having done it in correct standard written English, which seems like a fair assessment. I rather like that the grammar instruction flows from class discussion of representative papers, and the idea that students can work in pairs to correct/edit each other's work while an instructor moves around the class to help).
A second concern is a tonal complaint. I just didn't like the phrasing of some of the writing prompts.
"Would you go on, after that, to talk about whatever in the chapter seems most important or most significant to you? And would you be sure to explain why you choose what you do?" (23)
I get that Bartholomae and Petrosky want to de-mystify writing and to get students to engage with the readings, and a more formal phrasing for this question could potentially scare students away from that goal. Nevertheless, "And would you be sure to explain..." to me sounds like talking down to the students. It's borderline patronizing. I thought the point was to treat remedial students like adults, and if they can handle college-level reading, can't they handle a more adult-sounding prompt? I propose. "Please be sure to explain why you choose what you do." This is a writing class, and this is an assignment. There's no need to act like we're politely requesting their participation, pretty-please...is there?
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