Arkansas English Journal

AEJ is an official publication of

the Arkansas Council of Teachers

of English Language Arts, an

affiliate of NCTE

Fall/Winter 2015: 1.1

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Arkansas English Journal

Fall/Winter 2015

Editor:

Dr. Janine Chitty

University of Arkansas Fort Smith

Editorial Board:

Dr. Kay Walter, University of Arkansas Monticello

Sunny Styles-Foster, University of Central Arkansas

Grover Welch, Gosnell Public Schools

Dr. Dixie Keyes, Arkansas State University

Dr. Rob Lamm, Arkansas State University

Dr. Janine Chitty, University of Arkansas Fort Smith

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Arkansas English Journal

Fall/Winter 2015

Call for Submissions

Theme for the Spring/Summer 2016 Issue:

“In the Realm of Advocacy”

Submission deadline: April 15, 2016

AEJ is an official publication of the Arkansas Council of

Teachers of English Language Arts (ACTELA).

ACTELA seeks a variety of submissions based on the

issue theme. Submissions must be original, previously

unpublished work. The AEJ is peer-reviewed by fellow

teachers, ELA educators and professionals. The AEJ will

publish a variety of articles and materials on subjects of

interest to English teachers.

Guidelines for Manuscript Submission:

Manuscripts should be sent by email as an attachment to

ACTELA123@gmail.com. Manuscripts should be no

more than ten to fifteen double-spaced pages in length.

For additional guidelines see the AEJ website:

http://arkansas-english-journal.weebly.com/

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Table of Contents

Engaging Marginalized Voices: A How-To Guide for Using Teaching Rhetorica

in the Writing Classroom

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Let There Be Metaphor: The Inventive Light of Metaphorical Development in

the Writing and Thinking of High School Students

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(Re) Inventing the Hamburger: The (Frustrating) Search for a Reading Comprehension Strategy

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Realizing our Place in the Field and the Field Itself: Why Writing Center

Conferences are Important

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Epic Resonance of Vygotsky 44

Literary Voices of England 48

Thank You, Sam 50

We’ve Got a Ways to Go 53

Advocating for ELA 55

A Serenity Prayer for Teachers 58

Editorial Disclaimer:

The views in the Arkansas English Journal are not necessarily the views of the Editorial Board or ACTELA.

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Justin Cook

Brennah Hutchison

Engaging Marginalized Voices:

A How-To Guide for Using Teaching Rhetorica in the Writing Classroom

Employing feminist pedagogical tactics to meet the critical needs of the composition classroom can be beneficial to a generation of writers learning to confront and defy the conventional standardization of academia; instructors must acclimatize themselves to these alternative perspectives. Kate Ronald and Joy Ritchie’s collection of essays entitled Teaching Rhetorica provides a wide-range of pedagogical scholarship from a variety of feminist scholars that facilitate these aforementioned notions. While the majority of these essays are accessible, they are also theoretical. Within this essay the theories behind four of the anthology’s more inspiring works are reinterpreted for practical use in the compositional classroom. Overall, the anthology’s essays may be chiefly abstract, but their activist theories are reachable, adaptable, and can be easily modified to benefit the composition teacher and her students.

When considering critical strategies to implement in composition, one might not im-mediately consider a feminist approach. The word “feminist” might, initially, leave a prospec-tive instructor thinking that its goals are synonymous with an uprising of oppressed female students. Kate Ronald and Joy Ritchie’s collection of essays from a comprehensive spectrum of feminist scholars provides an interesting and graspable guide to instructing a composition classroom in an era when critical alternatives and identities are now becoming an essential tool for creating good writers. To inspire such a compositional space, Ronald and Ritchie asked these questions of their contributors:

What difference does the emerging canon of women’s rhetorics make to our teaching of writing and rhetoric? How is the recovery of women’s rhetorics translating into re-vised, reexamined theories, practices, and pedagogies of writing, rhetoric, and dis-course—and into revised understandings of ourselves as teachers? (p.2)

These questions lead to thought provoking essays. While most of these works were excep-tionally accessible, they were also, for the most part, theoretical. This is where it was thought necessary to take this anthology a step further and reinterpret four of its more influential es-says to show how to implement the work’s inclusive theme in a composition classroom.

Featured Articles……..

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These essays may be predominantly theoretical, but their unconventional and peda-gogical messages are accessible, applicable, and seek action. As the two anthologists elo-quently state in Teaching Rhetorica’s introduction:

Our impulse to take this pragmatic stance arises directly from what our experience tells are the central uses of women’s rhetoric: it challenges dominant epistemologies, as-serts new topoi/contexts from which to argue, places material experience—especially that of women, women of color, sexual minorities, and other nonmainstream groups—at the center of knowledge formation, and it reconnects language/rhetoric to action and change. (p.11)

Acknowledging and Analyzing “Crimes” of Reading and Writing

This anthology’s first essay, “Crimes of Writing and Reading” by Andrea Lunsford and Lisa Ede (2006), challenged the idea that instructors can control the results of rhetorical prac-tices. The authors wanted to “encourage…students to take risks and to challenge conventional understandings of gender and patriarchy” (p. 29). Alongside these goals the authors also chal-lenged the typically patriarchal notions of agency, voice, authorship, individual genius and orig-inality. They divided their article into two halves: the crimes of writing and the crimes of read-ing.

Among the examples given in the crimes of writing section, Kathy Acker’s rewriting of the works of others stands as the most poignant. Acker’s work has been simultaneously la-beled as criminal plagiarism and heralded as “outlaw intelligence” (p. 18). Acker rewrote clas-sic works and changed any aspect she saw fit, sometimes even changing the characters into parodies of themselves. Acker acted out her theory that “language cannot be owned—particularly by coherent, organic ‘individuals’” (p. 19). She also helped to define a rhetorical space for fringe rhetoricians to exact their revenge against an oppressive and patriarchal sys-tem. In a perhaps more personal way, the crimes of reading did much in the same way of chal-lenging the academic system.

Lunsford and Ede cited multiple examples of the crimes of reading, but largely the most intense one was Azar Nafisi who ran an “underground (and highly dangerous) class on English and American literature” (p. 23). She was not only illegally educating women of her country, specifically on English and American literature, but she was also teaching banned books in this class. Her novel Reading Lolita in Tehran tells the story of her struggle through these anti-Feminist issues. Her willingness to face condemnation and even execution, for educating women, provided the authors with material for this section.

The abstract concepts of crimes of reading can be transformed into practical applica-tion by taking the abstract and making it personal for the student. In order to do so, engage the students in assignments that mirror those of the rhetoricians about whom they are learning. For example, if Kathy Acker and her works are taught then an instructor might ask students to begin by explicating allusions to other literary works and then comparing them to Acker’s work. Having students compile a poem from their favorite quotations, creating a coalesced message or expressing a singular idea without using a single word of their own creation is recommend-ed. Also, students might enjoy simply answering open-ended questions with quotations, or writing their feelings down in song lyrics. These assignments can help students to understand the power of language as well as analyze language for content that is appropriate to the task.

Lunsford and Ede understood that their invitations to their students toward experi-mental writing and reading were risky, but they ultimately resolved that trying to solve or guar-antee the results of any rhetorical practice placed the instructor within the same patriarchal system that they railed against. They also understood that students’ reactions to these “crimes” informed the way in which students were initiated into the academy, mostly through

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no fault of their own. The use of a feminist lens and discourse about power structures can lead to a reduction of previously uneasy feelings students may have with the rules of reading and writing; however, it can also open up an entire new world of possibilities for students and in-structors who actively seek to make a difference.

Shifting the Center of Academic Gravity from Academia to Student

Kathryn T. Flannery’s observation of second-wave, feminist publications between the years of 1968-1975 reveals a problematic point that many feminist pedagogues have to face when try-ing to reinterpret the academy for their own revolutionary and “counterinstitutional” gains. In her essay “Shifting the Center of Gravity: The Rhetorics of Radical Feminist Pedagogy, 1968-1975” (2006), Flannery stressed that one does not have to replace the stratifying bureaucracy that has been instilled in the scaffolding of many universities to achieve such a groundbreaking feat. Many feminist advocates realized that instead of supplanting one pecking order with an-other, the movement should go beyond academia and decided to splinter the rhetoric of the institutional, academic framework by reaching out to one another on an even playing field both in and outside the classroom. Flannery explained, “At its core, radical feminists called into question traditional understandings of ‘woman,’ not to replace one unitary concept with anoth-er, but to fracture traditional and repressive ways of knowing” (p.50). Many feminists saw the rhetorical power of writing and went about employing this by establishing jour nals, magazines, and newsletters.

Although Flannery never suggested a specific pedagogical strategy, her essay could easily inspire a lesson plan in the composition classroom. In order to implement the im-portance of research in a student’s desired field of study, creating zines (personal chapbook/ scrapbook) inspired by a specific topic that concerns their major, can later evolve into material that will be utilized to write their final research/argument essay. Prompting this assignment by allowing them to choose a topic that pertains to their areas of study, and having them research this issue by interviewing faculty members in that specific department, will create a sense of familiarity with their chosen fields. Emphasize the fact that they’re, more or less, creating a canon of information surrounding their thesis and are generating a publication to explain and expound on their unique proposal because there isn’t enough research about it as it is. This will enable students to establish a sense of ethos within themselves because it denotes that they are the authority of their thesis and that it is their job to inform their academic communi-ties of their findings. Asserting the importance of their contribution to an academic conversa-tion will give them an opportunity to show their expertise and gain credibility as scholars.

Understanding the Need for “Dissoi Logoi” in the Composition Classroom

In Beth Daniell’s “Dissoi Logoi: Women’s Rhetoric and Classroom Practice,” (2006) the author has taken a feminist approach to dissoi logoi, or contradicting propositions, and has succeeded in demonstrating the radical nuances of that Greek term, not least among those nuances is the term’s ability to create critical consciousness. This duality opens the reader to Daniell’s claim that the term can be useful when implementing feministic pedagogy, but also calls attention to its rhetorical practicality that can assist composition students in becoming crit-ically aware.

Daniell quoted an adage on multiple outcomes caused by a single event: “And death is bad for those who die, but good for the undertakers and grave diggers’” (p.82). The reader who is critically conscious can digest the rhetorical implications of both perspectives and will understand that one may not be superior to the other. Furthermore, to really internalize the meaning of one outcome, one has to contemplate the significance of the other(s).

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This approach to interpretation is crucial when considering multiple and alternative pos-sibilities. It’s especially central when propagating the validity of the opinions that belong to non-mainstream groups that are in many ways marginalized and have become synonymous with words like “otherness” (p.84). The author mentioned this struggle by citing Western civiliza-tion’s need for “unicity of truth” or “…belief in only one right answer” (p.84). Daniell illustrated the detrimental implications of this belief when she referenced a study done by Carol Gilligan, which measured the development of morality among men and women and how they compared to one another: “Gilligan’s contrary proposition is that women’s moral reasoning is different from, not less developed than” (p. 85). By not considering the perspective differences between the sexes, and the need to label one as being “right” and the other being “wrong,” the other’s reasoning is disregarded completely.

Daniell further illustrated her feministic angle of dissoi logoi when she observed the communicative practices of Al-Anon-a 12-step association that coincides with Alcoholics Anon-ymous. This organization assists women who are recovering from an abusive relationship with an alcoholic. Methods for establishing community among the women of Al-Anon takes the form of sharing books and then discussing them afterward. Disagreeing with one another about how they react to these books is a significant part of their emotional and mental progress. Under-standing that they have more than one opinion or option reiterates the fact that they are not necessarily bound to the life they are accustomed to leading: “they begin to see themselves primarily as competent human beings and spiritual seekers, propositions clearly contrary to the traditional conception of woman or wife” (p. 86)

The implementation that Daniell suggested for dissoi logoi in the classroom is actually something she borrowed from Lester Faigley and not only demystifies the connotations that are normally associated with the word “otherness,” but also relies heavily on giving her compo-sition students authority by empowering them to state their opinions. She begins by assigning her class a response paper. When students present their responses aloud, she requires that they also bring extra copies of this response so the class as a whole can make comments and bring up issues they might have to spark a conversation. She then rereads the response and makes her own remarks. This communal workshop alleviates the power struggle between in-structor and student. It also establishes trust by allowing students to consider each other’s per-spectives when revising their responses and ethos which is gradually acquired through peer review. Logos is inculcated with the differing possibilities that multiple perspectives can infer on a student’s response-by comparing and contrasting the potentials, students can make a critical and well-rounded response.

Another way to adjust dissoi logoi to the composition classroom is by making certain that students establish a strong sense of ethos and pathos among each other. It should be un-derstood that the composition classroom is not meeting grounds for criticizing differing opin-ions, but a place to observe, analyze, and investigate them in a democratic matter. These ob-jectives can be achieved by finding a news article that is a response to a relevant issue. Cut up this article in sections of differing lengths, pass these out to the students, and ask them the following questions:

1. What issue is being spoken of?

2. What stance has the speaker taken?

3. What rhetorical tools has the speaker used to make his or her point?

4. Do you agree or disagree with the speaker? Why?

5. If you do not have enough of the story to form an opinion based on the previous questions, what questions might you ask to better inform yourself?

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After they have had time to read their section and answer these questions, it should be explained that the length given represents the quantity of advantage that one might have in so-ciety. A student who has a larger portion of the story will have a better understanding of the is-sue, the stance that the author has taken, and therefore is more able to form his or her opinion. This is contrary to a student who is given a smaller portion of the text: not only does such a stu-dent have less access to vital information that is pertinent to the article, he or she will also have to make additional efforts to form an opinion. The particular section that the student is given represents the student’s quality and perspective on the matter. A student may receive a shorter section, but that same section might contain the central argument to a particular piece. On the other hand, another student may be given a large portion of the story, but without essential in-formation.

This assignment will instill that the logic of “otherness” is not incorrect logic, but is simply different: different but not deficient. Highlighting that everyone comes from different social, sex-ual, racial, and economic backgrounds underlines the fact that each individual will have differing opinions based on the aforementioned influences that lead to societal compartmentalization. Also, stressing the importance of communal learning: by discussing each other’s sections, per-spectives, questions, and stances on the issue, will lead to a more complete picture of the issue at hand. Students should be able to form a more solid and autonomous opinion as diverse indi-viduals after completing this assignment, as well as developing ethos amongst each other.

Expanding Rhetorical Spaces and Subjects

Marguerite Helmers’ article entitled “Objects, Memory, and Narrative: New Notes To-ward Materialist Rhetoric” (2006) enhances this anthology’s definitions of rhetorical space and action. The anthology itself, while considering open and accommodating definitions of rhetoric and action, was largely focused on the acts of writing, reading or speaking as rhetorical. How-ever, Helmers expanded these categories exponentially.

