Two Feet In | Writing and the Institution

Bruce J. Martin Dr. M. Backus ENGL 7390 29 November 2011 Time Line and Dream Liner Essay Time Line 1993-2016 1993-2003 Worked as a technical analyst for a data warehousing company. I had already received a BA degree in literature and my employer figured out that I could write complete paragraphs, more so than most of the programmers. I was eventually assigned to write press notices, white papers, technical instructions for customers, and marketing products for horrible-feeling massive conventions in Las Vegas. By that time, I realized that, though the money was great, the industry made me feel like I had been living in some scum-covered pond and I never felt clean, so I opted to get out and go into teaching. Finished a second BA in Psychology and an MA in Education along the way. 2003-2007 Began teaching (with alternative certification) middle school English Language Arts in a Title I school in the Klein ISD. I should have realized that with a curriculum with a Newspe...

http://pedagogy.dwrl.utexas.edu/content/case-digital-submission One of the scenes I hate most at the end of the semester is not the stack of papers I need to grade, but the hundreds of unclaimed portfolio notebooks abandoned in the graduate lounge. They'll wait there over the break, sometimes over the entire next semester, never to be retrieved by the student-authors. I think this is really, really telling. If a portfolio is meant to be a reflection instrument, to show changes, progress, regression, or insight, if the notebook isn't retrieved, there's little reflection going on. And, though I'm not certain if this is the larger or lesser crime, think about all those thousands of pieces of paper just wasted. Eventually the notebooks will be thrown into the recycling bin, but so many unused pages will go to waste. This waste is indicative of the wasteful attitude we have in our country, and in the academy, where teachers too often will photocopy reams of paper that st...

Brian van brunt brian.vanbrunt@wku.edu   Rogerian Genuineness and congruence (What is this?) Unconditional regard Grace and Mercy Students are striving, in the only ways that they perceive as available to the, to move toward growth, toward becoming. How Rogers Applies Students do not seek conflict Students overwhelmed with stresses and often do not see choices and obstacles Empathetic listening, genuine caring and positive support Covey Be proactive Begin with the end in mind Be aware of the goal Put first things first Think Win-Win Create an environment in which the student feels safe expressing ideas Work together to create new opportunities Understand then be understood Seek context of behavior, seek commonality Synergize Sharpen the Saw MI or MET (motivation?) Listening/guiding Guiding Direction/Informtion Motivational Interviewing Express empathy. Respect freedom of choice and self-direction. Listen more than talk. Subtle attempts at atti...

Lindahl has written this to a colleague in the AFS: A QUESTION ON SOMETHING A BIT DIFFERENT: I hope that we have a chance to talk about this during the very busy weekend approaching, but I thought I'd broach it now. IF Teagle money will partially fund our AFS trips this fall, would it be cricket for me to delegate my $ to my graduate student, Bruce Martin, who is teaching the freshman version, the tougher version, of the Documenting Community Culture that I'm pioneering for the Teagle Project? He would give a paper there, maybe in combination with ours, but maybe a separate paper as well. I'm trying to lure him into folklore. Just thought I'd ask.   The reality is that there is no money, or very little. What is important to me is 1) Lindahl thinks I have something to offer the AFS annual meeting, and I should prepare some paper on this (I regret not teaching more 1303 at UH to continue this ethnography project and I feel that CL is embittered because of my de...

30 January 2011 Dr. Lindahl writes in reference to my concerns about being perceived as an outside when interviewing Freshmen: CL: that’s technically not a problem for this course, but I think that the basic thrust is as folkloric as it is educational, in the sense that a good deal of what you are hoping to achieve is to discover the community factors, the unofficial-cultural factors influencing how students learn and to bring those factors to bear upon their learning process. One possibility is to have freshmen students interview other students. This would be ideal, as it would have the insiders talking to the insiders, using their language, empathizing because of share background and experiences. However, this would take time – I would need to either a) train new students in interviewing technique, or b) retrain my freshmen from last semester to do this. I likely could get a few of my former students to work with me, but their time is in just as much demand as I am, and they woul...

24 January 2011 So, my concern is that I am unsure of what would be best as a project, or for my own purposes of developing my documenting skills/strategies as a professional researcher. I'm thinking that this semester project will not only be useful in developing my research and analysis strategies but also in preliminary data for a PhD project of some relevance (though that is cloudy as well). Possible projects include: Freshmen composition students; though I am not interested in their cognitive strategies in writing (like Emig), I am interested in the way that the R/C course influences their attitudes towards writing, researching, and learning in their university experience. Freshmen at large; I'm very interested in knowing how UH's freshmen ground themselves in the university experience and how their first semesters affect their purpose or sense of purpose. Ultimately, I could use this information as a launch to working with retention programs, since that is ...