Critical Methods Reflection
Learning involves literate practices, which are psychosocial endeavors (Purcell-Gates); therefore I strive to create learning environments that are conducive to community. Everything from formatting conventions to genre expectations are only learned when there is a personal, affective, and social reason to learn. For as we seek entry to and desire acceptance by the social groups around us, we become attuned to and adopt the discursive strategies those communities use. This is a process I do not take lightly and that I make explicit to learners. Likewise, the affective realm holds incredible sway over what motivates learners to persist. My teaching practice therefore involves offering choice whenever possible, ensuring assignments invite or draw on prior knowledge and knowledge-making strategies, and allowing any “correction” to occur within carefully curated peer groups. I challenge learners without alienating them by using the power of collaborative relationships to scaffold emotionally and academically difficult tasks. The balance struck between deliberate orchestration of learning environments on one hand, and invitation of the fruitful chaos that comes with relationship-building and experiential learning on the other, results in learning that stimulates students to recognize their own power.
One parallel I recognize between adult literacy work and college writing is the gatekeeping function of language. Literacy as a construct has always been manipulated by dominant groups to engender fear among the general population and establish scapegoats for society’s ills (Rockhill). It’s “a means of gate-keeping” (Castellano 193; Dornan et al. 18) and a way to dictate what is learned. An example of this last case is illustrated by the title of a workplace literacy textbook for English language learners who work in the service industry titled, “How May I Help You?” (Auerbach 230). The promise of “literacy” is certainly limited here and discriminates based on cultural background. As Dornan et al. note, “To speak of the cultural roots of literacy … is also to suggest that literacy in both its teaching and learning is never a value-free, neutral activity. It is rather an act imbued with political consequences” (19). As with all direct instruction, the instructor constantly makes decisions in the classroom that either contribute to or resist existing power structures (Brown et al.; Tisdell).
Indeed, assessment in the context of both individual writing practices and college-wide placement has long used euphemisms of “college ready” and “clarity” to exclude learners from non-dominant communities from entry into academic spheres. Language instruction, then, is arguably the most power-saturated work to be done. It requires care and confidence, a critical awareness of how, what, and why we’re teaching. My epistemology has shifted in this regard. Like many of us, I initially adhered to Lisa Delpit’s call to teach discourses of power. For me, this involved enacting a superficial brand of culturally responsive pedagogy that ultimately emphasized the importance of code switching. I was preaching process and aware of post-process critiques, but I was still offering up the master’s tools. The scholarship of Asao Inoue, Jamila Lyiscott, and Brown and Land then helped me frame and work with the tension I felt in my approach. More recently, April Baker-Bell has become my mentor-in-print. All of these scholars give shape to the underlying assumptions that inform my teaching.
As a result of these perspectives, my writing assessment involves a modified version of Inoue’s labor-based grading contract in which grades are distinct from feedback. Feedback is a topic of class discussion that is ultimately placed in learners’ hands. I ask them to tell me what they want from me, and I insist on the same during peer review. The author-led peer workshop materials in my portfolio reflect my own approach to writing feedback. True assessment of writing cannot be done in a vacuum devoid of rhetorical reality, but learners work within the constraints of formal learning to meet their own and the institution’s goals. I recently revised JCC’s formal learning outcomes for Comp I and collaboratively developed an instructional framework focused on the development of: intentional revision-oriented process, awareness of rhetorical situations, and critical engagement with text. Three major assignments provide a framework for instruction. I use these, but amend them and supplement heavily with weekly reading responses that invite reflection on writing practice. To the extent that I use textbooks, the ideas presented are but one set of options that reflect or challenge learners’ existing beliefs and practice. While I provide prompts for thinking, writing, and sharing, my instruction relies on learners to work with each other, seeking my guidance only as desired.
Baker-Bell, April. Linguistic Justice: Black Language, Literacy, Identity, and Pedagogy. NCTE and Routledge, 2020.
Brown, A. H., et al. “Making the Invisible Visible: Race, Gender, and Teaching in Adult Education.” Adult Education Quarterly, vol. 50, no. 4, Aug. 2000, pp. 273–288.
Brown II, M. Christopher, and Roderic R. Land. The Politics of Curricular Change: Race, Hegemony, and Power in Education. Peter Lang Publishing, 2007.
Castellano, M. “‘It’s Not Your Skills, It’s the Test’: Gatekeepers for Women in the Skilled Trades.” Changing Work, Changing Workers: Critical Perspectives on Language, Literacy, and Skills, edited by Glynda A. Hull, State Univ. of New York Press, 1997, pp. 189–213.
Delpit, Lisa. “The Politics of Teaching Literate Discourse.” Literacy: A Critical Sourcebook, edited by Ellen Cushman et al., Bedford, 2001, pp. 545–554.
Dornan, Reade W.., Lois Matz Rosen, and Marilyn Wilson. Within and Beyond the Writing Process in the Secondary English Classroom. McGraw-Hill, 2002.
Inoue, Asao B. Antiracist Writing Assessment Ecologies: Teaching and Assessing Writing for a Socially Just Future. The WAC Clearinghouse, 2015.
Inoue, Asao B. “Racial Methodologies for Composition Studies: Reflecting on Theories of Race in Writing Assessment Research.” Writing Studies Research in Practice: Methods and Methodologies, edited by Lee Nickoson and Mary P. Sheridan, Southern Illinois UP, 2012, pp. 125–139.
Lyiscott, Jamila. How Broken English Made Me Whole: Exploring Race, New Literacies, and Social Justice Within a Youth Participatory Action Research Framework. 2015. Columbia University, PhD dissertation.
Purcell-Gates, Victoria. Other People’s Words: The Cycle of Low Literacy. Harvard UP, 1995.
Rockhill, K. “Gender, Language and the Politics of Literacy.” British Journal of Sociology of Education, vol. 8, no. 2, 1987, pp. 153-167.
Tisdell, Elizabeth J. “Interlocking Systems of Power, Privilege, and Oppression in Adult Higher Education Classes.” Adult Education Quarterly, vol. 43, no. 4, 1993, pp. 203-226.