Prelude: The Chipmunk Connection - Moravian College
Prelude: The Chipmunk Connection - Moravian College Prelude: The Chipmunk Connection - Moravian College
Photo by John Kish IV 14 MORAVIAN COLLEGE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2010
Not Your Mother’s Freshman Comp Moder n English101 is more process, less rhetoric. By Joel Wingard First-year writing—or freshman composition as it used to be called—is the most widely required course in American higher education. Since a course of this type was first taught at Harvard in the 1870s, its main purpose has been to introduce students to the practice of academic writing—the kinds of writing students are likely to encounter throughout their college careers. Some 135 years later, the methods of teaching this course have changed considerably. A major force in making first-year writing what it is today was the process movement, which recognizes that most good writing, especially good academic writing, follows a process that involves inventing ideas, arranging them for expression, trying out that expression in an early draft, and then revising and editing until a paper is “finished.” Older models of instruction in first-year writing assigned students regular “themes” in which apprentice writers were expected to demonstrate competence in “rhetorical modes” such as narration, description, comparison, and argumentation. These papers were typically due, in finished fashion, one week after an assignment was given or even at the next class meeting. And the evaluation of student writing most often focused on its correctness in terms of grammar, spelling, and writing mechanics, such as punctuation. But in the 1970s and ’80s that method began to change as teachers and composition scholars realized that rhetorical modes were artificial and that no one—other than a first-year writing student—ever purposely wrote to demonstrate competency in comparison-and-contrast, for instance. Studies in the writing practices of professional writers have shown that written prose is driven by the purposes of the writer and the needs of the audience, and that it often takes several drafts of an essay with the attendant revision to each draft—to make it what the writer wants and what the reader needs. An influential book by composition scholar Peter Elbow, Writing Without Teachers, in the early 1970s contributed to a shift in writing teachers’ roles from “sage on the stage” to “guide on the side.” Instead of being a classroom figure who tells students what to do and how well they have done, the writing teacher now facilitates student development by coaching the writing process. This involves providing feedback—not just grades—to student writers as they work on an essay: talking over a student’s ideas for an essay before she ever sits down at her keyboard; commenting on a preliminary draft so that the student can make revisions herself; creating writing groups in a class and guiding them in “writerly” ways of reading each other’s work; and perhaps most especially, attending to deeper matters of a piece of writing—structure, development, consistency—and leaving attention to correctness until the piece is nearly finished. It follows that the students’ writing is the central text in the class: student writing is what is primarily practiced, produced, and studied. Any other writing, such as essays by professional writers, is secondary and used only to exemplify writing strategies or provide intellectual context for the students’ work. First-year writing courses are writing courses, not literature or history or political science courses in disguise. Traditionally, first-year writing was taught by English faculty members, based on the premise that their training in the belletristic canon gave them responsibility for student literacy. In recent years, however, many small liberal arts colleges “decentralized” first-year writing beyond the English Department. At Moravian, this occurred with the institution of the Learning in Common (LinC) curriculum in 2001. A typical semester at Moravian would have sections of Writing 100 (the required course) taught by biologists, psychologists, musicians, political scientists, economists, mathematicians— in short, faculty from a variety of disciplines other than English. Now, first-year students can see that writing is an important way of knowing in every academic field, not just in English. The teaching of first-year writing continues to evolve. Starting in fall 2011, the course will be called First-Year Seminar. The crossdisciplinary model will continue, but the faculty members who teach the class also will serve as academic advisors to the students enrolled in their sections. This makes sense because the approach to teaching this course encourages close student-faculty interaction anyway, and a first-year writing student often gets closer to his instructor than a student in a lecture or lab course might. And the notion of “writing” itself is broadening and changing to include digital media and genres, so one would expect to see not just print essays developed in first-year writing, but audio essays and video mash-ups as well. Even with these anticipated changes, the process approach continues to be well suited to helping students develop the clear thinking and clear writing they will need throughout their college years and beyond. W Joel Wingard is professor of English and director of the Writing-across-the-Curriculum Program. Taught by faculty members of all disciplines, Moravian’s Writing 100 develops writing skills that students will use througout college and beyond. Shown: Jennifer Gillard ’07 SUMMER 2010 MORAVIAN COLLEGE MAGAZINE 15
- Page 1 and 2: SUMMER 2010 Moravian Words Count Mo
- Page 3 and 4: summer 2 Prelude: The Chipmunk Conn
- Page 5 and 6: The Chipmunk Connection By Lois Bru
- Page 7 and 8: June Guitar Classic Classical guita
- Page 9 and 10: Transformation of Collier Hall Begi
- Page 11 and 12: LETTER FROM THE PRESIDENT Warm gree
- Page 13 and 14: oyce Hinnefeld, associate professor
- Page 15: of Matches and The Anthologist, whi
- Page 19 and 20: that, though, they are friendly, as
- Page 21 and 22: dedicated Precious to her sister Ca
- Page 23 and 24: Alumni Weekend Where were you Alumn
- Page 25 and 26: transitions Look for Class Notes On
- Page 27 and 28: Our greatest need The Moravian Scho
Photo by John Kish IV<br />
14 MORAVIAN COLLEGE MAGAZINE SUMMER 2010
Change language