Further Study into Portfolios in the Classroom

Elbow, Peter and Pat Belanoff. “Portfolios as a Substitute for Proficiency Examinations."

            NCTE 37.3 (1986): 336-39.

Elbow and Belanoff go after standardized grading by accusing testing of being contradictory to good teaching and enforcing a concept that, “proficient writing means having a serious topic sprung on you…and writing one draft ‘ (336).  They argue for a collaborative grading process to review portfolios and create a more unified standard of assessment.  The collaboration is used to determine only if a portfolio meets a C standard and the remaining assessment is still determined by the instructor.  Creating a community to exchange value judgments, they argue, strengthens both the teaching and makes the “C line” more uniform thereby reducing student perception that grades are arbitrary (338). 

Altering the role of teacher by adding another voice in the grading allows the teacher to serve as advocate.  Teacher becomes, “someone who can help the student overcome an obstacle” (337).  Insinuated is that otherwise the teacher is perceived as an obstacle or adversary to the process.  Elbow and Belanoff do not define how traditional assessments hinder learning other than to say that proficiency exams do not reflect student ability and only reviewing a broader scope of work can this be achieved. 

This article is very clear about how the faculty at SUNY Stony Brook conduct the process of grading, but the staff also attend a “calibration session” to help determine a baseline that is not discussed (336).  What constitutes a good teacher/student interaction is not defined, but it is argued the portfolio process improves the relationship.  Key concepts here resonate with my purpose of determining how to give students agency.  They determine their grade based on revision opportunities and building a strong piece so evaluation shifts to a more formative purpose of feedback. 

 

Berryman, Lizabeth and David R. Russell. “Portfolios across the Curriculum:  Whole

            School Assessment in Kentucky.” NCTE 90.6 (2001): 76-83.

Teachers of English often profess the value of writing beyond the confines of an English classroom and if we truly believe this the writing portfolio must include topics beyond that classroom.  Writing across the curriculum is critical to connecting learning for students and Berryman uses this idea to explore a mandatory portfolio requirement in Kentucky.  Seniors must compile portfolios for graduation, but it is the school being assessed rather than the student.  The schools are rewarded or sanctioned based on student improvement, stasis, or decline.  After three years of stagnant results Berryman suggested her high school combine efforts of all departments.

Traditionally English teachers review the portfolios, but involving teachers from all disciplines brought about a sense of unity of purpose for the school and also gave a fresh perspective on writing.  They were failing not in mechanics, but in execution of process.  Russell, a researcher, helped synthesize the results citing Moffett’s “universe of discourse” and noting the value of meaningful application and variety of purpose in writing (81).  Instructors of science, math, and art changed writing from a method of testing to a tool for learning (77).  Collaborating on the process helped reduce the tension between departments and the traditional blame that one department fails to teach.   Another result not mentioned is that students often believe that science, math, and English have few intersections and this attitude is mirrored in how curriculum is taught.  Writing in a science class as a means to understanding proteins enforces these connections.  The portfolio does include two pieces written in another discipline outside of English. 

The result of this study is that most portfolios improved to the level of proficiency.  Both Berryman and Russell note that not all teachers support the program.  Russell simply notes that not all buy in and Berryman suggests teachers resist believing portfolios bring them additional work and are unfamiliar with the writing process.  Many staff did receive professional development on how to effectively use a writing process, but this was not explained in depth.  The authors do not cite one specific concern opposed to the process, but quote only advocates of the program.  This research does suggest writing can be an effective link to connect disciplines.  Creating these connections raises data from the level of trivia to one of personal meaning for students and is a component to assessing how to implement portfolios effectively into a secondary classroom. 

 

McCollister, Sandra.  “Developing Criteria Rubrics in the Art Classroom.” Art Education

            55.4 (2002): 46-52.

Writing is often considered a craft, a technical skill, and an art.  These multiple facets are shared by any art form and McCollister looks at how to use rubrics and a standardized method of evaluation for the visual arts.  She struggles with many of the same obstacles as writing teachers, how does one assess creativity or place value judgments on skill?  Artists traditionally use portfolios as well, but all in public education must ultimately have a summative assessment when grades are due each six weeks.