Helmers began with examples from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum and the Vietnam Veteran’s Memorial wall. She made the claim (from previous scholarship in the fields of materialist rhetoric) that not only are objects able to be rhetorical, but the repurposing of them into new discourses was a rhetorical act. The objects Helmers analyzed (the shoes of Holocaust victims in a museum display case and items left at the memorial wall) become rhetor-ical because “things do speak. Material objects tell stories, hint at lives, remember events, weave into memory” (p. 115). Helmers illustrated her point in two very different ways.

The first way that an object can be rhetorical is through association/memory. When a spectator engages with an object, “the respondent draws on her or his personal history and lived experience to create meaning” (p. 116). Thus the object becomes a signifier of personal responses. To illustrate, Helmers used the example of a soldier’s boots left at the Vietnam Vet-eran’s Memorial wall. They conjured memories of personal experiences either with soldiers or the war and created an internal rhetoric within the spectator. Helmers went as far as to claim that “the object takes on a value as a fetish, representing the lost owner” (p. 119). Since they are most often left with little explanation, “individuals must narrate and present their own pain and memory” (p. 115). The act of leaving these objects in specific places and the way in which they are positioned also plays an important role in the creation of this internal rhetoric, and is the second way in which an object can be considered rhetorical. Helmers explained this as “a redeployment of the object into new contexts” (p. 117). She went on to describe this act as communicative and indicative of a speech act. By leaving a pair of soldier’s boots at a Veter-an’s memorial the rhetorical agent is sending a message, usually one of remembrance and reverence, but nonetheless a message. The person who left the boots there is purposefully cre-ating an emotional appeal that will engage with an onlooker more directly than names on a wall. Here Helmers moved into a discourse about public exhibition which she explained as

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recreating “the objects’ meaning because that object is deployed within a new discourse, that of aesthetics” (p. 114).

Implementation of this object rhetoric can take many forms. Helmers encouraged her students to select an item of personal value to them and to write about it. She even had them bring in their objects and present them to the class with their rationale. However, this theory should be taken a step further. Students will select an item of their choosing, imagine them-selves so famous that a museum is erected in their honor, and then imagine their selected item is placed within that museum. This activity can become a way to teach students the value of audience and tone, as it has significantly changed now that the item has been repurposed. Most concisely, that can be achieved by asking students to write the blurb to accompany this item. They should explain the item’s significance to them. Then, they should reflect on the kinds of reactions onlookers might have upon viewing this item and reading their blurb. It is key to take the time to examine the audience and tone of the reaction to the object in both of its placements. For example, when in the home of the student the tone will be personal and emo-tional and the audience will be only the students and whosoever knows the student personally. However, when in the museum the tone will likely be more reverent and the audience will bring to bear their own meaning. This is also an excellent time to have students evaluate each oth-er’s blurb and if the student is unhappy with how his or her classmates have received the ob-ject, then he or she might rewrite the blurb so that it conveys the proper rhetorical appeal. This assignment can be drawn out or can exist in the timeframe of one class period, but either way it challenges the student’s conception of rhetoric, his or her knowledge of the rhetorical appeals and finally his or her use of such appeals in his or her writing.

In conclusion, Helmers called for writing instructors to implement marginalized rhetorics and framed it through the lens of contemporary feminist discourse which “offers rhetoricians the opportunity to focus on opposition, disruption, and particularity” (p. 120). We agree that the study of object rhetoric can break down traditional rhetorical spaces, lines of stratification and can “infuse the banality of daily life and consumer products with spiritual meaning” (121). Ob-jects are often the sites of any and all rhetorical appeals, which can lead to investigative trans-fer of these appeals into the everyday life of students.

Conclusion

In all, the texts compiled by Ritchie and Ronald bring to the forefront a myriad of previ-ously ignored feminist rhetorics which can provide insight into the modern writing classroom. As generations of students learn to challenge and rebel against the established norming of ac-ademia, instructors must adapt to these new and fresh mindsets. Teaching Rhetorica (2006) establishes a base of operations for the modernizing instructor, or a handbook for integrating and valuing previously oppressed voices into the writing classroom.

The thirteen authors present in this anthology challenge authorship, power, argumenta-tion and spectatorship in writing. They advocate for interruption of hierarchical systems, action that produces change in these systems and the valuation of alternative voices within academia. These authors have expanded rhetorical spaces, usurped common misconceptions about femi-nist pedagogies, and brought to the forefront a host of voices that were previously ignored.

As well as distilling these articles into their most fascinating parts, it is hoped that the examples given are clear and concise implementation techniques for the modern instructor of writing. Women’s rhetorics can provide a pedagogical tool belt with which instructors can begin to repair the cracks in sometimes failing writing classes, whose leaks in pedagogical theories tend to overwhelmingly exclude marginalized identities.

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References

Daniell, B. (2006). Dissoi logoi: Women’s rhetoric and feminist pedagogy in the writing class-room. In Kate Ronald and Joy Ritchie (Eds.), Teaching rhetorica: Theory, pedagogy and practice (83-92). Portsmouth, NH: Boynton/Cook.

Flannery, K. (2006). Shifting the center of gravity: The rhetorics of radical feminist pedagogy, 1968-1975. In Kate Ronald and Joy Ritchie (Eds.), Teaching rhetorica: Theory, peda-gogy and practice (48-65). Portsmouth, NH: Boynton/Cook.

Helmers, M. (2006). Objects, memory and narrative: New notes toward materialist rhetoric. In Kate Ronald and Joy Ritchie (Eds.), Teaching rhetorica: Theory, pedagogy and practice (114-130). Portsmouth, NH: Boynton/Cook.

Lunsford, A., Ede, L. (2006). Crimes of writing and reading. In Kate Ronald and Joy Ritchie (Eds.), Teaching rhetorica: Theory, pedagogy and practice (13-30). Portsmouth, NH: Boynton/Cook.

Ronald, K., Ritchie, J. (2006). Asking “so what?”: Expansive pedagogies of experience and ac-tion. In Kate Ronald and Joy Ritchie (Eds.), Teaching rhetorica: Theory, pedagogy and practice (1-12). Portsmouth, NH: Boynton/Cook.

Justin Cook is a second year Graduate Teaching Assistant at Arkansas State University. He is also the Public Relations and Programming Coordinator for the A-State Writing Center. He is originally from Harrisburg, Arkansas and received his Bachelors of Arts in English from Arkan-sas State University in Jonesboro, Arkansas in 2012. His master’s level areas of emphasis are Victorian Literature, Popular Culture, Feminist Rhetorics and Composition Theory. His current research involves the rhetorical and social value of dead, decaying and morbid bodies in nine-teenth century British literature.

Brennah Hutchison is a second year Graduate Assistant at Arkansas State University; she will be teaching Composition II in the spring semester of 2016. She is also a tutor for the A-State Writing Center, Secretary/ Treasurer of the A-State Feminist Union, and Poetry Editor of The Tributary. She received her Bachelors of Arts in English from Arkansas State University in Jonesboro, Arkansas in 2012. Her master’s level areas of emphasis are Creative Writing, Com-position and Cultural Rhetoric, and Feminist Rhetorics and Composition Theory. Her current research encompasses the feminist approach of new materialist rhetorics in the novels of Milan Kundera.

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This narrative of an English teacher/researcher’s account of guiding students in writing using metaphor validates metaphor as a valuable tool for driving and deepening understanding and expression of experiences through writing. This research describes how three high school students utilized metaphors in their writing (form) in order to think more deeply and reflectively about their content (invention of understanding). Outcomes are shared through the students’ writing and the researcher’s metaphor mapping that detail the invention and cognition that emanated from the use of metaphor when writing about adversity. Discoveries include (with theoretical support) that: 1) the creation of metaphors can be taught and be practical for use in the classroom; 2) the form of metaphorical writing can be related to the inventive content and reflection in the writing; 3) and by analyzing students’ use of metaphor and the known theories behind metaphor, we can note how and when students move from linguistic to conceptual metaphor as they use them for writing.

Dixie Keyes, Ed.D.

Let There Be Metaphor:

The Inventive Light of Metaphorical Development in the Writing and Thinking of High

School Students

Inventive Light: The Proof is in the Metaphorical Pudding

When I read how one of my students wrote of slavery, comparing it to the dusty, ground-up gravel material called caliche (often used for the topping of dirt roads in South Tex-as), I immediately realized the student had deepened his understanding of an unfamiliar, ab-stract concept by making metaphorical connections to something known to him. He consid-ered the dry dirtiness of caliche, the way in which it is overpowered and beaten into the ground to serve a functional purpose.

Slavery is like a pile of caliche, brought together from the four points

of the world, to be beaten, overworked, mixed together with other rocks,

to be used for the benefit of others, to be trampled on.

One can see the inventiveness of thought, the creativity involved, and the possible effects this

writing response could have on the thinking of others. Aristotle described this freshness of

metaphorical language. “Liveliness is specially conveyed by metaphor, and by further power

of surprising the hearer. . .” (Halliwell, 1995, p. 1412b). The caliche metaphor for slavery

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viewpoint about the origin of slavery and the selfish separations involved. Using a stretching exercise in metaphorical development suggested by W. J. J. Gordon (1961), I found the op-portunity to let students find a metaphor for an unfamiliar topic helpful in developing inventive thought of slavery before we read an excerpt from The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano (a slave narrative) in my English Language Arts class. Because the stu-dents invented their own metaphors for slavery, they reached into the light of their own expe-riences and prior knowledge to generate further understanding or new understandings of reading focus.

Teachers have the opportunity to see how the student creation of metaphor can be a powerful conduit to deeper understanding of literature and abstract concepts. A conceptual metaphor uses two domains; one is the source domain from which “we draw metaphorical expressions to understand another conceptual domain,” and the other is the target domain, “the conceptual domain which is understood” through metaphor (Kovecses, 2002, p. 4). Fleckenstein (1995) emphasized the two knowledge domains in metaphors during her work with student writers; in her words: “For writers and readers, the familiarity of the ‘known’ do-main can offer initial guidance to investigate and to plumb the ‘unknown’ domain” (p. 111). The student to whom the writing belongs was familiar with caliche, and a recognition of possi-ble similarities to slavery guided him to additional thoughts and understandings.

Writing with metaphorical language is usually considered delightful, invigorating, or creative in high school language arts settings when teachers provide opportunities for its use. Can the creations of metaphors be taught and be practical for use in the classroom? Or is the development of metaphor an art which requires a gift of genius, as Aristotle has said (Halliwell, 1995, p. 255)? He also mentioned that one could practice the use of metaphors (“taking sayings”) (Rhys, 1954, p. 1410b) to become more proficient. W. J. J. Gordon, former Harvard professor, researcher and creator of Synectics (a model of teaching based in meta-phorical thought), found through his thirty-plus years of research that metaphorical thought can be taught. “The use of metaphor is a characteristic of man. Though hidden and inhibited in some people, Synectics1 research reveals that there are certain practical psychological conditions for its re-emergence as a useful tool for human invention” (Gordon, 1961, p. 111). Metaphors are known to work at different levels, from form to invention to models. How deep-ly is the form of metaphorical writing related to the inventive content of the writing and the re-flection of learning found within it? How and when do students move from linguistic to concep-tual metaphors? Through analyzing the metaphorical writing of my students, I can see such patterns. From the past to the present, some do not recognize the inventive light of metaphor-ical development. Nietzsche recognized the varying levels and purposes of metaphors; he also seemingly criticized Aristotle for being obsessed with the invention level of metaphor (Blair, 1983,p. 101). Nietzsche’s criticism of forced metaphors (p. 123) is shadowed by Coe’s (1996) assertion that, “Metaphors, not being literal, are neither true nor false; but some are much better than others. And the proof is in the pudding (p. 433).

The pudding is the metaphorical writing and thinking of my students. Realizing the ca-pacity of metaphors to function as part of cognition (in conjunction with the tool of writing) can assist students in generating understanding of literature, life and themselves. We may find answers to the questions posed by taking the time to see how these high school students per-ceive and use metaphors in their writing, and we may also generate new or additional ques-tions about the inventive light of metaphorical development in writing.

The purpose of this research is to describe how three high school students utilized

metaphors in their writing (form) in order to think more deeply and reflectively about their

1 I capitalize Synectics here to note it as a model of teaching (Joyce & Weil, 2010).

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content (invention of understanding). Following are the questions that guided this inquiry:

Can the creations of metaphors be taught and be practical for use in the class-room?

How deeply is the form of metaphorical writing related to the inventive content of the writing and the reflection of learning found within it?

How and when do students move from linguistic to conceptual metaphors?

Gerardo: A Special Student Relives the past Gerardo (pseudonym) is an eighteen-year-old, tall and handsome, young Hispanic man who kisses his girlfriend each day in the crossing of the hallway in front of my room. Gre-garious and streetwise, Gerardo loses focus and esteem when he comes into classrooms. He is a second language learner and is learning disabled. He has been in the special education program since he was in middle school. His spelling dysfunction and limited function in written expression make it hard for him to complete assignments well and in a timely manner; he wants to achieve because he is successful in other areas of his life, but he fears rejection and failure. He has failed several six weeks in my English Language Arts class simply because of incomplete work (he never attempted tutoring time). After Gerardo’s class had brainstormed events in their lives when they faced and pro-gressed through adversity, I asked them to brainstorm a metaphor(s) using the “metaphorical categories” handout (Appendix 4). They used the three columned chart (Appendix 5) to assist them in the meaning of adversity and in the selection of a metaphorical category and a specif-ic source domain. I had to repeatedly encourage Gerardo to brainstorm a metaphor for adver-sity, visiting his desk three to four times in one class period. I suggested he consider types of “weather,” so he selected “tornado” as the source domain. At that time, I was not aware of the event in adversity he had chosen to write about. After I helped him begin the mapping in the third column and explained that he needed to compare adversity and tornados, he filled the column. He later lost that paper, so I could not include it in this field study. The next class period, I directed the class to write out an entire rough draft of their es-says on adversity, placing their metaphorical ideas in the introduction, and then continuing with their personal experience in adversity. I quickly modeled this, using another student’s metaphor and showing them transition sentence possibilities. Below is Gerardo’s introduction to his essay on adversity, as he wrote it. (see Appendix 1): Adversity and tornado they are almost a like because it brings all kinds of

prombles (problems), and it’s dark and it’s scare, it feels like death pulling you from the har (hair).

Despite the run-ons and spelling problems (I had to ask him what “har” was), one can feel the emotion of a second metaphor he created (“it feels like death pulling you from the har”). The tornado metaphor was not effective enough for him to express his emotion, and after I read his personal experience, I realized why. Below is an excerpt from the body of his essay: My wrost day in my life was almost 5 months ago. When my Grand Ma

past away. She past 3 days before my birthday on the 6 of September, and

my parents didn’t told me but that day I had a felling that something

happened . . . . I came from school and there was body (nobody) in my

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house and I had a bad feeling about it so I call to mexico there was no

body there so (I) just started thinking and by 5:00 clock I herd the car so I

wented out and I saw my mom in black so I started carring (crying) . . . .

