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I think that Berthoff does a good job of creating awareness of the way people who aren't specifically English majors can approach literature. He employs techniques that anyone can use to help enrich their learning experience, the dialectical journaling technique is something that I've seen people use in other courses beyond the English classroom. Actively participating with thought and content as it occurs and responding to questions allows for not only understanding of you own thought processes, but also helps to engage the content and the self critically, and substantively.

The purpose of the right side is note taking, but the left hand side is to answer and create questions in response to the material. To listen not only during a lecture or reading itself, but to engage with forming meaning for yourself as a reader.

I also appreciate when she talks about on the first page to preface the reading that "all knowledge is mediated" (Berthoff, pg. 11).
This helps to create this idea that knowledge is incomplete due to the fact that everyone processes and makes sense of facts and meanings differently. Perception, experience, and understanding all play a role in how one understands knowledge.

The ideas of tolerating ambiguity, gushing vs. thinking dialectically, and coming to terms with allatonceness all have implications beyond the literary space and the examination of texts as written pieces. Texts can be viewed as modern media, situations and contexts, constraints of social factors, etc. Thinking about these ideas in regard to texts specifically allow for people to begin engaging in critical thought beyond written words alone.

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I loved this piece. I recall the fact that I work with kids that were around this age when I was going through my last formal English education in high school. Eighth graders tell it like it is.

I think Atwell's goal is noble and helps to create not only a personal attachment to the students, but it helps them gain an educational advocate. I think that through this sort of letter writing journal system, people can speak more freely, within reason, on issues that may cause them to be ridiculed by their peers. I think of the girl at the end of the article who was in remedial classes until she learned Atwell's new approach to reading and thinking about texts. She instantly began to excell. It sometimes takes a critical approach, or a nontraditional approach to writing and literature, and pedagogy in general to help give students a chance to learn.
Kids that age are faced with a lot of social pressures, having an advocate, at least in terms of the students' education, creates a sense that the teacher cares about the chance for their students to excel.

I do appreciate that Atwell goes about creating boundaries for the journal entries as well as having a sort of nudging system. This helps keep conversation focused and deliberate. I also appreciate how there was a beginning of critical thinking and questioning of traditional values. I think of the boy talking about how caring for other men isn't inherently homosexual (Pg. 59-60).

Atwell breaks down conventional aspects of power dynamics in the classroom through this way and seems to form personal bonds over literary critique, analysis help, and literary gossip. It was a very heartening approach to teaching and something that I would like to implement in my own classroom if even given the chance.

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Tedards approach to journaling is very personal and also educational. I found the journaling pieces as a whole this unit to be very informative and interesting in how they help foster personal growth, dialogical thinking, and the importance of the personal voice in writing.
Tedards proposes that a student's journal entries should either be expressive, analytical, or creative.
Expressive and analytical writings focused on the reading itself, while creative responses were more to help readers gain a sense of their own voice and the sense they have in regard to writing and crafting their own writing style.

"Expressive, reader-response entries and analytical, interpretive entries, as I've said, comprise the bulk of the writing in these journals. At their best, they preview or parallel the reading, thinking, and talking we do collectively in class. Journal-based discussion, either in small groups or with the whole class, is a strategy for getting students to talk more, and more substantively" (Tedards,pg. 223).

These journals all overlap and blend together in their purpose, but all help to foster a better sense of communication and discourse in the classroom around the text itself, as well as create more substantial talk and agency within the students to create that talk.

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Are "literary" texts really better: Grant's Thoughts

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Are "literary" texts really better: Grant's Thoughts

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As I read through Scott's piece I found it rather elitist in his way of thinking. That one is so conformed to the rigidity of practice and form, granted from a modern perspective and with a decent English education that may be a bit biased of me. Frankly, I thought that he was alienating in his approach to talking.
I think back to the response to Lindemann that we read earlier on in this semester the entire time I read through this piece.
Though "literary" texts have merit, and though the authors that created them were important figures, it mutes and alienates. It distances the modern reader from tying in and thinking critically about concepts that are taught in regard to writing and literature.
Not only do literary texts exist as a form on institutional elitism in regard to academia, but they also exist as a form of silencing of other voices that can teach these same sorts of ideas, along with foster critical thinking and creating visiblity and agency for young readers.
Reflecting on Jay et al.'s piece, I thought of these courses being a means for some people to begin to be exposed to new ideas, cultural differences, and an idea of the importance of others' viewpoints. This approach ignores all of that and just feels rigid, tired, and boring.
He doesn't recognize the importance that teaching more modern and critical literature can have not only on the class in the moment, but also carrying the values of critical thinking, question formation, and other practical skills that will help them navigate academia.
"The third function commonly claimed for freshman readings is that of stimulus, of provoking the student's own response, usually with modern autobiographical or controversial writing, though sometimes with modern imaginative literature. But a traditional literature course in practice rubs against contemporary issues much more frequently than one might suppose, for what could be more contemporary than Chaucer's concern with the relation of physical appearance to inner personality, or King Lear's concern with the nature of parenthood, or Dickens' attack in Hard Times
on the absurdities of utilitarian education? The third function commonly claimed for freshman readings is that of stimulus, of provoking the student's own response, usually with modern autobiographical or controversial writing, though sometimes with modern imaginative literature. But a traditional literature course in practice rubs against contemporary issues much more frequently than one might suppose, for what could be more contemporary than Chaucer's concern with the relation of physical appearance to inner personality, or King Lear's concern with the nature of parenthood, or Dickens' attack in Hard Times
on the absurdities of utilitarian education" (Scott, 1980, pg. 7)?
Though these themes Scott discusses are potentially universal, one must ask if these same themes are played out, or in light of modern knowledge, outdated. Idk, it just really didn't sit well with me.

