Academia: March 2008 Archive Page

Here's how I've been spending my time lately.  It's after 8pm Sunday, and I've been at work since I handed my kids off to my wife this morning right after church. 

Tomorrow morning I drop this baby off in the Provost's office.

The question is... should I add this photo to the front cover or not?

English
Program
Review
Self-Study

 

2007-08

Seton Hill University

 

A chunk of pages got caught in the hole punch, and when I pulled them out the bottom of the hole punch opened up and all these little paper dots went flying in the copy room.

As an undergraduate, I started filling a jar with paper dots, and I told myself that I'd start earning a living off my writing before I filled the jar. (I met that goal, if you can call being a starving grad student earning a living. I might even still have the half-full jar of paper dots somewhere.)

There is still work to be done on the program review, but now I get to head off to New Orleans with one less thing on my mind.

I've been making an extra effort this year to create some new worksheets designed to teach basic, stand-alone concepts in my Introduction to Literary Study class.

Here's a new worksheet to help students write a sonnet.  Below is the part they're actually supposed to submit... after that I've included the text that explains the assignment. I've already taught the basic form of the sonnet, so this is a review, but I tried to make it stand on its own.  My goal is to teach the form, rather than to encourage or reward creative expression, but I also want students to have fun.

Suggestions?  Comments?

Workbook 2-2: Write a Sonnet                                           Name ____________________________
(Bring printout to class.)

This is a poem that I wrote; Eye Contact published it a few issues ago.

 

Your retro, old-skool little song enshrines The unrelenting jackboot five-stress beat Of heel-toe thumping heel-toe bumping feet In fourteen rigid rhyming goose-step lines. What talent's there? I'll never march; I swarm! I curse your foolish rules, your chains that bind, That dare to organize my off-beat mind; For truly I don't need no steenkin' form. Why pack and prune, revise, rework, rephrase My unproof'd laundry list of angst or hate? In beatless bliss I'll blurt and bloviate And vent my emo vices in cafés. From boxy vises freed, such verse as mine Shall flow like so much screw-top Wal-Mart wine.

Scan the poem (identify the rhyme scheme and stress pattern). (Write on this page.) Note the "turning point" and identify the new idea. (Write on this page.) Identify the "main point" driven home in the final couplet. (On this page.) What can you conclude about the relationship between the imaginary speaker of the poem, and my own intentions as the author of the poem (and a teacher who asks students to write sonnets)? (Answer in a brief paragraph on the back.)

 

Part IIa:  Present your own original sonnet in the grid. You may write on a printout, or edit this file.

Part IIb:  Write a short paragraph (on the back) that explains how your poem demonstrates your knowledge of prosody (see Hamilton) and your ability to apply that knowledge in an original creative work. Explain any deliberate deviations from iambic pentameter.

Blackboard, a company that sells popular course-management software, recently won a $3.1 settlement against Desire2Learn.  According to Slashdot,

Blackboard has been granted a patent that covers a single person having multiple roles in an LMS: for example, a TA might be a student in one class and an instructor in another. You wouldn't think something this obvious could even be patented, but so far it's been a very effective weapon for Blackboard, badly hurting Desire2Learn and generating a huge amount of worry for the few remaining commercial LMSs that Blackboard has not already bought, and open source solutions such as Moodle (Blackboard's pledge not to attack such providers notwithstanding)."

However, according to Desire2Learn,

On March 25, the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office issued its Non-Final Action on the re-examination of the Blackboard Patent. We are studying the document, found here, but in short, the PTO has rejected all 44 of Blackboard's claims.

At a workshop next week at the 4Cs, I'm presenting a half-hour on intellectual property and ethics, in an attempt to get users of off-the-shelf course management tools to think about what it means when they give an outside corporation so much control over the content of their courses.  (I'm guilty of this, too, since I use Turnitin.com a lot, so my intention is not to scold but rather raise questions; Mike Edwards will then introduce some open-source alternatives to commercial software.)

Mike Edwards describes his first time teaching Bartleby the Scrivener:

I stole the idea for my lesson plan from a colleague, who'd used it to great success. Minor modifications on my part, but it went like this: for homework, I'd asked them to read the story in its entirety, and told them to be prepared to lead discussion in class today, and to come to class with notes on motivation and action in the story to help them do so.

