Month: August 2012

Fundamental and Powerful Concepts

One of the sessions that I attended at this summer’s International Conference on Critical Thinking was about “Fundamental and Powerful Concepts,” which is, itself, a fundamental concept in the Paul and Elder critical thinking paradigm.

First, a note on the Paul and Elder paradigm, which I’ve written about before: the paradigm divides the basic processes of thought into eight “elements of thought.”  For every thought we have, we actually engage in all eight, whether we’re aware of it or not – that is, I’m always thinking from a point of view and making use of assumptions, consciously or unconsciously, whenever I solve any problems, whether it’s what shoes to wear or how to untangle a complex idea in an article that I’m trying to write.  Concepts are, well, concepts.  They’re the big ideas that we use to collect disparate pieces of information into groups.  As we advance to further levels of expertise within a discipline, those concepts become more specific and more rarified.  For example, in introduction to literature, one of the fundamental concepts we deal with is “literature,” but when we move towards more expertise, we can begin to think about “genre” as a concept or even a specific genre.

In every field, there are myriad concepts – and we certainly cannot get to them all when we teach a single course.  That’s what this particular session was about: trying to focus on the most important, the most fundamental, the most powerful concept within a particular course.  The session leader, Gerald Nosich, suggested that fundamental and powerful concepts are those that, should a student understand them deeply, he or she would understand a great deal of the rest of the course.  If a student begins to understand the concepts, the rest of the material of the course should fall into place, as the student refines her or his understanding of the material and the information. Continue reading “Fundamental and Powerful Concepts”

The Agony of Defeatism

Part of leading a discussion in a creative writing workshop involves encouraging students to give rigorous feedback and criticism to their classmates, while also fostering an atmosphere of respect and friendship.  Hank Devereaux Jr.—the narrator of Richard Russo’s academic satire Straight Man—observed that, in the creative writing classroom, “tough, rigorous criticism is predicated on good, not ill, will.” As teachers, it’s part of our job to create an environment where student writers feel comfortable receiving—and giving—detailed feedback and constructive criticism.  The workshop, after all, isn’t going to work if the only thing the student author hears is “great job” or “I really liked the words you used to convey your ideas.”

Creating an environment of friendly and well-intentioned critique is difficult in any creative writing classroom, but it’s particularly difficult in a creative nonfiction classroom.  As writers, we’re frequently defensive when it comes to our work, but as creative nonfiction writers, we sometimes wind up feeling defensive about our experiences and ideas as well.  Once, as a student in a workshop, I had to listen as a classmate explained that she didn’t like the piece I had written because the “narrator” was so whiney and self-absorbed.  And while I like to think that I have thick skin … come on.  That hurt.

I try to be particularly conscious of the student author’s feelings and protectiveness of her work even as I ask my students to talk specifically about what isn’t working in a piece.  Still, even with my attempts at sensitivity, some students are stressed out and even hurt by the entire workshop experience.  Who can blame them? They’ve just revealed themselves—exposed their realest, innermost selves—without the safety net of a fictional narrator or poetic speaker, and now they’re getting criticized for their efforts.  That can be disheartening, even infuriating. Continue reading “The Agony of Defeatism”

Groups of Three

Recently, I attended the International Conference on Critical Thinking and Education Reform in Berkeley, California.  My primary purpose in attending the conference was to bring back ideas for my institution’s Critical Thinking Program, which I coordinate.  But I also spent a good bit of time thinking about my own classroom, and particularly how I can better engage my students.  As I process the various things that I learned at the conference, I will share some of them with you in this space.  So this is just the first of what I hope to be several posts.

Unlike other academic conferences that I attend, this one is particularly oriented towards practical workshop exercises, where participants engage in some of the activities that might work in the classroom.  One of my workshop leaders divided us up into groups of three, assigning each of us a role: questioner, answerer, and observer.  We were then tasked with defining a major concept (in our session, they were concepts like education, schooling and leadership).  The answerer had to define the term, the questioner then asked questions for clarification and precision, and the observer took notes and then explained back to the others in the workshop what had just occurred.

I’ve read about this sort of discussion technique, but I’ve never really been a part of it.  I found it incredibly effective, particularly because I found myself having to clarify my own thinking on certain concepts.  And so I’ve been thinking about ways that this might be productive for the literature classroom.

Continue reading “Groups of Three”

A Conversation with Maureen P. Stanton

Periodically, I’ll be posting short discussions with writers and teachers of creative nonfiction whom I admire.  The first of these discussions is with Maureen P. Stanton, who happens to have been my dissertation director at the University of Missouri-Columbia and whose book Killer Stuff and Tons of Money—now available in paperback—was called “a treasure-trove of a book” by Kirkus Reviews.

William Bradley: What would you say is the most challenging thing about teaching creative nonfiction?

Maureen Stanton: I’d say that the most challenging aspect of teaching CNF is to help students write works that readers will care about, and to understand that it’s not enough to just relate a story—after all, everyone has a story but why should readers choose to read this piece of writing among all the options available?  This is not something that I emphasize too much with undergraduates, who are just trying their hands at the genre and gaining practical writing skills, and who generally aren’t ambitious about publishing their work or even thinking about publishing.  But with graduate students, it’s difficult to raise this subject because mentioning the “Why should I or anyone care?” question feels like a personal criticism, or at least is sounds harsh.  I should add that I don’t express this thought in those blunt terms exactly —“Why should I care what happened to you?”—because that is destructive and difficult criticism to hear about one’s own work.  But it is the central question of creative nonfiction, especially memoir, and sometimes it is the only question left to ask in an otherwise accomplished piece of writing.  The good news is that there are many ways to make any individual essay or memoir reach beyond being a well-written conveyance of an experience, even though dealing with the “who cares” aspect may also be the most difficult thing to learn as well as to teach.

Continue reading “A Conversation with Maureen P. Stanton”