28. PhD Candidate in Creative Writing and Literature. Loves cyborgs and zombies, sewing, steampunk and cosplay. Horror movies. Wants to be R. L. Stine when she grows up.
I suffer from Sacred Subject Syndrome (SSS). My favorite topics: zombies, cyborgs, fairy tales, Greek mythology, magic realism, Japanese culture, Ireland, and ghosts are all subjects I cannot write about. If I love it too much, I can't seem to write about it. I'm afraid of something but I don't rightly know what I'm afraid of--the grammarian in me can't end on a preposition although I very well know that in some cases it is acceptable.
Similarly, I suffer from Triple-S when teaching as well--although my students seem to think this is greatest class ever so far, I can't help but agonize over the schedule, what I've had to leave off, how much reading I'm making them do, and whether or not discussion is going well--even when the room is abuzz with the sound of student voices (which is typically a good and happy noise).
I can't seem to relax--although I fake relaxation very well. I realize I promised I wouldn't fake it for people ever again, but this is one instance where I think faking it is the wisest road, because if I'm not confident in the subject material, then the students are going to feel like this is a throwaway class. It's like I'm commanding troops and they're my little soldiers of wisdom. If the commander doesn't believe in the cause, then who's sticking around for the war? So I gots to be confident as a mofo. But in general, teaching content is so much different than teaching a writing workshop. I feel like the responsibility and power is unnerving.
I thought I'd chronicle the teaching strategies I employ throughout the semester, even the unsuccessful ones, as a kind of journal to myself (and others who may benefit from ideas).
The Challenge: The First Day
Activity: The Anti-Ice-Breaker
I hate ice-breakers. Especially Writing 140 ice breakers (Two truths and one lie? I'm going on a picnic? Laaaaaame.) These people are in college and I should treat them like adults. So after we went through the nitty-gritty, like the syllabus, I had them make cocentric circles. The inner circle of students faced the outer ring of students. I asked three questions. For the first question, the outer circle had one minute to respond. After the minute was up, the inner circle had one minute. Then they switched partners by sliding to the left. They repeated this process for the next two questions (except on the final question, I had students slide two partners over to try to get at least halfway around the circle).
The questions I asked were:
Why are you taking this class?
What are your fears or concerns about this class?
What topics are you most excited to explore in this class?
The Response:
I got some really interesting feedback. I repeated the question and asked students to just shout out what they heard and I wrote it down. To #1, "Because we're geeks" was the first response and everyone giggled and then I said, "Sweet! Me too!" and they laughed as I wrote it down. Other responses included: they were excited about the subject material, they were excited about the medium (because you don't get to read comic books for class, like, ever). Someone else said, "Maybe we should just put 'geeks' up there again," so I wrote: geeks x2.
To question no. 2, I got some really honest concerns that I thought were really good things to address the first day. My two favorites were: having to read a book in a week and having really high expectations for the class, but then the class not meeting those expectations.
To address the first concern, I said that I'm not going to judge anyone or mark anyone down if they weren't able to read the whole book. But that I do expect them to make an effort to read as much as they can and come to class prepared to discuss what they were able to read. Then, by the following class, try to make up what they couldn't accomplish. I also said that I tried to top-load Tuesdays since they have 5 days between classes, so most of the reading is done for Tuesday and Thursday is a lighter load. But then I said, "Just be honest. If you didn't read it, like I said, you're not going to get marked down as long as you're prepared to discuss what you did read. But if you're uncomfortable or embarrassed, then, seriously. Just bullshit your way through and finish it by Thursday." I think I shocked them by saying, "bullshit," -- I think I said it twice actually.
Anyway, as for the second concern, I was just honest. I told them that that was one of my concerns, too, and I even said, "I probably shouldn't confess this to you since I'm in a position of authority here, but I agonized over the syllabus and course schedule. I spent approximately 56 hours creating it and refining it. And that is part of the reasons why you're doing Literary Critique Presentations--because originally those articles were all on the schedule and that was about 20 more articles that everyone had to read and I realized that the class I had put together was extremely unrealistic. But now, you're just responsible for one article and you can present it to the class and hopefully use that article for one of your projects, that way none of the work you do is arbitrary and it's always writing that will help you accomplish a goal."
