Re: Eric and Fred's ideas on grading

[Latisha LaRue <kfischer@keller.clarke.edu>]

Hi Dave and welcome back to Wcenter.  I agree that Neal, Eric, and I tend 
to agree, but let's face it, Dave, we all know I am righter;) even if 
Eric and Neal are sweller dressers.
			Katie
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Katherine M. Fischer      Box 1569               319-588-8115
English Department        Clarke College         319-588-6445
Writing Center            Dubuque IA 52001       kfischer@keller.clarke.edu
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On Thu, 4 Jan 1996, David Stacey wrote:

> 
> 
> 
> > True enough, Neal, but is the point of the classroom to duplicate life 
> > experiecnes?
> 
> Hi Katie,
> 
> 	I'm not sure that your point disqualifies Neal's point, and I'm 
> not sure Neal's point argues against Eric's way of (not)grading, phrased 
> by Neal as 
>   
> > >  our attempts to 
> > > "distribute authority" by putting the onus for evaluation on our 
> > > students....
> 
> You're both right insofar as Neal's concern for displaced workers in our 
> national economy (and the figure is 40,000, not 30,000, I believe) is an 
> argument for a _way_ of doing what Eric likes to do.
> 
> That way would be, of course, a keeping-of-the-eye-upon context.  At my 
> institution we are very markedly expressivist in orientation.  We put 
> great emphasis upon inviting students in to a community.  We talk about 
> and rehearse ways of facilitating non-threatening learning situations.  
> We believe very strongly in collaboration and we take pride in our 
> beliefs and methods.  A great deal of what we do is wrapped up in an 
> ongoing practiceal critique of grading which takes the form of 
> experimenting with portfolios and other kinds of assessment.
> 
> Then when our students leave our safe sequence (transitional and fyc) 
> they go out into the wider curriculum and get flunked--and flunked 
> hard--by certain madmen in certain departments who will not be persuaded 
> that "writing" is anything we in English say it is: an ongoing learning 
> process that involves so much more than correctness.
> 
> There's the point.  Insofar as we do not keep an eye on those madmen, 
> nearly all of whom have a great deal more institutional power than a 
> typical writing teacher, our methods are awry.  Insofar as our awareness 
> of them "out there" does not affect our teaching--so much of which adds 
> up to "welcoming strategies," we have a problem.  Our students do too, 
> needless to say.  What ARE we welcoming them to???
> 
> This is not to say of course that a writing classroom ought to duplicate 
> life experiences.  Writing classrooms are exactly the place, especially 
> in our society I would argue, where experiments with the distribution of 
> authority take place.  I very much like the look of Eric's non-linear 
> pedagogy and I am constantly tinkering with the question of grades in 
> every single thing I do, but if I don't allow my awareness of and 
> attitude toward those people with power beyond my classroom to affect my 
> teaching, then I'm doing something wrong.
> 
> It's part of my job too, of course, to try to persuade those I've called 
> "madmen," to look at writing differently.  I see them as the exact 
> parallels (indeed extensions) of AT&T, the men in power who would fire 
> 40,000 people for the sake of "flexibility" in an economy that seems ever 
> more antagonistic to the dreams of my students for a "better life."  
> There's part of my job wrapped up in all of that too.
> 
> 
> Sorry to go on to such length.  I just don't see a whole lot of 
> difference among you and Neal and Eric, once the implications of things 
> are spun out a bit into the all-important question of context.
> 
> Dave 
>