(last updated winter 2016)
Teaching Philosophies
When I went to the 2014 Conference on College Composition and Communication (CCCC), I visited the booth for the Digital Archive of Literacy Narratives (DALN). The DALN houses thousands of recordings from students and teachers discussing watershed moments in their literacy development. At CCCC, volunteers at the DALN booth recorded video narratives from conference goers, and I wanted to participate. However, as I sat in front of the camera, I was at a loss; I had so little recollection of how I learned to read and write that I couldn’t even come up with one story. This troubled me. When I returned home from the conference I asked myself, how can I teach students to write when I can’t even remember how I learned? After careful reflection, I discovered how I grew most as a writer and realized that my students saw similar progress when I used the same methods. In my classroom, I work to give students exposure to concrete audiences and tangible purposes, show them how analysis leads to informed and deliberate document production, allow them to explore their multifaceted identities, and enable them to use accessible technology to craft their documents.
Technical Communication
I have been a teaching assistant for Technical Writing once and an instructor of record for it twice. This is an upper-level course that fulfills part of the requirements of the English Studies in Writing Major at NIU, and one of its main goals is for students to learn craft appropriate documents that accomplish a set purpose while meeting the specific needs of their audience. Both times I have designed and taught the course, I have found that when I allow students to craft documents that connect with a concrete purpose and a real audience, they more easily understand how the writing they are doing will be relevant to their future professions.
The first project I assign is the claim letter, which asks students to address a letter to a person or company that they feel has wronged them in some way—nearly anything is a viable topic, from landlords not performing timely maintenance to companies that sold faulty products—and requesting reasonable compensation for the inconvenience. Students are instantly excited for the refreshing opportunity to produce something that connects to their real lives; they are even more excited when I tell them that what they are writing is a document that they could actually send to their audience and potentially receive a positive reply that fulfills their compensation request.
Since this project is also the semester’s first assignment, I use it as a tool to teach effectively using rhetoric to make requests in a professional setting. Some writing instruction shows students how to use a professional tone in a relatively neutral situation—such as asking for or conveying information—but I find it useful to frame professional writing in a negative context for the initial assignment. By navigating an unfavorable situation, students become more aware of their audience’s needs and the context of the document, so they more concretely understand how to communicate in a professional setting.
The final project—the recommendation report—also relies on a real-life audience and a genuine purpose. Students find a problem in one of their communities—whether they choose to interpret “community” as their campus, workplace, or something else is up to them—and write a report that includes a well-researched recommendation for how a decision-maker could solve it. Students perform primary and secondary research and use it to inform a logical solution. This assignment prepares them for the professional writing they may be asked to do in a workplace setting; it is especially useful for the large number of Engineering majors in the course who will almost certainly write similar documents in their careers. However, rather than giving students a hypothetical scenario and asking them to find a solution—a task which would have almost no stakes for most students—I ask them to find something to which they have a personal connection so they understand what can be at stake when working on this kind of project.
The first project I assign is the claim letter, which asks students to address a letter to a person or company that they feel has wronged them in some way—nearly anything is a viable topic, from landlords not performing timely maintenance to companies that sold faulty products—and requesting reasonable compensation for the inconvenience. Students are instantly excited for the refreshing opportunity to produce something that connects to their real lives; they are even more excited when I tell them that what they are writing is a document that they could actually send to their audience and potentially receive a positive reply that fulfills their compensation request.
Since this project is also the semester’s first assignment, I use it as a tool to teach effectively using rhetoric to make requests in a professional setting. Some writing instruction shows students how to use a professional tone in a relatively neutral situation—such as asking for or conveying information—but I find it useful to frame professional writing in a negative context for the initial assignment. By navigating an unfavorable situation, students become more aware of their audience’s needs and the context of the document, so they more concretely understand how to communicate in a professional setting.
The final project—the recommendation report—also relies on a real-life audience and a genuine purpose. Students find a problem in one of their communities—whether they choose to interpret “community” as their campus, workplace, or something else is up to them—and write a report that includes a well-researched recommendation for how a decision-maker could solve it. Students perform primary and secondary research and use it to inform a logical solution. This assignment prepares them for the professional writing they may be asked to do in a workplace setting; it is especially useful for the large number of Engineering majors in the course who will almost certainly write similar documents in their careers. However, rather than giving students a hypothetical scenario and asking them to find a solution—a task which would have almost no stakes for most students—I ask them to find something to which they have a personal connection so they understand what can be at stake when working on this kind of project.
Digital Rhetoric
When teaching digital writing assignments, I have found that analysis that serves as a precursor to production leads to more engaged learning. This process goes beyond simply writing an analysis of an artifact. Instead, students analyze various artifacts—both print and digital—before producing their own. This can be as straightforward as students looking at examples of résumés and cover letters before crafting their own, or it can lead to more interesting multimodal documents. Through this practice of analysis and production, students are able to produce relevant work that engages thoughtfully with the power of written and visual discourse.