The third question was fun because they're excited to explore constructions of gender, race and class in these texts. (And they're particularly excited about zombies and Sailor Moon.)
Why I Did It:
Well, I already said I hate ice-breakers, so that's one reason. The other reason why I chose this kind of activity was because I wanted to make sure the students were engaged in the subject matter of the course from the very beginning. Plus, I wanted to set a standard that students are getting up and out of their chairs from the very first class, because it makes it easier to expect them to get up and out of their chairs later on in the semester if the standard has been set.
The Second Day Challenge: Teaching Content For the First Time. Ever.
Activity: The Gallery
I have taught an intro to argumentative writing class for three years which is run like a workshop, so making the switch to lecture was... so... extremely bizarre to me. And fuckin'. Stressed. Me. Out. But then I realized that a lot of my literature classes (my favorite ones anyway) had a large discussion component to them and that maybe I could incorporate class discussion as a teaching method--that way I'm playing more to my workshop wheelhouse instead of trying to boldly go where no Jilly has gone before. Plus, I think discussion makes students responsible for their own learning, and, hopefully, responsible for each other's learning as well.
I assigned two articles to read for the second day of class. "Monster Culture (Seven Theses)" by Jeffrey Jerome Cohen and Chapter One: Perverts and Parasites from Judith Halberstam's Skin Shows. When they arrived to class, I said, "I know I said I was going to treat you like adults, and I realize I'm handing out paper and crayons right now, but, just go with me on this one." I had two boxes of crayons (24 colors each) and once everyone had selected two crayons, I said, "I want you to draw an abstract representation of your definition or understanding of monstrosity." One student asked if the drawing had to be about what they thought monsters were before and what they thought monsters were after having done the reading and I said it was purely up to them. Then I gave them a couple minutes to draw.
And then I said, "When you're done with the drawing, I'd like you write a haiku based on what you've drawn."
This really freaked them out. But I was doing these activities along with them and I said, "I realize it's a lot of pressure, but I'm doing this, too. I mean, come on, talk about performance anxiety. The fiction writer has to write a haiku in front of her students?" They kinda laughed and kept at it.
After they were done, I asked that they bring their drawings up and place them face down, because we're going to keep it anonymous for the people who want to be anonymous. Then I asked students to help me tape the drawings to the blackboard and then I invited students to come up and view the gallery.
It was cool, everyone was looking at what was created. And after a couple minutes of looking at the pictures, I started, and I pointed out my picture and read the haiku out loud and explained what I had drawn and why. Then I asked if anyone else wanted to go, and if they didn't want to talk about their own, they could choose someone else's to discuss instead.
The Response:
It was really cool because students would volunteer to go because their picture built upon the definition in someone else's picture. And not all students claimed their work but chose other peoples drawings to discuss. It was really positive. It got them out of their seats for the second day in a row and they seemed really animated and impressed at what they had collectively created.
Why I Did It:
I wanted to put the impoetus upon students to take responsibility for their learning environment early on, without overtly stating, "You are responsible for your own learning." I also think sometimes if we let go of traditional expectations of what a discussion can look like, then it can produce surprising results. So, I started the model--explaining what I drew and why--and then had to trust the students to take the lead in the discussion on their own. Some of the drawings and the haikus were really powerful, and I think this allowed students to express their opinion in a way they may not have been able to express themselves before--which, this time, seemed to yield fruitful results. I was really pleased with this activity, but I wondered if it was a one-shot wonder. Will it have the same impact if I do this again in a couple of weeks? Would it be as cool? Would the second time around cheapen the power of the first experience? These are questions I cannot answer at this time.
Challenge: Filling the Rest of the Class on Day 02
We did The Gallery for probably for 30-45 minutes, but then I still have another 45-60 minutes left (I teach for an hour and twenty-five minutes). Now came the hard part. Actual lecture? I wasn't sure how to start. So I began with a quick explanation of semiotics and then what structuralism means and how setting up binaries is really important to create structures of understanding, and how post-structuralism/deconstructionism starts to pull apart those binaries and that's why monsters are really interesting because--and then a student piped up, "Because they started to blur those boundaries!" as if a light bulb had gone off and I was like, "Exactly."
