The messy time

Another messy day. Just trying to remind myself this happens almost every term and the messiness is productive. It will all come together.

Okay, this day's plan was fueled by the assignment I wrote for I.2. Here's the assignment:
Due: At mid-term conference
Minimum 4 pages, double-spaced, 12 point Times New Roman

We have now read two essays by writers grappling with issues related to how identity intersects with community, family, and education. Both Wideman and Anzaldua use writerly moves to enhance their explorations of these issues. In this essay please discuss how specific writerly moves in these essays relate to what you see as the writer’s project. You should both describe how the writerly moves specifically function in relation to the project and explain what is at stake for the writer in doing this. What are the potential risks or rewards in undertaking these projects in these ways? What, in the end, do you think about these very different ways of exploring important issues?

You may find that you can build off of what you have already written in Project I.1, although you will need to reframe the essay. Some of may find that you will only use parts of what you have already written or that you need to rethink, extend and revise what you wrote previously.

Please use quotations to build your discussion and make sure you have a “quote sandwich” for each quote. Use MLA parenthetical citation with these quotations. Please also include a works cited page.

Here's the class plan for the day:
Conference Sign up

QW (15): What connections do you see between W’s and A’s projects?
· Discussion
· Wkshop
o Project
o Stake
o Quotations
o Successes, interest
o Other suggestions
· Reflection: How could you use this workshop to help you with I.2?

I hope this qw set up the groundwork for I.2. After they finished writing we had a really good discussion about what they had written with me putting their words on the board. I then had an impulse to hand out the assignment, which I did. We read through it and discussed it. The students asked me to clarify project and stakes again. I asked the students to help me compose a definition, which they did, and I wrote it on the board. One student proposed defining project as theme, which lead me to talking about how you talk about theme. (I hugely regret introducing "theme" into my previous assignment. It ended up springing a kind of trap on the students who used it and were used to h.s. ways of talking about theme as something outside the text: "Wideman talks about the theme of Tragedy Leading to a Downward Spiral.")

In trying to explain the problems associated with the above ways of talking about theme, I decided to ask the students to write a quick plan for themselves in relation to the next essay. I said write something like "I want to know about or talk about x because it is important because of y." This was a spur of the moment idea and as I said it I realized this could also terribly backfire. But, in asking what they wrote it seemed okay, especially since many students did set it up as a question they wanted to look into. I then talked about starting an essay with something you want to know is a great approach.

Since I was already totally off the plan, I segued from this to talking about beginning writing. I said I had noted that many students wrote about their struggles writing the 1st essay because it was hard to write the intro. I talked about writing the intro last (and said it was a secret move of many professional writers). One student suggested essentially freewriting to get started, which was great. I also talked about webbing as a tool for brainstorming. I tried to emphasize that individuals had to discover what works best for them.

Next, we turned to the workshop. I had put the workshop questions on the board and asked them to tell me what we thought writers should do with their quotes and I put this stuff on the board. I very quickly talked about citation and told them to use the handbooks to make sure they were doing this right in their essays.

We read both remaining essays (from last week's packet) aloud. By this time I was really running out of time. After giving them 10 minutes to work on the questions, we only really had 10 minutes to discuss the essay. We debated whether essay 2's scattered approach to having a project was a problem. A student also critiqued the essay writer's informal prose which lead to a discussion about voice and formal vs informal voice and context. This all sounds good now, but it was really rushed in class and messy. I ended the class by saying we were at a messy point but it would be okay. I handed back papers.

I'm feeling like I need a lot more time just to talk with them about their writing.