McCollister looks at a rubric as a more fluid form as students contribute their input to define the qualities to be reviewed regarding classroom behaviors and a standard criterion to strive for.  She does acknowledge that students are individually evaluated on this criteria based on personal development, rather than a ranking system (51).  The positives of rubrics applied to a creative process are:  improving work habits, providing a clear definition of standards for students in writing, and “to guide and stimulate artistic and intellectual assessment” (45).  This last piece sounds particularly intriguing, but is not clearly defined, but is left as a hazy idea of something better than using intuition to grade.

It is interesting to see that as rubrics meet with some criticism for not being a one-stop answer, particularly in the application toward a creative process, there is a competing viewpoint to suggest they may help eradicate some of the uncertainty of assessing the creative.  Ultimately all creative pieces and/or processes are judged in a classroom, gallery, publishing house, or hiring manager’s office.  McCollister ultimately raises more questions than are answered, but takes a step forward in attempting to fuse a process to a standard because this is essentially the same struggle of writing instructors in review of portfolios.  

Service Learning in a Composition Course

Here is the annotated bibliography from my progress report last Monday. I don't have a claim yet but I have narrowed down my definition of service learning (SL) or at least of what SL should look like in high school. I need some feedback before I construct a claim so if anyone reads this before Monday please let me know your thoughts.

SL program components:

• should be a subject/subject relationship between student and community members
  
• students should be focused on researching how their SL reveals a larger social issue
• SL should result in an academic research paper
  
• academic research should be focused on the larger social issue and possible solutions (maybe "solutions" is too strong a word?)
  
• the project should consist of a presentation in front of peers, community members, parents etc.

Question: What should the purpose of a service-learning project in a high school composition class be and how can the course be constructed in order to achieve that purpose?

Welch, Nancy “’And Now That I know Them’: Composing Mutuality in a Service-Learning Course” College Composition and Communication. Vol.54, No. 2 (Dec 2002): 243-263

Context: Nancy Welch has developed a service-learning course titled U.S. Literacy Politics at the University of Vermont. She writes this article revealing the socio-economic, cultural, and political problems that occur in subject-object relationship service learning programs. Welch asserts that students must go into the community with the intent of a subject-subject relationship and uses feminist psychoanalytic object-relations theory to support the construction of her course.

Summary: Welch primarily uses the work of two of her students, Janis and Jacqui, to explore the various issues at stake when privileged groups go into underprivileged areas with the intent to create change. Welch sets up the binary subject-object relationship, or the classic anthropological situation, and states that students (anthropologists) may go into a community (strange land) viewing its members (natives) in one of two ways: absolute identification (even though I am privileged we are all the same in the end) or absolute differentiation (because of my privilege we are complete opposites and who am I to ‘empower’ them). Although these views shift the relationship slightly they both conform to the subject-object view and reinforce the impossibility of change. Absolute identification seemingly negates the subject/object relations and yet in its denial of any difference it never allows questions about oppressive structures in play and therefore still objectifies the “others.” Absolute differentiation creates a further gap between subject/object relations and in its cynicism obstructs change. Welch turns to Jessica Benjamin’s and Melanie Klein’s feminist object-relations work to construct a subject/subject service learning program where “a mutuality…allows for and presumes separateness” (255) by ensuring “intersubjective exchange” (257) or a “back-and-forthness” (245) Welch does not however claim that this relieves tension. In fact, she states that it is at tension or conflict that this intersubjective exchange can occur and without tension the relationship turns into subject/object.