And I started yelling at my parents why in the hell you didn’t told me. . . .

And I still get remember my Grad Ma every day and more on the day she

pasted always. I always count down the days on till it comes around.

Gerardo possibly created the metaphor of death in his introduction because he imagined death pulling his grandmother away by the hair. This would symbolize his anger and grief about be-ing forced to let her go. Another possibility is that Gerardo was attempting to describe the pain death caused him (the pain of being pulled by the hair). Whichever is the case, pure emotion drove this metaphor, which also explains why his earlier tornado choice was not effective or valuable to him. Kovecses would call Gerardo’s self-generated metaphor a conceptual meta-phor, of the kind that is “rooted in the target” (2002, p. 74). The personified concept of “Death” was to be found in the story of Gerardo’s worst experience in adversity, which contained spe-cific remembrances of death (not being able to find anyone at home; his mother dressed in black; constant tears; a suspiciously bad feeling of doom).

Gerardo’s metaphor also fits into the Kovecses’ “events are actions” category of con-ceptual metaphor. Kovecses (2002) notes that the “Grim Reaper” metaphor portrays Death as an action of this persona, the “Grim Reaper” (p. 229). Gerardo chose to use the image of Death pulling his grandmother away by the hair, signifying intense pain, instead of visualizing the tool of a scythe. Gerardo manipulated this metaphor to more effectively enhance his ex-pression; his creativity mingled with strong emotion provided him a springboard for successful written expression. We fixed the run-ons and spelling mistakes later. Below is Gerardo’s con-clusion which shows too much interference from the teacher (me), still attempting follow-up on the tornado metaphor, and unaware of his story. With additional revision, he could further de-fine his death metaphor for stronger connections between the beginning and ending of his es-say, using his invention to enhance his form.

For me it is a tornado because it brains (brings) lost of bad thing but in the mid-

dle there sun shon (shone/shines) and it bittiflu (is beautiful) and when it past it

comes back. Just for little whall (while) I can forget.

Again, Gerardo is trying to place his emotion into this ending (“Just for a little while I can for-get”). Because the description of the sunshine “in the middle” fits a hurricane instead of a tor-nado, I think Gerardo rushed through his ending. This was the longest piece of writing he had ever completed, and it is possible he simply ran out of steam to consider the effectiveness of continuing the tornado metaphor. Despite that, he did continue his literary voice, expressing the sentiment of grief as he tried to forget about the death of his grandmother for a little while. The tornado/hurricane metaphor did lead him to recognize that the pain of her death would re-turn to him (“when it past it comes back”). Gerardo’s efforts in writing this essay are epistemo-logical in nature; he figured out what he knew and understood more about the pain of his grandmother’s death as he wrote.

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Conclusions about Gerardo’s Experience: Invention and Cognition

The power of Gerardo’s writing lies in the intensity of sharing such an emotional, per-sonal experience, using an intense conceptual metaphor to begin, despite his fear of writing. Without the opportunity to relive this experience in metaphorical terms, I am not sure Gerardo would have written in so much detail or with so much depth. Although his tornado metaphor did not provide him the emotional strength he was searching for, I cannot be certain he would have found his death metaphor without the space I provided to search for metaphors. Using form (placing a metaphor in the introduction and connecting to it again in the conclusion) to drive invention (the pondering of adversity, what it really means), and vice-versa (invention to form) surely assisted Gerardo in finding his voice about a difficult experience.

Figure 1:How metaphor drives form and deepens understanding

______________________________________________________________

FORM: Choosing a metaphorical representation for the Introduction

Deepens invention, understanding, reflection about an experience

AND

Drives form (middle sections of essay where narrative develops in unexpected

ways)

______________________________________________________________

FORM: Extending or revisiting the metaphorical representation for the Ending

Using the storm image solved his initial problem of writing a creative introduction, but it also shaped his thoughts on his experience with death, allowing him to create an additional, more meaningful metaphor. He received much praise from his classmates and me as this es-say was shared in small groups. One can see that the form utilized here deeply drove the con-tent, and recursively, the form of his essay could be enhanced later because of his metaphori-cal inventions. Aristotle probably had it right after all—he valued both form and content . . . for good reason.

Robert: A Reluctant Writer Finds Motivation

Robert (pseudonym) is 18 and is usually the first student to enter my room for his mid-day English III class. Robert is Hispanic, but does not speak Spanish as many of my students do. He communicates little with other students and often falls asleep in class. Even though I have tried moving him around to various seats in the room, he is consistently sleepy and ad-mits he stays up late watching television and playing computer games. He is not successful in all of his classes in school. One activity he especially dislikes is writing.

During the same assignment as the one given to Gerardo, Robert explored fruits and vegetables to find his metaphor. According to his brainstorming paper (see Appendix 4), he wrote down many fruits, one being a coconut. Robert selected coconut as his metaphor,

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by himself, without my approval or advice. Robert usually needs persistent monitoring and guidance for any amount of writing to occur for him. It seemed that the chart assisted him and allowed him to guide himself in this activity. After I explained how to do the third column of the chart, he identified some connections between adversity and a coconut. I helped him with one of the seven connections he wrote. After modeling the writing of the introduction, Robert wrote this (shown exactly like he wrote it):

Aversity is like a hard and rough cocunut, life isn’t easy to get by it is hard

but once you get by the hard outer shell you can enjoy the good life inside . . . . There was this one time when life was like a hard cocunut. I was in school,

I didn’t get the material of math, and I was having a hard time trying to

figure it out, it was like a cocanut was falling on my head.

Robert’s use of the similes “Adversity is like a hard and rough coconut,” “life was like a hard coconut,” and “it was like a coconut was falling on my head” all seem to place emphasis on the characteristic of “hardness.” Kovecses (2002) would call this “perceived structural simi-larities” (p. 72). Robert understood that adversity was hard and he decided the best projection of that toughness would be through the source of a coconut. What other fruit is tougher? By perceiving adversity in terms of the tough outer shell of a coconut or in terms of something hard falling on your head, Robert used this as a process of confronting the “hardness” or “toughness” of his situation in learning math. Finding this important similarity not only provided Robert the motivation to proceed through his writing independently, but he also generated ad-ditional similarities and extended his metaphor. In fact, he focused on the metaphor more than he did on the other required content of the essay (see Appendix 2). Although his essay was incomplete and needed more details of his adverse experience, the metaphor Robert chose provided him a helpful positive framework upon which to continue.

Conclusions about Robert’s Experience: Extensions and Motivation

With additional conferencing and revision, Robert can return to his coconut metaphor, and it may assist him in further elaborating the difficulties of his adverse experience in math. He did not even utilize all of the connections he brainstormed. Note on his chart (Appendix 4) that he did not use “they take a long time to eat it all”, “you could break your teeth eating this”, “it takes time to heal” and “scars could . . . .” Robert’s metaphorical brainstorming has more promise for extending his metaphor and providing him the motivation to further explain his thoughts. Maybe the opportunity of writing with metaphors and requiring them in the form of the essay could heighten Robert’s motivation to effectively complete his writing. Furthermore, did thinking metaphorically enhance Robert’s conception of adversity? Without using the coconut metaphor, his essay would have only entailed a few sentences about math class. But with the exploration of a metaphor, he built himself a cognitive schema that provided adequate guid-ance and inspiration to effectively begin an essay.

As noted in Appendix 2, Robert’s “adversity is like a hard and rough coconut” metaphor

fits into the broader metaphorical category of “difficulties are impediments.” Rudy seemed to

learn from his coconut metaphor that difficulties are painful and they remain painful; the coco-

nut shell does not lose its hardness. But the tasty inner goodness awaits; one must simply find

a way to crack it open. Rudy sought a tutor and discovered he could “overcome anything” (“It

was really hard, until I got help from a tutor then my life got much easier, I understood the ma-

terial and I actually like doing math”) (Appendix 2). He expressed new understanding that he

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could actually enjoy “doing math,” or as he expressed in the beginning, “You can enjoy the good life inside” the coconut. Impediments can occur; coconuts may fall and hurt your head. Through Robert’s expression of adversity with a metaphor, he was able to reconstruct the story of his lived experience, just as Gerardo did. Robert’s was not so emotionally driven, but aca-demic pursuits are difficult for him, and he found a way to creatively express his frustration and understand himself better. Johnson (1993) writes of the construction of narrative and its episte-mological character in relation to morality, which helps to explain why my young writers con-structed new knowledge through their writing. “. . . an adequate moral theory must acknowledge the way we try to construct narrative unities that give us the means to criticize our present situation, explore avenues of possible action, and transform our identity in the pro-cess” (p. 154). Robert criticized his inadequate knowledge in math, explored a solution, and in the process, transformed his attitude about math class. He shared his narrative of finding a math tutor, and in the future when other coconuts fall on his head, he will probably know to seek help in breaking the hard, outer shells of new challenges.

Devin: Seeking Metaphors in the Familiar

Devin plays soccer and he is very successful at it. His name is often heard over the in-tercom during second period announcements as the high scorer for our high school team. Devin is not so successful in writing; he often takes half the class to simply forget distractions and shift his thinking to concentrate on the topic at hand. Once he sparks with a clever idea, he writes quickly and even stays after class to finish. As good athletes often do, he has a drive to be successful. As the class brainstormed metaphors and their connections for the adversity essay, Devin had trouble with the “connection column.” I guided him by asking him questions about soccer (Does the other team intercept passes? Is dribbling down the field against the defense full of pressure? Is there stress to keep the ball? Do you look for opportunities to score?) (See Appendix 3). This allowed him to proceed in his writing, using his experience in soccer as a conceptual, metaphorical hook in which to discuss a difficult time in his life. Fleck-enstein (1995) found that metaphors can be guided by existing relationships which allows for a “systematic rather than a fragmented search pattern” (p. 111). Devin’s strong relationship to soccer and his knowledge of the systems involved in playing a soccer game provided him that specific “search pattern.” With only a few simple questions from my rudimentary knowledge of soccer, Devin actively began to write his essay. Fleckenstein (1995) also notes that “a strongly imagistic metaphor can serve as a conceptual peg, or focus, to which students can continually return to orient themselves” (p. 111). Soccer is a visual game with a goal on each end of the field and a brightly clothed goalie protecting each one. The yardage stripes are bright white and serve as symbols for progression down the field. Besides those visual aspects, Devin had built up visual memories of specific instances during soccer games. He used these important experiences to detail his story of adversity.

Note how Devin used soccer as a conceptual hook in the beginning of his essay.

There’s a lot of problems in life you have to deal with. Just when you think

that everything is alright trouble comes and intercepts your good time.

Just like in soccer, if you’re making good passes and then the other team intercepts it you start feeling bad. It was just like that time my brother

and me had to take care of my mom. We thought we were gonna do

that forever.

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Not only did Devin connect the idea of “trouble” and “feeling bad” with an interception during a soccer game, but he also related this feeling directly to a similar feeling during a diffi-cult family situation. By using experiences in soccer, Devin developed a pattern throughout the rest of the essay (See Appendix 3). I included more excerpts of Devin’s work as compared to Gerardo and Robert’s pieces because of Devin’s central use of the metaphor as a “hook” throughout. In each of the additional three paragraphs below, Devin continued using the soc-cer “peg” and images from soccer game events. In the second paragraph of his essay, he wrote:

So me and my brother had to take care of her for two months. Right away

I got real worried because it was going to be hard work. So the pressure

was on us. I felt like the pressure you have when your playing soccer to

not lose the ball.

He continued this pattern in the third paragraph:

But my brother and me defended ourselves against adversity. We did

everything possible to make it better for my mom. It sort of like when the other team in soccer has a free kick and you have to defend your goal. We didn’t let adversity take over us.

Finally, in writing his conclusion he found a way to end optimistically, again taking on the atti-tude of a successful competitor in a soccer game.

What I learned was that no matter if difficulties come your way, we should

always look for options to score. Don’t let anything put you down in life. It’s going to be hard but you have to learn how to deal with problems. It’s like in soccer no matter if your opponents come your way, you have to keep on dribbling while looking for options to score.

Although the overarching conceptual metaphors, “sport is a war” or “life is a game,” that seem to belong to Devin’s metaphor are conventional, Devin used his metaphor unconvention-ally; his efforts were original, relying on his unique experiences. Kovecses (2002) cites several examples of unconventional metaphor including Robert Frost’s poem “The Road Not Taken” as an unconventional use of the conventional metaphor “Life is a Journey.” Another example is Ross Perot’s comment about America’s high medical costs. “We’re buying a front row box seat, and we’re not even getting to see a bad show from the bleachers” (p. 31). Although Perot’s version is unconventional, the conventional metaphor for this linguistic expression is “life is a sporting game.” Kovecses states, “While it is easy to find unconventionalized meta-phorical linguistic expressions that realize conventional conceptual metaphors, it is less easy to find unconventional conceptual metaphors for a given target domain” (2002, p. 31-32). Devin used the target of “adversity,” found his source domain (a soccer game), and used it in unconventional ways, mostly for the images soccer provided him and also for the conceptual peg to spatially describe the steps of progress he and his brother made in helping their mother. Those steps matched the steps of progression to a successful soccer game.

Another aspect found in Devin’s conceptual metaphor is emotional value. Such phrases as “feeling bad,” “the pressure was on us,” and “we defended ourselves against adversity” sug-gest emotions about this incident, just as there are emotional occurrences in the game of soc-cer. Fleckenstein (1995) writes, “. . . metaphors are endowed with emotion as well as infor-mation . . . . As a result, students can associate an emotional value with the metaphor, thereby

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more easily developing a ‘felt sense’ for their topics . . . .” (p. 111).

Conclusions: Emotions of Success and Affirmation of Experience

By looking at Appendix 3, one can see how Devin used the larger metaphor “adversity is like the game of soccer” to find the specific metaphorical ideas for each paragraph of his es-say. His understanding and reflection of his own personal growth during the time he took care of his mother developed through his experiences with soccer. He seemed to be reaching for feelings of success and achievement as he described how he and his brother worked hard to ensure their mother’s safekeeping during her illness. Because of success in his specialty sport, he had a conceptual peg that assisted him in detailing the events of an adverse time in his life. Devin wanted others to empathize with his plight, to feel the pressure of his situation. He be-lieves everyone loves soccer as he does; therefore, soccer was his vehicle for sharing his nar-rative of adversity. Johnson (1993) backs up this action when he writes of a hooker who justi-fied her actions on the streets. Just as the hooker tried to “justify herself morally in terms of the values and practices of her culture,” Devin tried to share his story to “resolve an indeterminate situation” to share how he solved a problem, and to set the “standards of narrative explanation” so the community around him could understand (Johnson, 1993, p. 155). Since several of Devin’s English classmates play soccer, he knew they would react affirmatively to his writing.