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So, I love, (and echo) the questions that Richardson starts out with: "Is there a way of teaching literature that keeps the focus on writing, on making meaning, and that inimizes the other objections while maximizing the benefits of working with literary texts?" (p. 279-280).
He then goes into the complications of putting the 2 together; the idea that writing about literature is a struggle for a beginner. They struggle to make their own connections and the widely viewed idea of "agreeing with the professor gets me a good grade" makes connections even tougher. I feel like labor based grading could fix the problem of pleasing your professor, but how do we fix beginner writing? surface writing? Is journaling (like many others this week mention) the answer? Is there another way to prompt students to attempt meaning out of literature without fear of misunderstanding?  So, he describes this attempt at finding your voice through Edgar Allan Poe, which brings me to my next question: do literary texts with ambiguous meanings (such as Edgar Allen Poe) make  this attempt to find your own voice easier? Because the contextual meaning isn't black and white, you now have the obligation to find your own thoughts in the haze.

As you can see -- I ended up with more questions than answers throughout this article.

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First - elegantly written! The opening paragraph is so well written that I was moved and want to put this as part of my syllabus / policy section as to why we journal. She just says so completely why we write that I don't think I could do justice to her explanation.
I found her take of dialectical journals interesting, and find myself wanting to experiment with it before assigning it to my students to have a better grasp on how it should work. It don't think it's conventional in means of a journal and think that is why I like it so much. I think that students need to be handed unconventional sometimes so they think outside the box about the literature. My only argument is I wonder whether this is truly considered composition becuase it sounded like more note taking, chaotic thoughts, and jotting, or scribbling. That is not something I think of when I hear composition. So my question, or take-away from this article is, can this type of journal be considered composition?

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I decided to read this one because I had already read the other journaling article by Atwell and decided that it might be a good way of juxtaposing journaling with literature. I appreciated this journalling article a little more because it talks about the nuances of journalling and the anxieties that it cause for most students. Also, He strategically gives 3 ways of journalling that is helpful to making it a success: expressive, analytical, and creative journalling. He then goes into detail about how each on of these would look as you talk about poetry in a journal. I love the idea of giving students the options and structure of how/what to write, especially in an introductory course. I also liked the way he explained these three writing options. I look forward to testing them out some day.

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I would like to say that I got something profound out of this article, but I can't say I did. I like the idea of journaling and connecting literary works with real life, but I feel, as a teacher, if you don't prompt a student, this assignment could fail miserably. I also think that is article felt a little juvenile. This is something I would expect in a junior high or high school setting, but I felt like it was very superficial for a college setting. Connection is good, but what about context, and meaning and the things we hope to uncover, reveal, or even hypothesis in college classrooms that exist only in literature classes? I would hope my students could go further than just a simple connection or plot line.
The one good take-away I have from this article is all the books that are mentioned throughout the article. It gives me a good idea of other options to put into my own syllabus without feeling tied to the classic literary canon. So I will say I did appreciate all the novels mentioned in this article and I think that YA novels are something that could definitely be used, even in a college setting.

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The story element was very beneficial, and it was interesting to see the student's progression through a conversation about a poem. There is always more to it  than we may think. Sometimes it just takes a little bit of prompting as evidenced by the author. "To open it to the kinds of information that students already command, allowing them to bring to their writing the confidence and conviction that flows from knowledge" I think this relates back to students having a voice in what they learn. We ask them for their experiences to make it easier to write on. It takes the focus away from the lecturer as the all-knowing individual and conversations about the meaning of the text to what the students believe and then they can write about their own beliefs.

I also appreciate this point, "Our writing assignments should make explicit that we want to see students constructing the meanings of works of literature in light of their own knowledge." Instead of asking them what the author thought or meant, we ask for what they think and it relates to what they have experienced. I LOVE this aspect.

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It seemed as if the questions posed on the sample assignments in this reading had focus in grammar - like listing pronouns, separating into structural units, etc. This is away from what I think we have been learning and the model we are moving to (yes grammar is important, but with how different speakers of English use it we may see some variations so we can't rely on one standard). This could just be me overthinking, but it was just something I noticed. I like how the instructor uses what, how, and why to prompt students. It is important to critical reading to help better writers when they can get to deeper parts of the reading.

Side note: I don't know how much I would like this course since it has a bit of an emphasis on Shakespeare. Maybe if students had a choice in the poems/readings like we talked about in the last DL, but I can see challenges that could pose.

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I liked this text as it helped show the importance of going deeper than just reading the text. The double-entry journal with one page about observations, sketches, passages, etc. and the other is notes about those notes. It asks you to think about what the observations on the other side mean. You have a conversation with yourself and between the two sides to get to deeper understanding. These questions can help students develop their writing more as they think deeper about these ideas.

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I found this piece kind of challenging, and I'm not really sure why. Maybe it just didn't resonate with me all that much. However, Scott does propose four functions of literary readings which are: 1. Readings have usually been put forward as models. 2. Readings illustrate the tools of prose, the methods and devices of careful authors, so students can use them in their own writing. 3. Readings provoke the students’ own response. Scott also proposes a 4th function: Readings provide subject matter – write about things they are already familiar with. I like his fourth proposal because I do think it easier to write about something that we are already familiar with. It can be super challenging for students to come up with topics out of the blue, so having these texts could prove useful in that aspect.