Then I moved on to what "terministic screen" means, but then to illustrate that entirely, I showed them these two trailers:
First, the original theatrical trailer for The Shining:
Now, a fan-based, parody trailer of The Shining:
I explained that this is what you can do with the same source material, but approaching it with two very different filters, or, terministic screens. They enjoyed the contrast and I think it illustrated the definition very well. So then I went from definition and illustration to allowing them to practice it. So I gave them this image:
I made them do a Fact/Idea list, those of us who teach Writing 140 will know exactly what that is, but for those of us who don't, I made them concentrate on listing facts only in small groups. They weren't allowed to make judgment calls. I went around and listened and looked at their lists. I saw one group called the woman stupid, and I said cross that out because that's not a fact.
We reconvened as a class and I had them tell me the facts they saw and I wrote them down on one side that said Fact. Then, as a class, I asked them what were the ideas motivating those facts and I wrote those down under Ideas, on the opposite side.
They focused a lot on the woman and as I felt the energy begin to stall, I went to one of the facts and I asked, "So who's bed is she on?" And they were all like, "Ooooooh. It's a guy's bed!" Then they started talking about the guy. And then I asked, "How do you know it's a guy? How do you know that she isn't a lesbian?"
So then I used that as an opportunity to talk about how sometimes we are expected to fill in the blanks in culture because we come to images already with a set of preconceived notions. Such as how the idea behind her pose was archetypal "stupid blonde" and "damsel-in-distress-y," then used that as a way to address an idea another student had said and that I wrote down but wasn't really explored that "the pose is obviously fake; she's not really scared of anything." I used that to talk about the gazer/gazed binary and how the woman in the ad could be interpreted to be in control on the gaze of the viewer. Then I asked them to talk about the colors, because they hadn't really addressed those.
And so they started shouting out the colors and then they started shouting out what the colors meant, and once they got to green, a student said, "Green means envy or jealousy." And then another student chimed in and said, "And she's on a pedestal, so you should be envious. Like this is something to achieve." And then the whole class was like, "Woooooah."
And then that's when I said, "That is a great observation. Because think about it... we never would have come up with this reading 20 minutes ago. We definitely had to dig for it."
I had five minutes left, but I let 'em go early.
So far, the class is off to a good start, I think. I had someone e-mail me saying that his roommate is taking the class and that his roommate said the class was so cool that he wanted to register but was afraid that he had missed the first week already. (He registered for the class anyway.) So I have 21 of 25 seats officially filled.
this is brilliant. you've set the bar high as far as documenting your teaching process goes, but I hope you keep doing this.
my one question is how the readings were incorporated into the activities - that was the only thing that wasn't 100% clear. as you discussed the haiku and images, were there "teachable moments"? or was explicit discussion of the reading just not the first priority?
That is such a good question. We didn't have an explicit roundtable of discussion for the readings--which made me very uncomfortable at first because I've never taught this way before. I just let what they read inform our discussion. It fit particularly well when we were doing the The Gallery because some students would bring up the articles on their own and how the article influenced what they drew. Or, if we went to an anonymous picture, I would talk about connections to the articles I saw happening to get the momentum started, but I only had to do that once or twice before students took control.
I'm nervous about Tuesday. They're reading Frankenstein. I'm thinking about using a fishbowl but I have never used a fishbowl before, so there's anxiety whenever a new method is employed.
I'll explain "fishbowl" on Tuesday after I've taught. Because if I explain what it is now, I am afraid I won't actually update and continue to write about the teaching process. And writing about this is something I really want to make sure I continue to do. I think it'll help me reflect on what has been covered already and what I can improve or what is working. And hopefully I'll be able to use this in the future, too. Unless we can finally connect on the phone (we keep missing each other!) then I'll tell you. ;)
How do you think the SSS will affect your dissertation writing? Does your critical project have to connect to your creative one? How are you going to avoid SSS in each section?
charlie said...
Post a Comment