Let There Be Metaphor: The Power of Metaphorical Invention in Cognition and Writing

W. J. J. Gordon wrote a book (The Metaphorical Way of Learning and Knowing) de-scribing his research with the model of teaching, Synectics, and four series of workbooks for young students which could assist them in developing creative and metaphorical thought. Through his research in public schools using his workbooks, he found, “The form of the meta-phorical texts intrinsically implied interest and caring for the students’ ideas and feelings. This attitude of ‘caring’ is objective and unsentimental, but it says to the student that the authors of the text give a damn about him and wish to honor him” (1973, p. 67). By guiding students in the development of their own metaphorical thoughts, teachers guide students in valuing their own experiences and ideas. Gerardo, Robert and Devin are all reluctant writers and far from being top students. By giving them a choice of metaphors, connecting metaphorical thought to the form of their writing, and by leading them to write about themselves, my actions as a teacher honored them. More of such honoring actions could lead students to feel better about their learning, not to mention their self-expression.

Gordon (1973) also describes the beneficial cognitive elements for the students of low-er intelligence he researched. “Locked into a one-dimensional context by which to view the ele-ments of the assigned concept, they are like a man with only one eye—they have no depth vi-sion . . . . the metaphorical way is a powerful motivator. It is a fundamental organizer that breaks down the walls of substantive material and lets in the student” (p. 92). Each student’s writing was full of voice, depth of emotion or challenge, and sense of accomplishment or deep-er understanding. Writing about adverse times is not a joyful activity, but the use of metaphors seemed to stimulate each student in different ways, ending with successful written communica-tion for them all.

Max Black is another researcher who believes metaphors serve as cognitive instru-

ments. His interaction theory of metaphor describes the power of having a “better grasp on

what it is to think of something (A) as something else (B)” (Ortney, 1993, p. 31). Black’s “A”

would be the “target” and his “B” would be the “source” domain as mentioned earlier. By map-

ping the metaphorical events, as in the appendices, the inventive quality of metaphor is

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evident. Black confronts critics of metaphor by answering the question, “Why stretch and twist, press and expand, concepts in this way—Why try to see A as metaphorically B, when it literally is not B?” He writes:

“ . . . because we can do so, conceptual boundaries not being rigid, but elastic and per-meable; and because we often need to do so, the available literal resources of the lan-guage being insufficient to express our sense of the rich correspondences, interrela-tions, and analogies of domains conventionally separated; and because metaphorical thought and utterance sometimes embody insight expressible in no other fashion.” (p. 33)

It seemed that Devin had no other way to organize his writing except in the progression of a soccer game; it seemed that Gerardo could not effectively express the emotion he felt without personifying Death; possibly Robert could not adequately define his feelings about struggling in math without contemplating a coconut. The insights of these students may have not been “expressible” in any other way but the metaphorical way.

After witnessing the strengths of the metaphorical thinking and writing of these stu-dents, educators can see the importance of metaphorical light. Metaphors as cognitive instru-ments illuminate invention and produce effective writing, both through form and generation of new ideas or connections. By utilizing models of teaching such as Synectics, or writing strate-gies such as those used by Kristie Fleckenstein, teachers could effectively lead students to embrace metaphorical development as part of their metacognition, making metaphor a recog-nized part of their daily thoughts. Janet Emig, an esteemed researcher of writing, comments in her book The Web of Meaning (1983), “If our ability to comprehend and to create metaphor is a valid mark of our cognitive, emotional, and moral development, should we not set about im-mediately to study so crucial, so central, so revelatory a phenomenon?” (p. 107). Let there be more metaphorical light.

References

Blair, C. (1983). Nietzsche’s lecture notes on rhetoric: a translation. Coe, R., (1996). In Enos, T (Ed). Encyclopedia of rhetoric and composition. New York:

Routledge. Emig, Janet. (1983). The web of meaning. Portsmouth, NH: Boynton/Cook. Fleckenstein, Kristie S. (1995). Writing and strategic use of metaphor. Teaching English

in the two year college, Vol. 22, 2, p. 110-115.

Gordon, Willam J. J. (1961). Synectics: the development of creative capacity. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Porpoise Books.

Gordon, Willam J. J. (1973). The metaphorical way of learning and knowing. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Porpoise Books.

Halliwell, Stephen, Ed. (1995). Aristotle’s Poetics. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press.

Johnson, Mark. (1993). Moral imagination. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. Kovecses, Zoltan. (2002). Metaphor: a practical introduction. New York: Oxford

University Press.

Ortney, A. (1975). Metaphor and thought. Boston: Cambridge University Press.

Roberts, Rhys. (1954). Aristotle’s Rhetoric. New York: Modern Library.

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Dixie Keyes received her Ed.D. from the University of Houston in 2006 and joined the faculty

at Arkansas State University as a Professor of Education. For 13 years, she taught middle

and high school literature and language arts in deep South Texas and assisted at-risk stu-

dents in accelerating their reading and writing proficiency. She has a masters degree in

Reading and has provided professional development sessions to public school teachers

(profit-free) throughout South Texas in reading and writing instruction, reflective practice and

models of teaching. She has published book chapters and peer-reviewed research on narra-

tive inquiry research regarding teacher curriculum-making, teacher education, critical literacy,

and the complexities of early-career teachers. She was most recently one of the editors and

authors of Narrative Inquirers in the Midst of Meaning-making: Interpretive Acts of Teacher

Educators(2012) , one of the volumes in the Advances in Research on Teaching series. She

is also the Director of the Arkansas Delta Writing Project at Arkansas State University in

Jonesboro as well as the President of the Arkansas Council of Teachers of English Language

Arts, an NCTE state affiliate.

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Ryan R. Kelly, Ph.D.

(Re) Inventing the Hamburger: The (Frustrating)

Search for a Reading Comprehension Strategy

Trying to develop a new and cutting-edge reading comprehension strategy is exactly like developing a hamburger—or worse, tying to claim invention of the hamburger. No matter how hard I brainstorm, no matter how hard I try, there is nothing I can do to convince anyone that I had a hand in inventing the hamburger. In fact, it is a sure bet that it is actually other people that will be convincing me that all I have done is to serve up just a mere hamburger. Why is this process so frustrating? Every time I examine what works, what I have used in my own teaching, what I have trained others to use in their teaching—and especially when I sit down to brainstorm—I accidentally re-invent something like KWL. My new acronym for this famous strategy, with its ideal table representing what students Know, Want to know, and Learned, may be different, and I may feel incredibly positive for a few moments, but then I am forced to highlight text and strike the delete key. This quest does tend to keep the brain engaged, but in the end (sadly) leaves me without glorious new intellectual property. It does, however, help me keep in perspective the core nature of what I love in a good comprehension strategy, as well as why I feel they have the power to work so well.

The First Hamburger I Savored

I have always loved this comprehension strategy. From the early days of my high school teaching and literacy coaching work, as well as my first college teaching, KWL is one that most would agree has made its mark on our pedagogy. It’s not just a fantastic strategy because it won the comprehension strategy popularity contest at the tail end of Whole Lan-guage and continued well past the onset of the No Child Left Behind era. As a comprehension strategy it offers all a teacher could want: multiple connections among knowledge areas, a us-er-friendly and simple interface, a crisp logic, and a belief that thinking can and must take place at different points in the reading process. Ogle (1986) very specifically gave us this strategy “to help teachers honor what children bring to each reading situation” (p. 564), and did so with a clearly fundamental belief that we con-struct knowledge around a text. Originally intended for expository texts (but quickly taken up pedagogically for all sorts of reading), she called it “a simple procedure that can be used with nonfiction selections at any grade level and in any content, whether in reading groups or in

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content learning situations” (p. 564). It does not get any better than this pedagogically; the strategy looks, feels, and is useful in any type of reading situation where students are asked to map the progression of their thinking, or connect ideas. It also tends to be a home run at pre-service and in-service teacher training—buy-in is quick and KWL lends itself to conversation and pedagogical discussion very easily.

The final nugget: it really works with students. Ogle (1986) reported student participa-

tion showed gains with use, improved quality of thinking, and noted that “student involvement and enjoyment of reading expository texts “goes from lukewarm to really keen” (p. 570). In fact, when teachers didn’t use the strategy, students missed its use, since they came to appre-ciate the way the strategy and the way their teachers validated their thoughts about the text. What I wouldn’t give to develop a strategy that, when properly deployed, works so well with students that it further draws pre-service and in-service teachers into the pedagogical process. It builds their confidence as professionals as they not only examine their use of the strategy, but also the evidence of student learning that the K, the W, and the L leave behind as a data trail. Ogle mentions a principal involved in the deployment of KWL who reported that she was “amazed by the high level of recall of all the articles [one of her teachers] had taken time to de-velop using the K-W-L strategy” (p. 569). With this confidence in the bag, it becomes a “gateway strategy” for others to follow. Given how long KWL has been in our pedagogical tool box, this is likely no shock to hear since many of us in the field of education have tried it, en-joyed it, and naturally moved on to other strategies. What scholar wouldn’t want to come up with this particular original hamburger? Or, perhaps—more realistically—what teacher would-n’t want to experience that feeling once again when they first got a strategy like KWL right in the classroom? Additional Versions of the Hamburger That I Have Enjoyed

Yes, KWL has been adjusted several times. One notable example comes from Hersh-berger, Zembal-Saul, and Starr (2006) who rebuilt the hamburger into K-L-E-W (the Know-Learning-Evidence-Wonder chart) in response to teachers who may “Dismiss inquiry as im-practical, interpreting science inquiry as ‘free inquiry,’ a time in which children pursue questions of their choosing and conduct investigations over extended periods of time” (p. 50). For these authors, it was about inquiry becoming long-term, open to all, and fostering a more confident independence. Thanks to KWL’s popularity, the researchers felt that it was a “reasonable and non-threatening place to start” (p. 50). Their students began to suggest questions spontane-ously; they collected new kinds of evidence, modified original thinking, and grew in confidence. The researchers even stated that “this new twist on an old favorite has the potential to go a long way toward supporting the vision of reform in elementary science teaching” (p. 53). This adjustment to a reading comprehension strategy not only made the hamburger popular again, but made science inquiry delicious.

A great deal of the work by Margaret Mooney (1995) focuses on explicit steps for teaching reading, as well as a great deal of engagement with students and their ideas. When guiding reading, she offers that during “any stage of a reader’s development, guided reading allows you to make children aware of the ‘why and how and the knowledge that you know’ of reading” (p. 75). In particular, Mooney works with the familiar sections of thinking in KWL; she also engages heavily with how readers already know things, and what evidence helps them reach their conclusions and opinions. She ultimately calls for readers to explain and deepen their prior knowledge, to work with the author’s process and intent during reading, and to con-sider further questions and resonance of the text after the reading.

All the while she pushes for active reading and collecting evidence every step of the

way. And why does she make adjustment such as this to a familiar package of KWL thinking?

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“Once children know how to apply and integrate the strategies of predicting, sampling and con-firming text”—again, what KWL inherently asks of us—“and can regain control when meaning is lost, the focus of guiding reading can shift to make children aware of how they can use these competencies to cope with more complex challenges in content and structure” (p. 75). And these are useful adjustments, to be sure, as adjustments such as this not only foster student independence with strategy use, but also aim for no less than the transfer of these reading skills into the content areas and to improve learning throughout them. Useful adjustments, yes, but this is still very much the hamburger with which I initially fell in love.

Why the Hamburger Tastes So Good Spike, a contestant on the popular cooking show Top Chef, earned fame by developing a world-famous hamburger. My wife and I both agree: his secret was not the toppings. It was-n’t about the truffles on top, or the various gourmet cheeses. His secret was the formation of the burger, the searing of the meat—the preparation. His actions and process as a chef forged the destiny of a delicious hamburger, not merely the constituent parts. Granted, it may seem the inventive toppings and combinations make the burger work, but it all points back to Spike’s culinary training and background in the restaurant business. In search of a comprehension strategy—whether it be in development or in selection for classroom use—the thrill of the hunt lies more in how it is prepared and the decisions made by the chef, and not the ingredients themselves. In much the same way as Spike forced me to think differently about cooking this particular dish, I encourage my pre-service teacher candidates, as well as graduate students in reading and literacy, to consider thinking deeper about their process of engagement with a comprehension strategy, and not its particular ingredients or its acronym. As we continue into a new era of education where Common Core is met with both de-bate and focus, and perhaps into what future policy iteration lies beyond, I have no doubt that there will be a new generation of reading comprehension strategies that dominate our pre-service training and our professional development. I consider it very likely that the new gener-ation of reading strategies will not be about logistics (ingredients), but more about the modes of thought that readers activate and more about how readers make themselves ready to em-ploy the strategy. Future strategies will reinvest our energies (perhaps while reinventing the name of the process) in prior knowledge; the, “how and why” we approach a text the way we do, and make a strong case for the outcome. Ultimately, future strategies will be all about how the strategy itself functions as a conduit between multiple ideas or “chunks” of thinking, and between texts and other sizable bodies of knowledge. What it will require is that “chefs” care-fully refine their technique, regardless of the flashy toppings. KWL is inherently a strategy for constructing new knowledge around a text—and readers can only construct this new knowledge when they connect units of thinking in new ways. For Love of the Hamburger

As a literacy theorist, I don’t just teach an entire semester about what the ingredients are, nor do I spend all semester just teaching pre-service candidates how to use them. I be-lieve in teaching why we have the strategies, why they are used, and why they make it possi-ble for readers to

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connect pieces of thinking in ways that make the construction of new knowledge possible. It was KWL that had a hand in tuning me into this process as I saw it work for my students, and as I saw it invigorate my colleagues’ practice. The variations on KWL, only a few of which I have sampled here, still allow readers to do this. These revisions each ask for additional units of thinking to be added to the mix, but still do not deviate from that core process that is the cor-nerstone of comprehension. These revisions work particularly well when they push the higher-order thinking skills (e.g. the how and why a reader knows what they know), and when they set the stage for transfer to the content areas. Clearly, the quest of others to re-invent the ham-burger has only deepened the field of available strategies; it’s no wonder I continue to want in on this trend.

