Teaching Reflection Week 14

Thanksgiving is next week, and when we come back from Thanksgiving break, we have dead week and finals week before the end of term. That frantic energy of holiday excitement combined with the particular anxiety this semester has brought has combined to form an unease that my students can feel in the classroom. Navigating that unease has been part of my responsibilities as a learner-centered teacher.

Teaching Reflection Week 11

​The last couple of weeks have been a unique challenge because students, especially first-year students, are facing more difficulty this semester than seemingly any semester prior. The ongoing pandemic may no longer be ushering us into virtual classrooms, but it continues to impact us in unforeseen ways. Students are exhausted, struggling, having a more challenging time focusing, and operating at lower energy levels than I’ve ever seen first-year students operate. 

Teaching Reflection Week 7

We’re approaching the middle of the semester, and mid-term grades were due today. The past two weeks have encompassed our second unit in Composition 101—textual analysis. Their final draft is due next week.

Teaching Reflection: Week 5

Now that we are five weeks into the semester, we've settled into a routine. We had a rocky start to the semester with the unknowing that a rise in COVID-19 cases brought, lack of clarity from the administrative regarding our campus plan, and the impact of Hurricane Ida. Having two weeks free from those additional external complications helped a lot in terms of setting expectations and building a classroom space that is welcoming and inclusive.

Teaching Reflection: Week 3

The last two weeks have felt overwhelming and challenging, with Hurricane Ida making landfall the weekend before Week 2 of our sixteen week semester.

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An Introduction to The Anti-Racist Writing Workshop by Felicia Rose Chavez

Chavez writes in the preface, "Here is my own testament, my own movement, a blueprint for a twenty-first-century writing workshop that concedes the humanity of people of color so that we may raise our voices in vote for love over hate" (xii). 

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Fully Online and Hybrid Writing Instruction by Beth Hewett

In Hewett's chapter about online and hybrid writing instruction, they begin by engaging a historical view of literacy education. Beginning in Greece and Rome, they outline rhetoric passed orally from teacher to student and the teaching processes of philosophers like Socrates. 

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Teaching the OWI Course by Scott Warnock

In "Teaching the OWI Course," Warnock opens his chapter with a question that applies to any pedagogy-specific principles, How do instructors teach writing online well? Guided by that question, Warnock's chapter considers five OWI principles focused on pedagogy

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Teaching Writing as a Process - Donald M. Murray

In Donald M. Murray's "Teach Writing as a Process Not Product," Murray implores us to abandon our traditional English training where we operate in a way that is entirely product-centered. 

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A Guide to Composition Pedagogies: An Introduction

Taggart, Hessler and Schick's text, A Guide to Composition Pedagogies, opens up their introduction with a definition of Pedagogy. 

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Teaching Reflection: Week 1

I'm processing week 1 of Fall 2021 as I write this reflection post. Being back on campus in person is a surreal experience. You can feel the vibrations of energy spread across the campus as students masked faces and wide eyes pepper the landscape.

Mask up!

Engaging students from different backgrounds in classroom community and policies.