I brought my laptop to class, which I'd never done before. (Each classroom has its own dedicated computer.) I set it up on my desk. In the seconds before class started, I said to them something like this: "You've just read a story in which someone, with a screen between him and the other characters, fails to do what they expect of him, and in violating the expectations customary to their relationship, causes disruption and concern."

And that was All. I. Said.

So I'm sitting at Julie's place, right, having some rather delicious cherry M&Ms (which my momma could alphabetize in her belly!), when she pops up this blog by Dennis Jerz wherein I spy this quote, in response to Jeff Rice:

So students who can only remix don't get practice thinking critically about culture -- and it's certainly possible to recognize remix culture and design assignments that ask them to think critically about it, without rejecting it out of hand as plagiarism.

I hate to take up the position of the Jeopardy judge and simply say "bzzzzzz, wrong!" but... that's just wrong.

And I don't mean to hurl an insult at Dr. Jerz, but... this is a case of looking in at something from the outside (I would assume, based on the admission later in the post that Jerz knows little about music) attempting to critique something without ever getting the insider's perspective.

I would argue the exact opposite of the first portion of the quote (before the dash). But let's also be realistic; if Jerz has encountered, or thinks he will encounter, a student who can only remix, he's failed to keep track of public high schools in America.

Where to start with this one?  The "about" page says "Who am I? I'm just a guy. I've got a story like everyone."   The author claims to be "someone who spent four years teaching--and three prior to that as a TA/writing tutor--at an open admissions college" but that doesn't really help me figure out whether I am writing to a grad student who is struggling to figure out the professional landscape, a very bright undergraduate who could use some gentle instruction in tone and focus, or a professional college instructor who should know better.

Here is the comment I posted...

"that's just wrong."

Could you clarify what part of my statement you mean? Are you reacting against the part where I say "students who can only remix don't get practice thinking critically about culture," or the part where I say that it *is* possible to design remix assignments that ask them to think critically?

"And I don't mean to hurl an insult at Dr. Jerz, but..."

Let's have a conversation instead, shall we?

"he's failed to keep track of public high schools in America. Every student who makes it through that system with any success--meaning 95% of our trad students--will know how to write a five paragraph essay."

I regularly teach freshman who are fresh out of high school, and I know for a fact they can't all write a five-paragraph essay -- because if they could, they would not be in my "Basic Composition" class, they would all be in "Seminar in Thinking and Writing" (I think about a third of our students skip Basic Comp, not 95%). Perhaps the public schools where you are are much better than those where I am, or perhaps we simply disagree over what level of writing counts as acceptable. Regardless, I applaud any effort to break students out of the high-school five-paragraph-essay box, and I won't dismiss your conclusions as "wrong" simply because the experiences that inform them differ from mine.  I will, instead, ask you to clarify.

For the record, here is the thesis of my blog entry:

"It's true that one's own ideas only come after one has filtered through many other ideas. I think the problem I see in the classroom is that students find it difficult to trace details back to the source."

And here is the conclusion:

"I certainly don't feel that students should never, ever remix -- but if we graduate students who can ONLY remix, and have never been forced to trace an idea back to its source and critique its validity, but instead settle for riffing on it and referencing "www.somehomepage.com" as one of a handful of "Works Consulted," then we are doing them -- and our culture at large -- a great disservice."

Your defense of remix culture is a very good example of the thinking that makes me shake my head. I am not writing against remix; I am writing about a willingness to settle for the creative expressions of personal reactions to a text, without demonstrating the ability and willingness to explore those ideas more fully.

Before I go any farther, let me first state that I recognize that a blog entry is not the same thing as an academic paper. The rhetoric of blogs is rougher, and sometimes the invitation to rumble is what motivates us to post our ideas online.

And I also note that in the remix culture, creating and publishing that initial response can take on the role of the discovery draft, sparking conversations that help the student develop a more accurate, more thorough, more nuanced understanding of an issue.

I'm responding because "What's with the Remix Disrespect" does not merely engage with my ideas; it makes several global statements about my competence, both directly and implicitly, which I find personally distressing. This entry presumes to judge my whole career based on what I wrote in this single blog entry from 2004. It assumes a superior rhetorical stance -- first dismissing the idea of being a game-show judge, then promptly performing exactly that role; then rejecting the idea of hurling an insult, and promptly doing just that.