My interest is why we chose to put the beef patty between the pieces of bread, rather than use both pieces of bread as a topping for the patty. As a theorist I care about why the parts of the strategy’s process do what they do and why the strategy works. Yet, I can only talk about or cite KWL so much. Like so many others who have brought comprehension to pedagogical life for us, I have become invested in the process within, and have found the de-sire to add additional units of thinking for students to place alongside what KWL originally asked. I need to invent a strategy both to help convey my exploration process in this regard and also to create a proving ground for exploring these “why” moments that happen when readers engage with a text. I need to design a strategy that satisfies the taste I’m craving—but it can’t be another hamburger. Unfortunately, one can only adjust the preparation so much. Thus, the fact that I continue to return to the point where I started, where I keep trying to create a new strategy only to see it take shape in an all-too-familiar form. While it is honestly frustrat-ing that I can’t get past this particular road block, it is also genuinely reassuring in that it helps to keep my focus on what matters about a good reading comprehension strategy. I find it particularly inspiring that Ogle said KWL came to be “so that students can learn through the classroom group experience how to become better expository readers,” and also that “it has taught teachers more about the interactive nature of reading and the importance of per-sonal involvement before, during, and after reading” (p. 570). One of our original favorites taught students how to be better readers, and taught teachers how to be better practitioners of their art. The subsequent re-inventions have given us yet more pedagogical steam. As much as I would like to pen my own strategy that would send similar ripples forward that would en-dure through theory and policy shifts and the (re)invention of strategy after strategy, I find it’s not all that difficult to relax and enjoy a time-tested strategy like KWL. It is, after all, a strategy that does precisely what I believe a good comprehension strategy should do, and has endured for that very reason. I only hope I can continue to do justice to KWL by keeping it and its es-sential underlying process in place as a vital part of training teachers to value comprehension itself, and to understand why we deploy strategies in support of comprehension.

With all this in mind, I suddenly find myself longing for a certain deli in downtown Pitts-burgh where I once enjoyed an alternative to hamburgers. There, they served me an incredi-ble ham and turkey on white with the French fries inside the sandwich….

References

Mooney, M. (1995). Guided reading beyond the primary grades. Teaching Pre K-8, 26(10), 75

-77. Hershberger, K., Zembal-Saul, C. & Starr, M. L. (2006). Evidence helps the KWL get a KLEW.

Science and Children, 45(5), 50-53. Ogle, D. M. (1986). K-W-L: A teaching model that develops active reading of expository text.

The Reading Teacher, 39(6), 564-570.

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Ryan Kelly grew up in Central Iowa, the child of elementary teachers and grandchild of farm-

ers. His love of writing and literature grew in high school and at the University of Iowa where

he was an English major and taught high school language arts at multiple Iowa schools. He

attended graduate school at Iowa State University where he studied Reading and assisted

with teaching and research. He completed his doctorate in 2010 in literacy education and

traveled to Arkansas State University where he is currently an Associate Professor, in his

sixth year as a Red Wolf. His research interests and publications are in the areas of literacy

coaching, reading comprehension, new literacies, and culturally relevant teaching/pedagogy.

He has also served the Arkansas Council of Teachers of English and Language Arts for three

years, currently serving as Board Secretary.

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Kristi Costello, Leslie Malland, & Skye Roberson

Realizing our Place in the Field and the Field Itself: Why Writing Center Conferences are

Important

Faculty, staff, and peer misconceptions regarding the work of writing centers affect more than the egos of writing consultants and writing center directors. As our three-part study suggests, such misunderstandings also impact the perceptions current and future writing consultants have about our writing centers, their roles as writing consultants, and the field of Writing Center Studies, in general. While quality training, a theoretical foundation in Writing Center Studies, and practice tutoring combine to combat these misconceptions, a critical, but often-neglected step in writing consultants’ development is participation at writing center conferences (WCCs). To this end, this article chronicles the pre- and post-professionalization (e.g. a tutor-training course and participation in a WCC) of six writing Arkansas State University Writing Center consultants and engages in conversation with four writing center directors from universities in Arkansas toward ultimately arguing that writing center directors need budgets for writing consultant WCC travel. WCCs not only help writing consultants recognize Writing Center Studies as a field worthy of exploration and study, encourage them to see themselves as professionals in the field, and increase writing consultants’ enthusiasm for their work, but they also provide them the opportunity to experience the community and understanding so often lacking on our campuses.

We’ve all been there. A faculty member emails us, appalled that one of our tutors

won’t “edit” her student’s paper. Another faculty member, maybe even the same day, catches

us in the hall and asks us to come to his class to teach his students grammar; he has allotted

one fifty-minute class period. These occurrences and misunderstandings about the roles of

writing centers and the nature of writing proficiency and language acquisition are not at all

uncommon for writing center directors and writing consultants. In fact, in 1984, Stephen North

lamented in his landmark article, “The Idea of a Writing Center” that too many university stu-

dents, faculty members, and administrators “do not understand what does happen, what can

happen, in a writing center” (p. 433). The unfortunate reality is more than thirty years have

passed since North’s famous essay that “began out of frustration,” and yet many of our faculty

colleagues and administrators still do not understand what we do (p. 433). Many see us as a

remediation service, some consider us snotty or lazy for not “editing” their students’ work, and

some still don’t know we exist. While North’s (1984) assertion that “misunderstanding is

something one expects and almost gets used to in the writing center business,“ it can be es-

pecially troubling not just because of how it impacts our reputations on campus, but

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because of how it can impact the perceptions current and future writing consultants have about our writing centers, their roles as writing consultants, and the field of Writing Center Studies, in general (p. 433). While quality training, a theoretical foundation in Writing Center Studies, and practice tutoring combine to combat these misconceptions, a critical, but often neglected step (particularly given current budget restraints) in writing consultants’ development is participation at writing center conferences (WCCs). In additional to the benefits typically ex-perienced by students and faculty who attend academic conferences, such as opportunities for networking and experience presenting one’s work, WCCs, in particular, help writing consult-ants recognize Writing Center Studies as a field worthy of exploration and study, encourage them to see themselves as professionals in the field, increase writing consultants’ enthusiasm for their work, and provide them, ever so briefly, with a community of colleagues who under-stand who we are, what we do, and why writing center work is important.

Our work on this piece began as an attempt to make a compelling argument to our uni-versity for professional development funding for our eight Writing Center consultants to attend the 2014 International Writing Center Association Collaborative (IWCAC) and the Conference on College Composition and Communication (CCCC), which happen concurrently and in the same city. However, we ran into roadblocks as we searched for research to substantiate our claim that such experiences were essential to the growth, development, and professionaliza-tion of our writing consultants and the Writing Center, at large. There are several articles, par-ticularly from the 1990s, that echo the importance of professionalization for writing center writ-ing consultants, including Mark C. Long, Jennifer H. Holberg, and Marcy M. Taylor’s 1990 arti-cle, “Beyond Apprenticeship: Graduate Students, Professional Development Programs and the Future(s) of English Studies” and Peter Vandenberg’s 1999 “Lessons of Inscription: Tutor Training and the ‘Professional Conversation’.” However, none of them provide data to support the benefits of WCC participation reinforcing Angelito Calma’s (2013) assertion that “Tutor de-velopment is an essential part of academic staff development, yet is comparatively under-researched” (p. 331). This article will attempt to address this gap in the literature and substan-tiate our claim regarding the importance of WCCs in the development of writing center consult-ants.

Methods

To learn about writing center consultants’ perspectives of their work and the field of Writing Center Studies, we conducted a small three-part study. For Part One, in the spring of 2014 we conducted interviews with six of the Arkansas State University writing consultants who attended the 2014 IWCAC and CCCC and the current writing center director (identified as WPA throughout the text). The questions varied somewhat depending on tutors’ responses, but all were asked to consider the importance and impact of engaging in professionalization as well as examine their personal and professional goals (see Appendix 1). The breakdown of the writing consultants who were interviewed is as follows: one student was an undergraduate writing center volunteer; another was a graduate student volunteer; three Graduate Assistants were all in their second full semester of graduate studies; and the last respondent was a re-turning graduate student. Only one of the students interviewed had attended a conference be-fore, and none had been to a WCC. Two writing consultants who attended the conference did not complete the survey or the interview and have since graduated.

Part Two was comprised of two online, quantitative surveys that asked these same stu-dents to examine their professional lives pre- and post-conference. The first survey was dis-tributed late spring 2014 and consisted of ten questions (see Appendix 2). Of the students who participated in the interview, two fewer responded than had completed the interviews. The content of the first survey focused on the overall experience gained from the conferences, in-cluding questions about university support and funding. In summer 2014, a follow up survey was distributed to the students who attended the trip and were working as graduate assistants.

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This second survey consisted of 11 questions regarding the impact of the conference on the Arkansas State University Writing Center and their professional lives (see Appendix 3).

Lastly, in the summer of 2014, Part Three of the study was distributed. For this compo-nent, interview requests were sent to seven Writing Center Directors at universities across the state of Arkansas. Four Writing Center Directors responded: three from regional state universi-ties who run general writing centers and another who runs a discipline-specific writing center. Respondents were then interviewed about their writing center policies, staffs, professionaliza-tion, and budgets via email (See Appendix 4). These surveys were confidential, but not anony-mous.

Institutional Context

Attendance at the 2014 IWCAC and CCCC was particularly important for the Arkansas State University Writing Center because, prior to their hiring of a Writing Program Director in July 2013, the position had not been well-supported, resulting in the Writing Program and Writ-ing Center having been without supervision and direction for several years. To provide readers with perspective regarding our institution, Arkansas State University is a public state university and the second largest university in the state with more than 13,000 students and 160+ fields of study. Though A-State has students from more than 68 countries, the majority of A-State students are from the area. Many of them are also low-income, first generation college stu-dents. In the past few years, A-State has not only increased its enrollment, but it has also in-creased its standards for enrollment. As Arkansas State University has continued to grow, as has their need for better writing instruction and support (Arkansas State University).

While many of the writing center consultants (previously called tutors) were still doing great work, some were not, and there was little consistency and quality control. This was re-flected in the 2011-2013 tutoring logs, which contained little information about students and tutoring sessions, and reflected that that the center saw fewer than 500 students each year. One interviewee explained: “they [consultants] were just essentially told ‘here are you hours, show up’ and they weren’t trained” (WPA). Consequently, by and large, a reoccurring theme in the survey responses of returning writing consultants revealed they did not see their work as important nor see themselves as professionals in the field of Writing Center Studies. As Stu-dent F notes:

Prior to 2013, the writing center and the writing center tutors seemed like after-thoughts. We saw very few students and had very little contact with university faculty. The writing center was located in a windowless room that one could on-ly get to by using a side door. For the most part, we spent our time in the writing center hanging out… our preparation for tutoring consisted of a one-day training and very little follow-up.

Findings

While the reemergence of the Preceptorship in Professional Tutoring, a seminar course that engages writing consultants in conversations about their experiences in the center and scholarship in Writing Center Studies, contributed to writing consultants’ improved perceptions of the field and themselves as professionals in the field in fall 2013, it was certainly the experi-ence of presenting at the 2014 International Writing Center Association Collaborative and at-tending the 2014 Conference on College Composition and Communication that seemed to have the most positive impact . In fact, despite having been in the preceptorship course for several weeks, more than half of the writing consultants still saw Writing Center Studies as a field of study “somewhat” or “not at all” prior to attending the conferences (see Figure 2). Spe-cifically, Student B noted that the preceptorship was helpful, but it wasn’t until the conferences that she felt able to develop her Writing Center philosophy. Student A suggests that once

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students realized they “were contributing to this body of knowledge,” they felt encouraged and motivated to “continue working in the field.”

Interestingly, though the Preceptorship course received high evaluation scores, very little was mentioned about the preceptorship in the interviews conducted. In synthesizing stu-dents’ responses, we have theorized this is because, while the Preceptorship course aided in providing a stronger community of writing consultants and a foundation in Writing Center Schol-arship, in many ways, it also further substantiated the alienation already felt by many of them. Each week the writing consultants met with their supervisor (WPA) to discuss theory and schol-arship not known, and in many cases, not appreciated by their other professors. In fact, Student F noted that while the preceptorship drew her closer to her colleagues, it simultaneously drew her further from her peers and professors, noting the discussions regarding frustrations felt as a result of the unrealistic expectations placed on them by faculty and students and the kinds of awkward and angering scenarios mentioned at the beginning of the article. Survey and inter-view responses suggest that it wasn’t until meeting other writing consultants, scholars and pro-fessionals in the field from outside the institution that many of the writing consultants began to feel a part of a discipline.

In fact, in each and every interview, the consultants mentioned meeting people in the field of Writing Center Studies. For many of them, it was the pivotal moment in which they be-came “insiders” and not “outsiders” studying for a class. Student A noted that these experienc-es inspire and motivate writing consultants, allowing them to “become contributors and schol-ars, not just workers.” Our study suggests that in the tutor-training course, consultants felt a part of a small community of writing center tutors, but the preceptorship did not help them feel included in the field of Writing Center Studies. However, after attending the IWCAC and CCCC, every respondent viewed Writing Center Studies as a field of study and all but one saw them-selves as an active agent in this field.

Since attending WCCs, writing consultants’ views regarding the scope and role of the writing center and themselves as writing consultants have also changed considerably. Before attending the conferences, the graduate students rated their professional experiences and their views of themselves as professionals as average and below average, largely related to “campus perception,” whereas all the scores rose above average after the trip, with every par-ticipant of the spring follow-up survey recognizing him/herself as a “professional tutor.”

Student A shed some insight into her ideas regarding the role of writing center consult-ants pre-professionalization: “As far as tutoring goes, my duties included helping students im-prove their papers by developing their ideas more, and recognizing patterns of error.” Student A did not feel her duties extended outside of the physical writing center in which she worked. Her duties, she thought, were esoteric to the writing center and the students with whom she worked. Similarly, prior to the conference, all writing center and writing program initiatives, with the exception of early semester classroom visits, were developed and carried out by the Writing Program and Writing Center Director (WPA); after returning from Indianapolis, writing consult-ants were eager to start making changes in the Arkansas State University Writing Center that had been learned about or suggested at the IWCAC and CCCC. Further, writing center consult-ants who attended the trip now seemed eager to make the Writing Center a fixture in their uni-versity community. As Student A notes:

Several of the discussions we had at the conference led to immediate changes in our policies, which bettered tutor work conditions, which in turn bettered condi-tions for students who were coming to get help because tutors were able to be more effective.

Since the conferences, there have been several initiatives led by writing consultants, including student and faculty writing groups, a new and improved Writing Center website,

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online tutoring, writing presentations, WAC/WID Initiatives, and promotional events related to International Writing Centers Week, National Writing Project and the National Day on Writing. Arkansas State University Writing Consultants have since presented panels in Writing Center Studies at CCCC, the International Writing Center Association Conference, and other regional conferences such as the Arkansas Philological Conference and Radical Writes. Perhaps most impressive though is, in the year following our participation in WCCs, the Arkansas State Uni-versity Writing Center had more than 4,000 tutoring sessions, nearly ten times more than ever before (see Figure 1). In an interview, Writing Center Director B described a similar experience after taking her Writing Center staff to South Central Writing Center Association Conference (SCWCA):

[After attending the conference,] they absolutely seemed more motivated, and encouraged. We encountered a lot of resistance (lots of people being angry, saying mean things to the consultants and to me, etc.) in trying to make our space into a “real” writing center, and it got demoralizing for us. Going to SCW-CA made everyone much more excited about writing center work, and we came back with lots of new ideas. Knowing that there’s a community of support out there did a world of good.