Evaluation: Welch has a very persuasive argument in her decision to actively create tension in the relationships between her students and the community and cites several times when these tensions were used to further conversations on social structures concerning the gap between the privileged and underprivileged. One major problem with this article is the conclusion where Welch uses Janis’ final reflection paper to sum up how a subject/subject relationship service-learning program can be effective, however, in her paper Janis uses absolute identification subject/object language. Interestingly enough, Welch never comments on this language weakening her argument.
Green, Ann E. “Difficult Stories: Service-Learning, Race, Class, and Whiteness” College Composition and Communication. Vol. 55, No. 2 (Dec 2003): 276-301

Context: Ann E. Green is an assistant professor at Saint Joseph’s University where she directs the Writing Center and teaches two first year service-learning courses. In this article, she illustrates how her white middle/upper class students refused to discuss racial and class structure issues at a personal level even though they were willing to have this conversation on a theoretical one. Green asserts that this refusal can be overcome through the sharing of personal narratives of racial and class conflicts and that this sharing must start with the teacher.

Summary: The conflict between seeing oppressive race and class structures in the abstract and viewing it as a personal reality, Green confirms is a major obstacle in service learning programs. Green points to several of her white students who did very well in critically analyzing and writing on theoretical work regarding race/class and yet maintained, and in some cases strongly reinforced, racial and class divides on campus and in the community during their service-learning work. Green claims that this division is due to her white student’s inability to view their race as inherently privileged and their belief that it is “impolite to acknowledge race or class directly”(293). According to Green, students “have difficulty applying theory about race and class logically to individual experiences”(291), making the problem twofold: “finding ways for white students to talk about race and then finding ways for white students to analyze race”(292). Green presents two possibilities in confronting the problems. One way is for the teacher to take the risk first. The teacher must model how to talk about race (the white race specifically) by sharing personal narratives of dealing with race. Through this modeling students will learn how to construct their narratives and through in class sharing these narratives can be critically examined as a group. The second way is to insure that the service-learning situation is not top-down. The students are not at the service-learning site to give knowledge to recipients but rather they are there to work with the community. Green requires her students to share their writing to gain feedback from the community members at the service site. Green also asserts that students must maintain a friendship with the community members, claming that “it is through friendships that [students] learn the most about the ways oppressions intersect”(295). Green realizes that these friendships do not always form but she states that by making “power relationships visible and encourage students to develop relationships with the learners at their site that are more mutual and egalitarian”(296).

Evaluation: Green makes some very interesting revelations about her issues with her own whiteness through a story about her first “volunteer” experience. She uses this story to connect the experiences of her students with her experience and then to a pedagogical choice to tell stories in the classroom. In her work she is assuming that all service learning teachers are white with white middle/upper class students and that they choose to do service-learning out of white guilt. The claims she makes about white students needing to analyze their white privilege are valid, however, her ways to encourage this analysis seem either vague or idealistic. This may be a start to understanding how service-learning has thus far been constructed.

Gender and Composition

Flynn, Elizabeth A. “Composing as a Woman.” College Composition and Communication, Vol. 39, No.4, (Dec. 1988), pp.423-435

Writing in 1988, Flynn, a Humanities professor from Michigan Technological University, describes the “new” field of composition studies as a feminization of previous writing theory. She writes that, “In a sense, composition specialists replace the figure of the authoritative father with an image of a nurturing mother.” (423) Flynn identifies many “foremothers” of composition studies: Janet Emig, Mina Shaughnessy, Ann Berthoff, Win Horner, Maxine Hairston, Shirley Heath, Nancy Martin, Linda Flower, Andrea Lunsford, Sondra Perl, Nancy Sommers, Marion Crowhurst, Lisa Ede. The field, she says, has been “shaped by women.” (424) She notes that composition studies is a marginalized field, and links that marginality to the marginality of its constituents, many of whom are women who teach part-time. Flynn traces major theories of gender difference, gives examples from student texts to illuminate gender differences, and gives some suggestions for bringing gender difference into the light of the classroom.



Brody, Miriam. Manly Writing: Gender, Rhetoric, and the Rise of Composition. Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press, 1993.