I find it interesting that in one passage where, instead of taking on the persona of an expert, I prefaced a statement about music by citing my source (since I can't rely on personal knowledge of what classical composers do when they quote each other), that detail surfaces in your blog as evidence of the claim that I am a cultural outsider who can't understand remix culture (which, as you know, involves far more than music).

So... my critique of the remix culture lies specifically in the convention that assumes the author's personal expression of reactions can substitute for investigating the issue.

If you would like to get a greater understanding of my attitude towards the remix culture, I invite you to search my blog for terms such as "remix," "open source," or "modding." I invite you to sample my own remix of Teletubbies and gothic poetry) or some of my found poetry exercises (poems comprised of lines taken from student blogs), or this blogger's account of a 2007 CCCC panel I co-organized, "When Student Experts Remix the Discipline: New Media in the Composition Classroom," or some of my recent articles on the blogosphere, video game history. You might also look at the websites for the courses I teach in Video Game Culture and Theory, or "The History and Future of the Book" or the 400-level studio course I teach in "New Media Projects," or the student work that you'll find via links on those sites.

While your entry refers to "a terrible fear of plagiarism," please note that my blog entry only mentions plagiarism once, in a sentence stating that remix is *not* the same thing as plagiarism -- thus, my only reference to plagiarism *agrees* with your position.

Were I writing this entry today, after four more years of watching the impact of the remix culture, I would not have written "students who can only remix don't get practice thinking critically about culture." I would have said something about how a student who remixes *well* has to understand the raw material, so a good course built around remix will have to include analysis and fact-checking.

They're definitely stressed. They're sleep-deprived. They may be furious (at me!).  But they're still riding the intellectual buzz that comes from finishing a research paper.

I love what happens in the classroom on the day a major assignment's due.  Students come to class after having wrestled a mess of free-write drafts and marginalia and Post-It-Notalia into some semblance of order.  In pursuit of evidence to support their thesis, they've turned to sources that aren't on the reading list, so their comments during class discussions are opportunities for them to introduce new knowledge, rather than a performance for my benefit. 

A similar thing happens in lit surveys on the day of a scheduled quiz. Because the students have spent some time re-reading and reflecting, they've noticed connections they didn't see when they were just trying to mow through the required number of pages.  The part of the class time that's not devoted to the quiz always seems a little livelier.  Yet I find reading quizzes to be confrontational and artificial. Of course, journalism students students do need practice writing under pressure, and there are courses in which the content is so voluminous and complex that regular quizzes can be an important tool for filtering and categorizing. 

So maybe quizzes are a necessary evil, in order to generate that quiz-day discussion buzz... but a quiz doesn't really teach... it doesn't really let me assess much besides quiz-taking ability... a quiz takes time away from discussion (which is what really matters in a seminar). An a quiz adds an artificial time constraint that's antithetical to everything we tell our students about how to read and write critically.  Oh... and I really hate grading quizzes... the students haven't had the time to put much soul into their work, and because they've learned the value of drafting and revising, they know they'd have been able to make their point more convincingly if they'd only had more time.  When I take the time to write prompts that will generate short answers that I'd actually be interested in reading, the short quizzes turn into "quizzams" (a word I use in order to signal to my students that they'll have to think, rather than regurgitate). 

There are other ways to check to make sure students are doing the readings... you can dictate a very general question and have them supply specific examples in a free-write for a few minutes. (The ones who didn't do the reading will spend most of the time flipping through the book -- if they brought it with them.) 

Of course, there are also the students who stay up all night to finish their paper, but are too tired to come to class.  I value the "post-paper buzz" so much that I have in the past added an explicit penalty to a major assignment grade, for students who skipped class on the day the assignment is due.  (That turned out to be more trouble than it was worth... now I just factor the student's decision into their overall class participation grade.)

By the time they've submitted their final draft, I've already seen at least the thesis paragraph and a few pages of quotes, so I can call on students who've already thought in depth about whatever sub-topic gets raised in the discussion.  More hands go up while I'm talking, and more heads nod when a peer makes a good connection. Students expecting to be quizzed come in braced for the unknown. That energy can be put to good use in a pre-quiz review session, but I don't get the idea that the effect is lasting.  On the other hand, students who come to class having just finished a research paper have a sense of accomplishment.