Figure 1. A-State Writing Center visits. This figure illustrates the annual increases in visits at the A-State Writing Center from 2012-2015.

Of the Arkansas State University writing consultants who participated in the online sur-veys, 75% felt more confident about their tutoring after attending a WCC (see Figure 2). Fur-ther, several respondents noted that their previous insecurities regarding their tutoring styles, methods, and skills were alleviated by the sessions they attended. Specifically, four of inter-viewed writing consultants discussed a session about tutor fatigue. This one session influ-enced them strongly. Without this session, these four writing consultants suggested that they would not have realized the normalcy of tutor fatigue and would never have felt comfortable expressing their fatigue.

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When asked in the survey if attending the IWCAC and CCCC changed their overall atti-tude toward the Arkansas State University Writing Center, 75% responded positively, with the remaining respondent suggesting that her perspective had not changed, but that her view of the A-State Writing Center began “just above average” (see Figure 2). One of the respondents changed her future goals enormously after her professionalization experience: “Before going [to IWCAC and CCCC], I didn’t plan on pursuing a PhD. I was just going to graduate with my Masters and teach at the High School level. But after attending I decided that I could not wait and I absolutely wanted to go get my PhD” (Student B). Similarly, Student D is considering be-coming a WPA after obtaining her PhD (Student D) and is currently applying to PhD programs. This is particularly interesting because the first survey revealed that only one of the writing con-sultants who entered the center in fall of 2013 had chosen to work in the Writing Center and/or pursue Writing Studies or a related discipline; this writing consultant noting that the “role put [her] into a position” of helping students and would facilitate her goal of becoming a teacher. The rest implied, or directly stated, that pre-WCC their work in the center was a means to an end—the means by which they could exit graduate school accruing minimal loan debt and/or “inflate the C.V.” However, since the Writing Center has obtained more exposure and support, this is quickly changing. One of these respondents shared in her interview that without this ex-perience, she would have never been able to comprehend how the role of the writing center can vary so much at different institutions. She is now able to think of her writing center duties as a professional experience, “not just a chore handed down” to her. Thus, these students went from believing the writing center to be a means to an end, a duty handed down to them, to speaking with professional writing consultants and WPAs from around the country and coming to believe that the writing centers can be sites for viable career options.

In addition to the benefits we’ve seen in the Writing Center, many of the students also benefitted personally from the conferences. When asked if their experience at IWCAC and CCCC changed their life goals, 85% responded positively. In a question that further investigat-ed how their plans changed 85% of students said they made valuable professional connections at WCCs and 71% made the decision to attend a particular graduate program. One student noted that she had made more than ten professional contacts: five of these contacts study and/or work at her PhD. program of interest, with three other contacts studying/working at other PhD programs on the student’s list. This student also spoke to professionals who managed to obtain their PhDs in her chosen field and work in a WC. This student is now open to the WC as a career or part of her career at an institution. Similarly, Student A has gone as far as changing her “focus of study to Composition and Rhetoric,” noting that “being a writing center tutor as well as a writing center professional has helped [her] understand the in and outs of composition and has translated well in teaching First Year Composition.”

to Figure 2. Pre- and Post-Writing Center Conference Participation. This figure illustrates the posi-tive impacts on tutor confidence, their view of the field of Writing Center Studies, and their view of the A-State Writing Center.

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While 100% of students interviewed and surveyed said they would participate in aca-demic conferences again and they would recommend the WCC experience to other graduate students, budget realities decrease the likelihood that the Arkansas State University Writing Center and other writing centers across the country will be able to take their staffs to WCCs. Of the eight Arkansas University Writing Consultants who attended the IWCAC and CCCC, not one of the students had their experience fully funded by the institution. In fact, two students (C&E) did not receive any direct funding from their institution, but only $150 in funds as a part of a small one-time grant obtained by the WPA. Similarly, of the four Writing Center Directors interviewed, only Writing Center Directors A and B have budgets that include funds earmarked specifically for professional development, though, as Writing Center Director B explained, “the department usually controls this so [she doesn’t] know the amount limit.” Neither Writing Center Director A nor B has enough funds to take the whole staff to a conference. Still, Writing Center Director B plans to take half of her staff to a WCC this year. Writing Center Director B shared her views on the importance of WCCs:

Many of our consultants want to go to graduate school, so exposing them to scholarship and professional conferences, and to leadership roles on campus and in the community really help them mature. The consultants I work with here have grown into polished, confident, curious young people who are very enthusi-astic about writing, and about their school and their communities. (Writing Cen-ter Director B)

Writing Center Director D noted that though the funding resources are not ample enough to fully cover conference travel, her institution does seem to value conference travel for graduate students, but seemingly not WCC travel, fearing this is representative of the value, or lack thereof, the institution places on the discipline of Writing Center Studies.

The effects of low funding resound in the students’ discussion of their goals. Student A, who had “almost everything” covered by her institution, says, “Funding is the number one de-terrent for more professionalizing. It’s very costly.” She also noted that, in order to obtain this funding, she exhausted “all of her funding options” for this one trip, obtaining funding from four different places on campus. She also added that she does not “submit to more conferences than [she] think[s] [she] can afford.” As a result, she is forced to “[do] fewer conferences per year to save money.” This pragmatic reality directly affects her and other graduate students’ chances of acceptance into competitive Ph.D. programs, since, as another respondent noted, “for someone who wants to get into a PhD program, attending two conferences a year can real-ly distinguish you from your peers” (WPA). None of the students interviewed believed their in-stitution could/would budget more than one conference a year. This creates an issue for not only the students’ future goals, particularly for those who wish to enter Ph.D. programs, but al-so for their own professionalization and confidence.

Conclusions

As scholarship in Writing Center Studies and our daily experiences in our centers illus-

trate, many of our faculty colleagues across campus and, as North (1984) suggested, some-

times even in our own departments don’t understand the roles of the writing center on our cam-

puses (p. 433). Many of these same faculty members are not just oblivious to the abundance of

innovative and advantageous research being conducted in Writing Center Studies, but they are

unaware the field even exists. Our three-part study suggests these misconceptions can be

passed down from faculty to the graduate students who work in our centers. When we take into

account Melissa Nicolas’ (2008) suggestion that “graduate students are most definitely stu-

dents, people who are learning about and becoming initiated into a field or discipline” (p. 1), we

see how writing centers have an uphill battle. While courses, such as A-State’s

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Preceptorship in Professional Tutoring contribute to writing consultants’ learning and applying of best practices in the field of Writing Center Studies and improve their perceptions of the field, they are not as effective in aiding writing consultants to see themselves as profes-sionals in the field. To the contrary, attendance at WCCs allows writing consultants’ to experi-ence the field firsthand. They give writing consultants the opportunity to participate in the na-tional writing center conversation and community, an involvement sure to benefit their writing center’s morale, policies and practices. In fact, the Arkansas State University Writing Center and writing centers throughout Arkansas have witnessed participation in WCCs transforming tutors into professional tutors. To this end, it is up to writing center directors to ensure that col-leagues who work in our centers are given the opportunity to attend WCCs.

In fact, once dormant, the Arkansas State University Writing Center is not only seeing more students than ever before, with visits now up more than 1000% from 2012, but it is in-creasingly becoming the focal point for WAC/WID initiatives, general writing support and schol-arship for students and faculty across the campus. As of 2013, the writing consultants now take a required, credit-bearing, graduate-level tutoring theory and pedagogy course their first semester in the center in addition to attending a summer pre-service orientation and training. In addition to developing faculty and graduate student writing groups, which are facilitated by the writing center, but allow the members autonomy and the ability to self-regulate as they en-gage further in the discourses and conventions of their disciplines, the Arkansas State Univer-sity Writing Center has recently expanded efforts to reach the across the disciplines, working with the departments of Social Work, Business, Education, Engineering, and Agriculture, to name a few, to create better writing support structures, resources, new writing courses, and workshops aimed at helping Arkansas State University students and instructors. Additionally, we have opened Graduate Assistant writing consultant positions to departments outside of English, to better support undergraduate and graduate writing in specific disciplines. Lastly, the university recently built us a new space—one that is well-lit, spacious, and has a coherent de-sign. None of this would have been possible without the enthusiasm, hard work, and dedica-tion of our post-conference writing consultants and none of this may be possible in the future without financial support earmarked in our budgets for writing consultants to attend WCCs.

References

Arkansas State University (2014, October 1). Admissions. Web. 1 October 2014.

Calma, A. (2013). Preparing Tutors to Hit the Ground Running: Lessons from New Tutors’ Ex-periences. Issues in Educational Research, 23.3, 331-345.

Long, M. C., Holberg, J. & Taylor, M. M. Beyond Apprenticeship: Graduate Students, Profes-sional Development Programs and the Future(s) of English Studies. WPA, 20.1/2, 66-78.

Nicolas, M. (2008). (E)Merging Identities: Graduate Students in the Writing Center. Southlake: Fountainhead Press.

North, S. (1984). The Idea of a Writing Center. College English, 46.5, 433-446.

Vandenberg, P. (1999). Lessons of Inscription: Tutor Training and the ‘Professional Conversa-tion’. The Writing Center Journal, 19.2, 59-83.

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Appendix 1:Writing Consultant Interview Questions

*Note: each interview developed into its own conversation depending upon the responses to questions. Each of these questions was asked, but some interviews contain more dialogue and further questioning. Interviews transcripts are available upon request.

What were your Student status, GA ship, and Tutor position at the time of the conferences?

How long have you been a WC Tutor?

Why were you a tutor?

What did you consider your duties and responsibilities to be as a tutor?

What were your goals in your education?

Were you interested in the WC as a career?

What were your perceptions of the WC?

What about after the conference?

Did those perceptions change? How?

Do you now consider your duties and responsibilities differently? Did something specific cause them to change? Have you acted on any of these changed perceptions, i.e. changed your focus of study, considered different schools, etc.?

Can you describe an event that was significant during your professionalization experience?

Why was it significant?

Did your experience change any of your plans or goals? (Either concerning the WC or not)

Did you have funding for this experience?

Where did the funding come from, and what percentage of your expenses did it cover?

Did you find your institution helpful and supportive in your endeavor? Why and why not?

If you had adequate funding, would you continue participating in professionalization oppor-tunities?

Does the availability of funding affect your decision to submit to conferences?

Do you believe your participation in these events will affect your future goals?

Do you feel it is imperative for you to participate in such events?

What role do you feel professionalization experiences play in a Graduate Assistant and WC Tutor’s life and career goals?

Through your experiences have you been able to better contribute to your institution? How?

What do you feel professionalization has done for you?

To whom would you recommend professionalization experiences?

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Appendix 2: Spring 2014 Online Survey Questions

1. What was your status during spring 2014?

2. How would you rate your professional experience?

3. Did the experience change your life plans or goals?

4. If you said yes, how did your plans change?

5. Was your trip funded?

6. How helpful was the institution in providing resources for your trip?

7. If your trip was funded, would you continue to participate in academic conferences?

8. Did you feel supported by faculty?

9. Overall, how would you rate your experience?

Would you recommend the conference experience to other graduate students?

Appendix 3: Summer 2014 Online Survey Questions

1. Prior to the spring semester, did you think of the writing center as a field of study?

2. Prior to the spring semester, did you want to make changes in the ASU Writing Center?

3. Prior to the spring semester, did you think of yourself as a professional tutor?

4. Prior to the spring semester, did you consider pursuing a career in a writing center?

5. After IWCA, did you think of the writing center as a field of study?

6. After IWCA, did you want to make changes in the ASU Writing Center?

7. After IWCA, did you think of yourself as a professional tutor?

8. After IWCA, did you consider pursuing a career in a writing center?

9. Did attending IWCA change your attitude toward the ASU Writing Center?

10. Did you change your tutoring style after IWCA?

Did you feel more confident about your tutoring after IWCA?

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Appendix 4: Interview Questions for Writing Center Directors

1) Does your Writing Center have its own budget? If so, how much is your budget?

2) What would you characterize as the perception of the Writing Center and Writing Center Studies, as a discipline, upon Writing Consultants' entry to the center?

3) Briefly explain your tutor-training process.

4) If you have a budget, does you budget include funds for tutors' professional development? If so, how much?

5) Have any of your tutors traveled to Writing Center Conferences? If so, about what percent-age of the staff and what conference/s? If not, why not?

6) If your tutors have attended Writing Center conferences, what did you see as the specific benefits of their participation?

7) Do you think professional development is important for Writing Consultants? If so, why?

8) Is there anything else you would like to add regarding Writing Consultants' and/or tutors' professional development?

Kristi Costello, Ph.D., is the Director of the Writing Program and Writing Center, as well as an Assistant Professor of Composition and Rhetoric, at Arkansas State University. Leslie Malland and Loren “Skye” Roberson are Arkan-sas State University alums who worked as writing consultants at the Arkansas State University Writing Center. Malland is entering University of Cincinnati as a Ph.D. student. Roberson is entering University of Memphis as a Ph.D. student. Kristi Murray Costello, Ph.D. Assistant Professor and Director of Writing Program and Writing Center Arkansas State University Leslie R. Malland Ph.D. Student, Renaissance Literature University of Kentucky Loren Skye Roberson Ph.D. Student, Composition Studies University of Memphis

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Ryan Kelly, Ph.D.

Epic Resonance of Vygotsky

I recently found myself engrossed in Mind in Society, where among the many theoreti-cal positions Vygotsky (1978) explores (including the epically familiar Zone of Proximal Devel-opment), is a notion that “learning is development” (p. 80). While we traditionally associate his thinking to primarily cooperative learning classrooms, the breadth of Vygotsky’s thinking in many ways spans all social engagement and collaboration that fosters our learning. When de-fining his zone, he adds that actual development is relative to potential development—which is “determined through problem solving under adult guidance or in collaboration with more capa-ble peers” (p. 86). He “views earning as a profoundly social process, emphasizes dialogue and the varied roles that language plays in instruction in in mediated cognitive growth” (John-Steiner & Souberman, 1978, p. 131). The sheer resonance of this, and likely the sum impact of his work in front of me, brought upon me an onslaught of memory and experiences in my own learning, development, and those who have mentored me over the years. While I shud-der to think where I would be right now without a humbling array of individuals who gave their time and energy toward my own learning process (e.g. my teachers, professors, and col-leagues), I am even more awestruck by the track record of more knowledgeable individuals with whom I have worked in the past.

