Metablog on Metafiction

These main principles are fundamental to the Freshman Composition course I teach: learner-centeredness, high expectations, flexibility, and, most importantly, authentic audience and purpose. Learner-centeredness is an idea that made immediate sense to me when I was getting a certificate to teach English as a Second Language. If learning is to happen, then the student must be an active participant. Throughout the years, I have seen the effectiveness of this approach. In the composition classroom, the learner centered approach is actualized in community building and warm-up exercises, frequent pair and group work, classroom activities, peer review sessions, and the Socratic method of teaching through questioning.

Read the rest of this entry »

Basically, my philosophy is that purpose must be made explicit, authentic writing should be integrated, process-oriented and collaborative, and both writing and teaching can delight, as well as instruct. Above all else, students must know why writing is important.

Unless students understand what effective writing can do for them in their real lives, writing assignments will remain little more than busy work, artificial assignments to prove that they have read and understood a text or mastered a particular form, and compositions courses will be just another hurdle to be surmounted on their way to graduation, instead of one of the most important classes in their careers. Student writers must experience firsthand how clear, exact, detailed, persuasive writing can give them power, yes power, in their academic, professional and even personal lives. Read the rest of this entry »