Brody, an associate professor in the Writing Program at Ithaca College, presents a history of composition theory focused on the frequent, pervasive use of gendered metaphor in works of rhetoric and writing advice, tracing a lineage of “manliness” in these texts from classical Rome all the way to Peter Elbow. This tradition serves to value (as masculine) certain writing and to devalue (as feminine) other writing. Plain, forceful, and true writing is valued as the product of those who are productive, coherent, virtuous, and heroic, while other writing, reviled as effeminate, is identified as ornate, unconvincing, and sometimes deceitful, and the product of uncertainty, vagueness, and timidity. “Good” writing is identified in these texts as a masculine virtue, and “weak” writing as “a feminine subversion that undermines a manly enterprise.” (3)

Bedford Bibliography online

But seriously, use this site http://www.bedfordstmartins.com/bb/ for up to date work in composition studies.

progress progress progress

Here is the progress report I will be delivering later today sans formatting:-( .

Morgan Sims

Question: What is the best method for developing student awareness of their composition process?

Moffett, James. “Writing, Inner Speech, and Meditation.” College English 44.3 (1982). JSTOR.
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At once entertaining and thought provoking, this essay explores the use of meditation as a tool for enhancing student composition and is part of Moffett’s larger project to inform the field.

James Moffett’s intriguing essay is an attempt to apply the principals of his meditation practice to the process of composition. Using concepts ranging from those of the Russian psycholinguists to his own guru Swami Sivalingam, Moffett describes how the disordered stream of sense impression, memory, experience, and reflections can be observed, suspended, and ultimately ordered by the writer into authoring for an audience. Moffett explores several techniques he believes can facilitate the authoring process including: Gazing—Rapt absorption in outer object, eyes open; Visualizing—Imagining of inner object, eyes closed; Witnessing Inner Speech—Watching as bystander the inner stream; Focusing Inner Speech—Narrowing down to and developing a subject intensively with all faculties of mind and heart together; and Suspending Inner Speech—Holding the mind on one point until it transcends discourse and culture and merges with cosmos, in trance. These concepts, backed up as they are by Moffett’s careful use of previous studies and anecdotal information, are all tied to the act of reflection, and indeed are meant to guide reflection in a composing subject, whether that subject be a spiritual devotee or a student of composition. The strengths of this essay lie in Moffett’s willingness to explore the subject of meditation freely. He points out that people often conflate meditation with foreign religious practice as well as our culture’s difficulty with intense reflection as barriers to the implementation of meditative study in schools. But his argument for this implementation is based on studies and observations proving the validity of the learning power of gazing and contemplation.





Berthoff, Ann E. The Making of Meaning. Upper Montclair, NJ: Boynton, 1981.

Berthoff’s assertive style and direct assault on those she considers backwater thinkers has made her work influential to numerous freshly-launched cohorts of composition teachers. Although at times didactic in her assault on those she considers misguided, Berthoff nonetheless makes a convincing case for the pursuit of a philosophy of composition.

In the first essay titled “The Intelligent Eye and the Thinking Hand” from section two of The Making of Meaning titled “Composing is Forming” (to attempt to summarize a larger section of this book would court disaster) Berthoff declares the need for a philosophy of composition to allow for the formation of a working pedagogy. Observation, visualization, and abstraction are all concepts Berthoff shares with Moffett, although she takes issue with the idea of a “ladder of abstraction” a concept Moffett explores positively in Teaching the Universe of Discourse. Imagination coupled with intention creates a process that is not so much visible or measurable as constitutive of concept for Berthoff, who advocates for the recognition of the mind’s power. Thinkers and writers such as I.A. Richards (whose ideas were influential in the development of modern literary criticism) and C.S. Pierce (father of semiotics) are emblematic of the type of conceptualization work Berthoff proposes will reclaim composition theory from “false philosophers” worshipful of the “idols of the laboratory” namely physicalism, mathematization, objectivity, methodology, and jargon. Berthoff’s strengths lie in her ability to proposition (or preposition), a method calling for the contribution of others in order to form a complete approach to teaching. This strength is also a weakness since her “theory of imagination” conceives of “composing as forming and forming as proceeding by means of abstraction,” provides a not altogether clear path of process.

My research and thinking thus far are woefully incomplete, but I do see potential in linking Berthoff with Moffett. Although Berthoff’s firebrand calls to arms establish urgency, Moffett’s work has a greater feeling of concreteness and practical applicability that may provide the necessary partner in a marriage of theory and practice that I hope will emerge out of the tumultuous courtship of this paper.