All three schools of thought are important in order to stop the pendulum swinging from one extreme to the other. Also, students level and motivation are important here. ESL students who are capable of going into a class that teaches academic writing across the curriculum, should be in that class. Not every ESL student is on the same level. There was a time when I needed to emulate/imitate either the great romantic imaginative writers and/ or the disciplined academic writers. Its all a process whether its controlled, traditional, or the process approach. So I don't get it when they refer to one as a process approach and the other as simply controlled or traditional. It's all a process that has to be internalized in order to write as a disciplined student. I think the controlled and traditional versions are important for college adult writers who are not native English speakers. They are older and the writing process has to be consciously controlled for an internalization process to take place in the race pace of college life. That's how I see it. This argument, however interesting, is ridiculous. All three approaches are important and relative, just like everything in life. This said, I agree- a writing approach that just focuses on a student expressing his/ her personal and emotional feelings and thoughts is not preparing a student for college. That's all good in the beginning stages. A student must eventually learn the discipline of academic writing for certain core courses or majors. Even when I wrote a critical essay in poetry, I wrote it for an academic audience. I had to learn this, I didn't know how to write like this, and couldn't write like this till I was in college for around three years. It's a gradual process. I find it interesting that none of these studies talk about the individual's pace. That's the real issue-how someone arrives at some information at a slower pace but no less intelligent, actually sometimes even more intelligent, but pace is the issue here. Schools, teachers, and the system as a whole do not give many students the time they need to understand the information. It's all about progress at a fast pace; that's why standardized testing is popular. It's also popular because of the big bucks it brings in.
On a personal note, I enjoyed writing for the humanities and about fiction much more than I did for the sciences. I have an active imagination and felt my tongue on a leash whenever I had to write for the sciences back in the day when I was a B.A. student. I didn't enjoy it. However, whether I'm writing for the arts or sciences, it's a process.
blogs re: MA language and literacy program-how to teach reading and writing
Studies are meant to look at large groups of people. Personal narratives talk about individual experiences. But personal experience is just that an individuals account of their own situation which does not reflect others' situations. We cannot create curricula based on some individual's experience. We need to account for different people with different needs
ReplyDeleteI just finished reading an interesting article "The Pleasures of Imagination." It fit in well with the other articles I read for my TIP. The author writes that Americans main activity is spent doing something unreal, like reading, watching movies or online porn. In fact, he says individuals "spend more time viewing Internet porn than with actual women and they spend more time watching shows about friends than being with actual friends." Another reason, I think, people live vicariously is due to familiarity or to seeing someone on a regular basis. We become less sensitized to people we know well or see all the time and therefore, its easier to feel sympathy for unknown characters in a book or movie; however, the good thing is, that this empathy could remind us of our loved ones and then tranferred over to them. Another point, Bloom says that we can learn from books or movies. For example, if we watch a film about the 80s, we can learn about how people talked then, what they ate, and how they swore, etc. I think we can all agree on that. On the other hand, Bloom says that people can take these unreal worlds too far. As when Ireland's tourist industry boomed after the viewing of the Da Vinci Code, because people believed the Holy Grail site really existed there. If you'd like to read more, the article can be found online. I recommend it.
ReplyDeleteSomeone asked why my blog is called blooper and I'll answer that question with a poem I wrote in memory of my dog Blooper:
ReplyDeleteMoon Dog Run
Blooper runs along the moon
making mischief, takes a bite.
he grips, grrrrowls, tugs, and chips it slight, while his tail signals with delight.
his panted trails of powdery moonbeams
litter the night speckles bright.
Blooper breathpaints the universe
then tries to bury like a bone.