From High School to Preservice Teaching Perhaps it is a symptom of time gone by, but I find myself dwelling a great deal more on early mentoring from high school and preservice teaching. The very fact that I am penning this very column right now may very well have its most key roots in my 10th grade Honors English teacher. The very thought of an honors course, at the time, was not something I was particu-larly thrilled about (e.g. more rigor). What I discovered was a veteran high school teacher of many years who was profoundly passionate about the connections students make with the lit-erature they read, and the emerging thoughts produced in writing. His classroom wall was decorated with the “golden ideas” of students, former and present, and in the years since I do not think I have ever encountered something that motivated a reader to push the limits of their own comprehension and synthesis than the sight of their own golden idea up on his wall. As my interest in writing grew, he gave of his own time to mentor my writing after school in an offi-cial independent study for class credit. This may very well have been some of the richest learning dialogue I ever experienced; looking back, I see quantum leaps in my cognitive growth (writing) occurred here. If I could somehow motivate even one preservice teacher to be of this caliber, I could retire a happy man. By contrast, I discovered at the same time a newly hired journalism teacher as I pound-ed the pavement and covered the news and features beat for the school paper. With middle and secondary teaching, younger teachers immediately seem easy to relate to—perhaps this is a stereotype, but at the time I found it to be true in my high school. This journalism teacher immediately engaged us with the ethics of journalism, weaving these concepts deeply into eve-ry conversation and decision and idea and column inch of our writing. I had no idea at the time, but this ethical foundation was in every sense a 1:1 when it came to professionalism. Yet, at the same time there was nothing stale about our work with this school paper; he urged creativity, new ideas, and even the kind of energy that allows student reporters to feel in every

Teacher Voices……..

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sense like real reporters. While I’m sure we worried him from time to time with our ideas and reporting, things worked out okay every time because he gave us an essential foundation to build upon. The world of college seemed to magnify the presence of more knowledgeable others tenfold (when in reality, I’m sure it was more). As an English major I encountered multiple pro-fessors that opened the door to a greater level of scholarship with what, by that time, became a strong love affair with American and British literature. I had no idea at the time, but my Shakespeare professor was perhaps the most rigorous (that’s a more pedagogically appropri-ate word for being epically brilliant in her field; Vygotsky might have called her a “most knowl-edgeable other”). Fifteen plays in sixteen weeks was the reading load (I did not commit the writing load to memory; it must have been that intense), and while I found it torturous at the time, by the fifth or sixth play I discovered that I, myself, was Shakespearean; such immersion made the Bard’s works alive, vivid, LOL funny, and provocative. I have never encountered a final exam (not even in doctoral candidacy) like this one. It almost broke me; and yet I remem-ber it fondly because that very immersion empowered me to comprehend and connect the readings in thrilling ways. As I shifted toward English education, I actively sought out those professors I connect-ed best with, and who energized my love of literature further, including one professor whose three courses became a “backbone” of my major coursework: Selected American Authors (Thoreau), Literature and Culture of America before 1800, and Literature of the Old West. Lucky for me I never had to choose between these in the same semester. And as I bridged the gap between English major and English teacher I found an English education advisor that adopted my entire cohort and protected us like a big sister, while at the same time motivating us to independently seek our own professional growth and savor our field experiences. While in the thick of methods courses (and feeling somewhat distant now from our literature classes), dialogue shared with one faculty member in particular helped us reach back and recapture our passion for the literature we loved and route that passion right back into our lesson planning (just in time for student teaching). I still have the audio cassettes where he dictated feedback to each of us on our coursework—often 20-30 minutes of verbal feedback, which we all played again and again.

In My First School and Graduate School Mentoring took on a significant and explicit change as I entered the teaching profes-sion. Suddely the process became significantly more formal, more scheduled, and with a great deal more paperwork. This did not, however, diminish any of the Vygotskyian power held by the process. I often joked at the time that there was a great deal of drama surrounding my mentor in my first teaching job (he was the drama teacher and director at the school). We enjoyed a number of common planning hours, the ease of conversations and evening meals from time to time. While teachers are certainly known for talking about teaching, it always felt effortless with my mentor teacher. On the observation and paperwork side of things, his feed-back was always formative, constructive, and useful. And more importantly, he was always willing to listen and give me perspective when needed—but most importantly (based on my own personality and drive), he was able to give me the independence to do my job, and reflect on the outcome. As if that was not a complex enough shift in the reality of mentoring, graduate school brought about perhaps the most comprehensive and heavy hitting package of mentoring expe-riences I have ever known. I’m not entirely sure what I thought this would feel like at the grad-uate school (beyond working with a thesis advisor). I discovered mentors everywhere. In-deed, for a new graduate student at a major university, it would be better described

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as “swimming in a sea of more knowledable others.” Indeed, Vygotsy, himself, would probably have told me to slow down a bit. Early experiences with coursework brought mentorship in theoretical content—and a number of these professors became members of my master’s the-sis committee. One professor in particular, who I served for multiple years as a teaching as-sistant in a large lecture class, mentored me a great deal in terms of the life, workload, and pressures of the professoriate. And, as I began working on funded research projects, the mentorship by the professors who were principal investigators took on a very unique quality: research methodology, data, and analysis. Doctoral candidacy, simply put, would be impossible without mentorship. In fact, I do not think my dissertation would have even sparked to life without the depth of conversations, advice, feedback, and encouragement of those who advised my work. One of the things I have always appreciated most was a committee of learned more knowledgable others, five to be exact, who all were generous enough to give me their time and feedback. While my major professor was the key “lens” of much of this advice, each member of my committee represent-ed somewhat different more knowledgable areas of my work, and significantly more knowledg-able perspectives on the dissertation process (which, for some in my line of work, includes ten-fold more Vygotsky than I have cited here!). In some ways, the dissertation is the most grand to-do list, at times a nearly endless one, but merely a process. In other ways, it containes hur-dles and barriers that cannot be crossed without these mentors. In the worst of times it always turned out that a 10 minute conversation with one of these mentors was the key. While one might think that this comes to a close upon defense of the dissertation, the emails continue to flow. Epilogue: Professorfront and Homefront Writing this column most certainly does not mean I have graduated from the need for the mentoring presence of more knowledgable others. Perhaps the greatest perk of the job, once graduate school is complete and a position secured, is that one becomes surrounded by a new type of mentors: colleagues. This comes in many forms, across committees and pro-grams and administrative structures, but the common thread of collaboration and synergy dominates it all. As I look back to my early days of preservice teaching, the seeds of this colle-giality was certainly there in the professors and role models I worked with in college; it was certainly enhanced as I worked more closely with professors as a graduate student; and has even taken time to refine over the past six years. Promotion and tenure, that process that dominates the hearts and minds of professors, is a process that would be impossible in isola-tion. By my second year, try though I did, I was not able to keep count of the moments of ad-vice and perspective given by my colleagues. To this day the work continues, and as this col-umn goes to press I will no doubt be consulting one colleague or another on something, or meeting with a group of colleagues to work together on university business. It never ends; it is a way of life. And I am extremely humbled to be able to model (effectively, I hope) these dis-positions and collaborations for other faculty, and especially for my undergraduate and gradu-ate students.

Yet, I would be remiss if I failed to mention the mentorship that happens on the home-front. Everything I know about marriage and parenting was developed in concert and collabo-ration with my wife. She teaches me constant lessons in effective management of work and home life, she offers me constant perspective and emotional support, and has distinguished herself as a unique type of more knowledgable other in my life. Taken all together, the men-torship and presence of these others that I have detailed here has been a journey, yes, and a constructive process, definitely. But more importantly, it has been the very ingredients of my professional and academic life. While it is not possible to unravel the tapestry of life in order to

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identify precisely how important each has been, I do know that each is a vital thread that tells the story, and has woven me on my way. And the journey, the mentorship, continues to this day. Our Essential Component in Learning and Development

Perhaps the reason why Vygotsky’s text resonated so with me was due to some litera-ture review writing in which I was dabbling—an engaging article with vibrant connection be-tween classic Vygotsky and technology in the classroom. In this article, Cicconi (2014) re-minds us that the more knowledgeable other is quite simply:

…an essential component of the learning process and defines it as someone with more knowledge or a greater understanding of a particular task or process than the learner. Decades later, educational research still supports his theoretical stance: socialization and collaboration play a vital role in learning. (p. 58)

She furthermore adds that “educators often identify the MKO as an advanced peer or an adult in the classroom” (p. 58). I couldn’t support this theoretical stance more; and I couldn’t be more thankful for the presence of these individuals—and the presence of their greater knowledge or understanding—and how it has very clearly shaped my life and career as an ed-ucator. Yet, educators must not relegate this stance to their cooperative learning groups of students alone. My roster of mentors each reached beyond traditional professional stances on their apporoaches to teaching and learning, and embraced me in something akin to a young colleague, certainly much more than a mere pupil, and invested energy in my learning and de-velopment.

Ultimately, my message to any educator or professional who may be reading this col-umn is this: it is vital that we always have and always interact with a mentoring voice through every level of our journey. Even if we happen to be mentors ourselves. We may not think we need it all the time; we may think we have everything under control. An independent streak is certainly not a bad thing. But, when we take a step back and identify those voices that once resonated with us, resonate with us now, and could resonate further with us if only we listen, we will discover that we are surrounded by more knowledgeable others who are invested in mentoring us. We all have benefitted from the presence and insight of others; we all have ac-cess to those who can send us to new levels of thinking, productivity, and action. Without mentoring in life and education, teaching and learning and development itself would, quite simply, not occur.

References

Cicconi, M. (2014). Vygotsky meets technology: A reinvention of collaboration in the early childhood mathematics classroom. Early Childhood Education Journal 42(1), 57-65.

John-Steiner, V., & Souberman, E. (1978). Afterward. In M. Cole, V. John-Steiner, S. Scribner,

& E. Souberman (Eds.), Mind in Society: The Development of Higher Psychological Processes (pp. 121-133). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Vygotsky, L. S. (1978). Mind in Society: The Development of Higher Psychological Processes.

In M. Cole, V. John-Steiner, S. Scribner, & E. Souberman (Eds.). Cambridge, MA: Har-vard University Press.

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England is a rich land, the native scenery of both our mother tongue and the most rec-ognizable voices of our language. The literary history of this kingdom enlivens its every village and city in ways that the United States has not yet had time to develop. The truism that claims a hundred miles is a long way in England and a hundred years is a long time in American is more truth than exaggeration. The millennia of English cultural development are visible in the juxtaposition of old, ancient, and modern influences and in their comfortable familiarity of inter-action. A sense of time evolves when the pub known as the New Inn proudly boasts construc-tion from the 1600s. The Royal Crescent of Bath has existed virtually unchanged since before our grandparents and great-grandparents were conceived. Artifacts from the medieval period are, admittedly, rare but traces of this time are evident and available for public appreciation, and historical discoveries are ongoing. Public interest in the opening of King Richard III’s makeshift grave and his tardy royal interment demonstrate the ceaseless enthusiasm for the stories of historical fact and legend.

The ongoing development of technology allows students new access to such spaces,

but such access is merely virtual and lacks the immediacy, the power, and the personal rele-vance of face-to-face experiences. Such personal relevance is essential to true learning and is a remarkable enrichment of any exploration of the voices this richly literary land has produced. Studying the voices in their geographic context offers the best opportunity for comprehending the ideas the writers share in their literary works. Shakespeare and the Lake District writers are primary examples of authors whose voices students struggle to absorb. A first-hand expe-rience with the land that influenced and was influenced by their voices creates a background that excites a desire to understand and motivates appreciation for reading the complex texts of their literary works. A community in which a group of students read with motivation can result in lessons absorption that changes lives entirely and irrevocably for the better. This is the layer of learning most challenging for students in rural Arkansas.

The force of learning from travel is profound. For this reason, Victorian scholars of social standing were expected to take The Grand Tour before they assumed their place in the world and undertook the duties of adulthood and their social station. Travel is in itself a form of edu-cation. The cultural exposure, the practice of critical thinking skills, the immersion of the indi-vidual into the diversity of the unfamiliar, and the expanding context for examining beliefs and behaviors is priceless. Particularly for students whose geographical experience is limited to Arkansas, travel is the ideal laboratory for exploring one’s voice and seeking the limits of one’s potential. The self confidence that results from becoming a part of a successful travel team forms a solid foundation for all efforts at learning.

Exploring the geographic proximity of the author’s life and composition develops in stu-dents a buy-in. Students feel invested in championing the voices they experience in this way as intellectual intimacy with authors empowers their efforts at mastery. The anticipated strug-gle to wrestle meaning from distant and detached literature becomes a challenge to demon-strate strengths. Students take justifiable pride in such personal growth and development.

Kay Walter, Ph.D.

Literary Voices of England

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It should be part of our job as teachers of English and Language Arts to encourage the intellectual curiosity that leads to such growth and development. We must both encourage them to travel and prepare them to travel. If I cannot take my World Literature classes on field trips to the Lake District of England when we study Wordsworth, I can help them to envision themselves as future travelers. I can be a traveler and model for them a successful example to follow. I can help them investigate travel by exploring literary works from outside the United States. I can include designing a travel brochure as a possible response to reading literature. (This is especially fun with a text such as The Odyssey. Imagine!) I can require my students to make written contact with a librarian or a museum curator or a scholar from another country as part of a research project. The more our students participate in such activities, the more navi-gable their world becomes. They grow ever more likely to develop richly-instructed, authentic voices with something wonderful to say.

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Dawn Bessee, Ed. D.

Thank You, Sam

It was a day like most where I was prepared to step into a classroom to model a lesson.

Actually, I was practicing a lesson, and a wonderful teacher was kind enough to lend me her

8th grade English class. The class was full of typical young adolescents—those who excelled,

those who did not, and those who felt they could not. Seeing that they were going to have a

“guest teacher” on a Friday morning near the end of the school year impacted each one in a

slightly different way. When I was introduced, I was met with eager smiles, blank stares, and

open indifference. It was going to be an interesting group, but I really needed to go through my

lesson. When the teacher left the room and closed the door behind her, I took a deep breath

and stepped in front of the class.

My lesson was two-fold in its purpose. I wanted students to practice close reading and

analysis of author’s craft in a text, and I wanted them to use the knowledge they had gained

from that analysis and replicate the craft in their own writing. I knew that time was of the es-

sence, and I needed a powerful exemplar that would yield deep, critical thinking without taking

more than half of the class period. I selected a classic go-to piece, “Mother to Son,” by Lang-

ston Hughes.

We analyzed for theme, vocabulary, extended metaphor, positives, and negatives. We

discussed how Hughes didn’t simply tell a story of how a mother encouraged her son to perse-

vere in the face of adversity. Hughes used words to paint a vivid picture of the condition of the

stairs, the physicality of the stairs, and the choices made on the stairs. Engaged and animat-

ed, the students used his words to infer what may have happened to this mother to warrant her

description of her life: “tacks…splinters…torn up…bare…dark….” At the close of our discus-

sion, we noted the overall structure of the text--the order in which the mother shares infor-

mation with her son, and how that affected the reader. I felt confident that the students were

ready to take that knowledge and create their own messages.

