I'm sitting here at my desk Friday afternoon pleasantly drained by the first week's interactions with students. Trying to put my finger on what my philosophy is for teaching writing will take some time. I haven't had to write specifically on this since my first job application 18 years ago! Have my thoughts and practices changed? Certainly, yet much has remained constant. My idea is I'll approach this question in steps. Here's the first one:
A writer needs to feel comfortable with her audience to begin writing. In the classroom that is why we're so exhausted by the end of the block, day, week; we're establishing and maintaining a connection with our classes so students feel like we care about what they have to say. So most basic beginning- learn their names, laugh with them, talk for awhile- then ask them to write.
How does that fit with digital writing? The idea of just writing what I'm thinking about for anyone to see or (no one) doesn't make me feel real excited. A few things our online class has done to get the process going help: profiles so we know a tiny bit about each other, Ken's emails commenting specifically on points we wrote about and last but not least -the blog is an assignment: )
More advanced writers may have imaginary audiences or care little about audience- I'm not sure. For myself and my students establishing a rapport and ease is the first step.
I find your thoughts on the need to connect with an audience so interesting, Katie. Online, the whole question of "social presence" is huge - the degree to which we feel as though we are speaking (e.g., in online discussion, email, etc.) or writing to real people. One point of view is that just the possibility of receiving comments (whether or not we get them, although eventually the feeling wears thin if we do not) gives us a sense of audience that we may not have putting pen to paper and sending that out into the world (with no comment mechanism). Also, I wonder if picturing an audience (our students, my mother) can focus writing in a way that supports the kind of connection in cyberspace that you seem to be suggesting. Thought-provoking. Thanks.
ReplyDeleteThanks for those points Ken. The fairly real possibility of an audience through digital writing and picturing an audience specifically are 2 things I'll add to my growing knowledge about blogging!
ReplyDeleteI was wondering do ning sites like Eng Companion count as blogs?