Lindsay Waters, Inside Higher Ed:

[T]he first step to re-establishing the essay as the standard in humanistic writing is to reinvigorate the sentences we write, so that, when one reads an essay, one feels it. One feels it the way one tastes -- and here I'm going global -- a good curry. It really sets you back. Or maybe forward. Style, maniera, modo is what we readers demand. The humanists of the Renaissance knew the Romans had the ability to put sentences that had concinnitas, but that their ancestors in what we call the Middle Ages had lost that ability. When the Ancients constructed the Arch of Constantine, it stayed together for centuries, even though neglected. Concinnity -- what a splendid word!

It seems to me that when bad styling of sentences became accepted, we got used to it. We compensated for the lack of quality and impact of the sentences that people wrote as evidence of their scholarly abilities by asking them for more of them in the hopes we could get the same buzz going that we used to get from fewer sentences. Last year I ran a panel at the Modern Language Association on "Slow Reading," and today I'm advocating slow writing. Editors are in the position to make this change take place.

Chronicle (subscription)

Each year Ms. O'Connell, a former dean of admissions at McDaniel College, in Maryland, gives between 35 and 40 presentations, during which she urges parents to stay calm despite the "scary headlines" they have seen in newspapers.

Ms. O'Connell often tries to reassure students by telling them that if they have conducted a thoughtful search, they need apply to only four or five colleges.

Sometimes that's a tough sell. "You don't see people nodding," she says. "They'll say, 'No, I've got to apply to 12 schools, or else I won't get in anywhere.'"

Jon Boeckenstedt, associate vice president for enrollment management at DePaul University, encounters the same perception. He has spent a lot of time, he says, talking to reporters who want to know why applying to college is so "awful for everyone," or how "nobody can afford it."

"I feel like I'm sort of a buzzkill," he says, "because after I finish talking to them, I've told them they don't have a story."

An excellent article that I'd like to be able to show my journalism students. It isn't common that the story is "there isn't much of a story here." But articles that work against the accepted trends suggest a journalist is thinking independently, rather than following the herd.

Toronto Star:

Avenir said he joined the Facebook group last fall to get help with some of the questions the professor would give students to do online. As the network grew, he took over as its administrator, which is why he believes he alone has been charged.

"So we each would be given chemistry questions and if we were having trouble, we'd post the question and say: `Does anyone get how to do this one? I didn't get it right and I don't know what I'm doing wrong.' Exactly what we would say to each other if we were sitting in the Dungeon," said Avenir yesterday.

He is still attending classes pending his hearing but admits the stress of the accusations is affecting his midterm exam results.

"But if this kind of help is cheating, then so is tutoring and all the mentoring programs the university runs and the discussions we do in tutorials," he said.

This is silly. The university should instead invest its resources on educating faculty about the collaborative learning strategies of today's students, who live in a a very different environment and have different strengths and weaknesses than undergraduates of previous generations. Does Avenir's university have an online tutoring center staffed by grad students who are available to answer questions on weekends and evenings, when undergraduates are likely to be doing their work?

I am regularly amazed at the hive culture students create for themselves, but I've been impressed at the extent to which students will slug away at an exercise if they clearly understand how it will benefit them.

Scott Jaschik (Inside Higher Ed)

At Hunter College of the City University of New York, some professors are asking those questions -- and a Faculty Senate committee is considering a formal complaint about violations of academic freedom -- over a course sponsored last year by the International Anticounterfeiting Coalition (known as the IACC), an organization of companies that are concerned about low-cost knockoffs of their products. The companies involved include some of the biggest names in fashion and consumer goods -- Abercrombie & Fitch, Chanel, Coach, Harley-Davidson, Levi Strauss, Reebok and so forth.

According to the complaints filed with the Faculty Senate, Hunter agreed to let the IACC sponsor a course for which students would create a campaign against counterfeiting in which they would create a fake Web site to tell the story of a fictional student experiencing trauma because of fake consumer goods.

Part of me hopes that the Hunter College incident is part of an art project... I've never heard of the International Anticounterfeiting Coalition, but it has a much bigger web presence than Mothers Against Video Game Violence (a hoax site that I've seen cited in freshman research papers).