I gave the students a few minutes to brainstorm ideas for their writing. I wanted them to

replicate the structure and the message in Hughes’s piece, but I told them that they had to use

something that they could relate to. The room literally buzzed as students shared thoughts and

ideas with one another. Everyone seemed to be actively participating in the assignment. Eve-

ryone except Sam*.

He sat over in the corner, away from everyone else, and leaned over his desk to block

his paper from view. I’ll admit it; I didn’t know exactly what to do with Sam or for him. I had no

background on any of the students. I would walk by his desk occasionally and ask if he had

any questions or needed any help. He would shake his head “no” and throw his arm over his

paper until I walked away. I could see that he had written something on his paper, but I had no

clue as to what he was writing. I was torn as to how much time I should invest in this kid. I was

really there to get a feel for my timing of the lesson and make sure that students understood

what I wanted them to do. So I meandered from table to table and talked to the students who

were more than willing to share their work with me.

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At the conclusion of class, I asked for volunteers to share their writing with the group. There

were witty pieces that compared life to food, fishing, and hitting a homerun. More serious piec-

es compared life to mountains, video games, and even an elevator (no, that wasn’t a far stretch

from the crystal stair analogy, but the student did work hard to articulate her message. What

she lacked in creativity, she made up for in tenacity.). Sam did not volunteer to read his out

loud, nor did he let anyone else read it for him. I was sure I would never know what thoughts he

had captured on his paper.

Out of habit, the students placed their papers in the tray as they filed out the door. The

teacher had returned by the time class was over, and she and I discussed the class as she

handed me the stack of papers to take and read. I asked her about Sam, and she told me that

he was a quiet kid. He rarely did his work in any of his classes, what work he did complete was

average at best, and there had been mention made of referring him for special education ser-

vices. My heart hurt at the thought, and I silently admonished myself for not helping him more

while I had the opportunity.

When I had a moment, I sat down to read through everyone’s writing. I wanted to see

what the students had created, but more importantly, I wanted to see if I had been an effective

teacher while sharing that lesson. Could I see patterns in what the kids wrote? Were they mak-

ing the same mistakes? Having the same successes? How could I use that information to im-

prove my teaching? I scoured the pages for evidence—reading, scanning, re-reading--until I

happened upon Sam’s paper.

Life for me ain’t been no drive in the countryside.

It’s had nails, roadblocks, and crashes;

But I’ve kept on riding.

Don’t pull over or pick someone up.

Drive and don’t ever look back

or you will dwell in the past

like you gawk at a wreck on the side of the road.

Don’t be like me, crashing and going through with no regrets,

because the penalties get taxing.

Just keep on driving.

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I can’t say exactly what I was expecting to read in Sam’s paper, but I can say without a

doubt that I was not expecting to read what he had actually written. Again and again I read his

words. No, it wasn’t perfect. It wasn’t written neatly. It didn’t follow the pure structure we had

discussed in class. But he wrote. For all intents and purposes, he completed the assignment

and had done what I had asked of him. More importantly, he made me—the reader—look for

hidden meaning in his words. What kind of life had this kid endured? Did he have regrets? Did

he grapple with dwelling on past mistakes? Was his writing sincere, or had he created what he

thought I wanted him to create? Regardless of the answer, I think it was safe to say that Sam

was capable of more than what was previously thought. Had I known more about the percep-

tions of Sam as a learner, or if I had pushed too hard to venture into his space while he was

writing, I might have missed the opportunity to read his work.

And so I say thank you, Sam, for reminding me that outward appearances and postur-

ing are not always a true indication of the heart or the mind of the student. For reminding me

that students can listen even when they aren’t looking. For reminding me that every student

can blossom in their own time. And for reminding me that I am still learning.

*The student’s name has been changed

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Our third nine weeks unit is easily my favorite unit that we teach. We spend three months, from January to March, teaching our students texts from and about the American Civil Rights Movement. This year, this unit of study has taken on a new significance for me. In past years, the unrest of our society has been more subdued and has lived further in the back-ground of everyday life. However, that anger and anxiety and unrest has risen again to the front pages of our newspapers and the forefront of our thoughts as events like those in Fergu-son, Missouri have reminded Americans that we've still got work to do. As an educator, I want to move beyond "teaching tolerance." I don't want to teach chil-dren to tolerate each other, to see their difference as something to simply be allowed. I want to teach acceptance. I want to teach justice. I want to teach equity. Life won't always be fair, but we should strive to ensure that it is just. In an effort to bring these ideas to an applicable level in my middle schoolers' lives, I ask students to write their own "I Have a Dream" speeches, to denounce bullying and honor the work and writing of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. I've shared ex-cerpts of these speeches in previous blog posts, but as I sat at Starbucks this morning grading this group of speeches, I came across one that I could not help but share in its entirety. This student's speech spoke straight to my heart, and it I hope it will speak to yours, too.

The Bottom Line Bullying stands as a great obstacle in the face of today's society. On a daily basis, there are about 2.1 million bullies bullying over 2.7 million victims in American schools alone. Bullying has never been such an urgent matter as it is in this generation. But I believe that the great fires of hatred and discrimination may be put out by the sweetest waters of kindness. But I believe that the great shadow of bullying that looms over its victims can and will go away by the brightest lights of friendship. But I believe that if we stand together as one against this great tyrant we face today, we will overcome it. Students who are victims of this great terror, stand together! We will not tolerate the pain that these bully terrorists have put on the children of our schools, our playgrounds, and our very homes. I want a world free of the fear of going to school to learn and receive a free education because of the bullies that await them. I want a world free of turning on the TV and seeing another suicide story about a kid who was a victim of bullying. I want a world free of the heavy chains of dealing with a bully weighing down upon kids' shoulders. I want a world free from bullying. Dr. King had a dream years ago not much different from the one I present before you today. Just as African Americans were bearing the weight of racism, students bear the weight of bullying. Just as King once said, "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character," I have a dream that no matter what color, size, shape, form, or fashion you are, you will not be judged. This pertains to all people, to those who are red, yellow, black, and white; no matter your race, you will not be judged. Those of us who are not victims, we must not forget those who are. We must not forget the pain, the guilt, the suffering they must be going through! Victims, you must not forget that as long as this great menace called bullying torments and rips at your soul, we will stand with you and try to put out this great fire that scorches you today. Bullies! You must not forget that

Jessica Herring

We’ve Got a Ways to Go

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others have feelings, too. And although you may have been a victim yourself, that gives you no right, NO RIGHT to put others in the line of fire. "15% of all school absenteeism is directly relat-ed to fears of being bullied as school. It is estimated that 160,000 children miss school every day due to fear of attack or intimidation by other students." That is 160,000 children that could be learning and taking advantage of their right to a free education but aren't because of bully-ing. The bottom line is that bullying is wrong. It can cause so much pain that kids die every day by their own hand. Hey, and newsflash! Bullying is illegal! And yet, "90% of 4th through 8th graders report being victims of bullying." I'll say it once and I'll say it again, stopping bullying has never been such an urgent matter. We must put an end to it. I hope that in your interactions with others this week, you will think about the way your actions and words reflect your feelings and thoughts. Dr. King said "Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that." We can on-ly continue to make our world better if we constantly and deliberately strive to put light and love into the world around us. We've got a ways to go, but we know where we're headed. Let's be sure we walk in the light.

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Donna Wake, Ed.D.

Advocating for ELA

Over the course of this summer, I had the pleasure of following the meandering path that de-fined Arkansas's (re)consideration of the Common Core. The newly installed Republican gov-ernor called for an examination of the "fit" of the Common Core standards for the students of Arkansas. As a colleague of mine pointed out in his testimony to the commission, "it's as if Ar-kansas is only now considering the Democratic Process and hearing the voices of those most affected and most able to provide guidance - the teachers. This conversation should have tak-en place 4 years ago, not now. But now at least the voices of the teachers may be heard." Let me share a brief timeline of the summer’s events in Arkansas around the CCSS before edi-torializing the issue.

April: Open call for and selection of special Council on Common Core Review to make rec-ommendations about Arkansas’s continued use of the CCSS

June: Commission held “listening tours” across the state as well as panel hearings at the state capitol

June 8: Based on Council recommendations, the governor announced the state was not going tor renew its contract with PARCC and would instead be entering a contract with ACT Aspire.

June 11: the state board of education rejected the governor’s decision as they felt it was political and rushed and would cause distress to teachers in the state to switch to a 3rd test in 3 years.

June 30th. Council makes formal recommendations to include retaining "some elements" of Common Core but that Arkansas will also "make improvements where needed." The recommendation also includes renaming the standards to "better reflect the state's needs."

July 9: Arkansas State Board of Education (with three new governor appointees) voted 4-2-2 to drop PARCC and adopt ACT Aspire reversing the June vote.

September: Arkansas Department of Education published the CCSS revision time-line targeting final draft of the revised CCSS for Arkansas to be submitted to the state board for approval by June 2016. Currently Arkansas teachers are invited to give input on the existing CCSS standards via a survey on the Arkansas Department of Education website. In part, the governor's request was a reaction to the loud media buzz around the PARCC test requirements or the buzz built around the opt-out movements that sprang up in the state in March and April. In part, the governor's request was a reaction to the loud media buzz about the charter school movement that assumes that the practice of public schools are somehow "wrong" for some students and confuses the conversation about common standards and accountability. In part, the governor's request was simply the response of a newly-elected Republican Gover-nor to standards issued under a Democratic president and adopted by the previous state ad-ministration.

Advocating for ELA……..

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Regardless of motivation, the stated purpose of examining the CCSS was the "fit" of the stand-ards for Arkansas students. I found this to be a spurious motivation for re-examining the stand-ards for many reasons. First, this argument assumes that somehow kids in Arkansas are qualitatively different from kids in other states. While I would assume some variation in kids across states, I would doubt that these differences are vast enough to call for a whole different set of standards. I have worked in K-12 and higher education settings in several states in my career (namely, Missis-sippi, California, Pennsylvania, and now Arkansas). In my work, it seems to me that kids in Philadelphia share more similarities to kids in Little Rock than there are differences. This argument that Arkansas kids need different standards also deteriorates when you actually read the CCSS. It has always been my opinion that the standards are a road for WHAT to teach, but not HOW to teach it. So even if kids were somehow qualitatively different, as a teacher you could still tailor how you taught to a standard and what materials you chose to meet that standard based on local kids' needs and contexts. Second the governor's supposition that the kids are different enough in Arkansas to require specialized standards assume that the kids in Arkansas are somehow qualitatively similar with-in the confines of the state border. Which I know to be false. The kids in Little Rock have vastly different experiences than the kids in Springdale, Pine Bluff, Jonesboro, Texarkana, Eudora, or Deer (yes, Deer, Arkansas - google it). If we were to take this argument to an extreme, you might argue that each district, or even each school, needs its own standards. At best, we might image a repertoire or menu of stand-ards for this situation. For example, if you are a poor, rural school with no diversity, then choose standard set "A". If you are an urban school with 30% of students unable to speak Eng-lish, then select standard set "B." And so on. At every point during this process, I attempted to have a voice in the action and was denied. I applied to be on the Council and (thankfully) was not selected. I say thankfully because the Council schedule was truly grueling. The committee, headed by our ambitious lieutenant gov-ernor, soon published a grueling schedule. Truly, it was. I was glad my name had not been se-lected. My hat goes off to those who did serve in this capacity. The committee had open "listening tour" meetings across the state. There were also panel hearings held in the state capitol building in Little Rock. I was also not selected to be a panelist but several of my colleagues whom I greatly admire did get a chance to give testimony. In these open (and webcast) sessions, selected panelists were asked to give their position on the CCSS and to then respond to questions asked by the com-mittee members, some of whom appeared to take their work with great seriousness and con-cern and with dedicated intelligence while a few others did seem to lose their focus engage in verbal meandering. I continued to watch the goings one with great interest. I noted that the government did appear to be involving the voices of teachers and teacher educators to a great extent. As my friend noted – “This conversation should have taken place 4 years ago, not now. But now at least the voices of the teachers may be heard." Indeed, that appears to be happening.

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For now, Arkansas has indeed embarked on a process to revise the CCSS based on the Council’s June recommendations. Arkansas Department of Education published the CCSS revision timeline targeting final draft of the revised CCSS for Arkansas to be submitted to the state board for approval by June 2016. Currently Arkansas teachers are invited to give input on the existing CCSS standards via a survey on the Arkansas Department of Education website. I will be interested to see what Arkansas does to make the CCSS better “fit” kids in the state.

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One year for Christmas, when I was in college, my mom got me a little silver plaque with the Se-renity Prayer engraved on it. She's always known that I like to be in control, and apparently she knew much better than I did that I needed a constant reminder that I don't al-ways get to make the decisions. When I first started teaching, that little Serenity Prayer plaque was the first thing I set up on my very first teacher desk. It's been on my desk at work, in basically the same place, ever since then. Honestly, there are many days when I forget that it's there at all. But lately, I've found myself repeating that little prayer in my head throughout the day. If you've every read any post I have ever written before, you may have a sense that I am a girl who likes to be in control of things. I like order and focus and a clear plan of action. However, I have been reminded in so many ways over the past month or so that I simply can't have all those things all the time. Our English team at the middle school has been doing a book study on Deliberate Optimism by Debbie Silver, Jack Berckemey-er, and Judith Baenen since Janu-ary and today in our discussion I was reminded all over again that I may not always get to make the choices, but I definitely get to choose how I live with them. In hon-or of my fellow teachers, I would like to recommit myself today to being more deliberately optimistic.

Jessica Herring

A Serenity Prayer for Teachers

Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change…

I can't change the fact that I have to

give a state mandated standardized test that takes away from instructional time.

I can't change the fact that this

legislative session has felt like an attack on my professionalism.

I can't change the fact that there are

more administrative tasks to be done in my classroom than hours in a day.

Courage to change the things I can… I can change my attitude toward

tasks I'd rather not complete. I can change my emotional reaction

to things beyond my control. I can change my approach to each

day by choosing to focus on the positive.

And wisdom to know the difference...

Reflections……..

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We may not get to make all the choices, and we may sometimes feel like we're under attack with all the choices that are being made for us. I'm not saying we need to just lay down and take that. I'm simply saying that there are adult-centered mindsets and then there are student-centered mindsets, and we have to remember why we choose to get up and walk into our classrooms each and every day. This is the real struggle. I find that it's in my nature to want to fix things that aren't working. However, there are moments when we just have to realize that, while parts of the system are struggling, there are some really awesome bright spots in education. There are fantastic educators making amazing, student-centered choices everyday in public education, and I want to be one of those people. I want to keep making lemonade out of my lemons. I had a very awesome, very student-centered principal who used to start every morning by reminding the students and teachers to "Make it a great day or not; the choice is yours." I've been so conscious of that choice lately. I hope I can find the serenity to always make the right ones.

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