All five times I have designed and taught Introduction to Rhetoric and Composition I (ENGL 103)—the first-semester course in the first-year composition program—the multimodal narrative has been one of the most successful projects I have assigned students. It serves as a capstone project that relies on all of the analytical skills from the semester to craft a web-based narrative that includes relevant graphics and other media. In earlier projects, students wrote a narrative and two analytical essays—one on rhetorical devices and the other on visual media—that provide them with a foundation for crafting a deliberate document. When students combine the knowledge gleaned from their analyses—looking at what worked and why, or what didn’t and why not—before creating their own rhetorical and visual documents, their work results in deliberately-designed and carefully-crafted narratives that demonstrate a full understanding of the power of well-informed discourse. They don’t just insert pretty pictures; they thoughtfully craft a web-document that tells a meaningful story, with each element adding a new dimension to their narrative.
My research into Internet memes has led to another analysis-to-production project I will assign when I design and teach Writing for Digital Media (ENGL 424) next semester. The goal of this assignment will be to show students the power of mundane public discourse. I will lead students through discussions and analyses of memes that carry some kind of negative connotation about race and gender, such as Successful Black Man (which assumes that Black people cannot be successful), Ordinary Muslim Man (which assumes that all Muslims are terrorists), or Fake Geek Girl (which assumes that female geeks fake their identities for male attention). Then, I will add a layer of production by asking students to craft their own counter-memes. For this project, students will use the original meme image but change the text to craft a new meaning. An assignment like this will show students that the artifacts they produce outside of their standard academic scholarship has significance in the real-world. Such rhetorical work is important in digital contexts as a way to reopen the kinds of civil discourse that hostile memes tend to shut down.
All five times I have designed and taught Introduction to Rhetoric and Composition I (ENGL 103)—the first-semester course in the first-year composition program—the multimodal narrative has been one of the most successful projects I have assigned students. It serves as a capstone project that relies on all of the analytical skills from the semester to craft a web-based narrative that includes relevant graphics and other media. In earlier projects, students wrote a narrative and two analytical essays—one on rhetorical devices and the other on visual media—that provide them with a foundation for crafting a deliberate document. When students combine the knowledge gleaned from their analyses—looking at what worked and why, or what didn’t and why not—before creating their own rhetorical and visual documents, their work results in deliberately-designed and carefully-crafted narratives that demonstrate a full understanding of the power of well-informed discourse. They don’t just insert pretty pictures; they thoughtfully craft a web-document that tells a meaningful story, with each element adding a new dimension to their narrative.
My research into Internet memes has led to another analysis-to-production project I will assign when I design and teach Writing for Digital Media (ENGL 424) next semester. The goal of this assignment will be to show students the power of mundane public discourse. I will lead students through discussions and analyses of memes that carry some kind of negative connotation about race and gender, such as Successful Black Man (which assumes that Black people cannot be successful), Ordinary Muslim Man (which assumes that all Muslims are terrorists), or Fake Geek Girl (which assumes that female geeks fake their identities for male attention). Then, I will add a layer of production by asking students to craft their own counter-memes. For this project, students will use the original meme image but change the text to craft a new meaning. An assignment like this will show students that the artifacts they produce outside of their standard academic scholarship has significance in the real-world. Such rhetorical work is important in digital contexts as a way to reopen the kinds of civil discourse that hostile memes tend to shut down.
Accessible Technology
Many of the projects I assign require the use of technology. However, I realize that not all students have the same level of access to various technologies—computers, software programs, even Internet connections sometimes. Therefore, when mandating the use of technology, I balance both the needs of the students and the requirements of a project to enable students to create effective documents.
A major assignment in the Technical Writing course asks students to create infographics that engage their fellow students as an audience. In a professional setting, these kinds of documents would likely be designed using Adobe software—Illustrator, Photoshop, and/or InDesign—or some other professional equivalent. I encourage students to use these programs when available and offer brief tutorials on how to use them effectively; however, since many of the students at NIU come from underserved urban populations, access to such well-reputed and expensive software is limited. Some computer labs on campus carry access to the Adobe Suite, but NIU’s student population is also largely commuter students who would not have access to these technologies on their home computers. As such, few students have accepted my offer to learn Adobe software, and even fewer have used them to create their infographics. Instead, I encourage students to use Canva, a free online program that not only offers a wide array of options for customization, but also allows unlimited free PDF downloads of certain documents. Although a technical communication course should provide students with not only the ability to design professional documents but also the proper software through which to design them, I have found that with budgetary limits it is better to use equally sufficient and accessible technology to help students learn core design skills.
In other projects, free and accessible technology is an asset. In the meme/counter-meme project I explained above, the focus is on entering the public sphere through a vernacular text. One of the main draws of memes is that anyone can make them with little to no training. As such, using easily accessible software like Microsoft Paint—which comes free with any computer running on Windows—or online versions of something similar is key to genuine production. To enter public discourse through memes, one must use the public’s tools.
A major assignment in the Technical Writing course asks students to create infographics that engage their fellow students as an audience. In a professional setting, these kinds of documents would likely be designed using Adobe software—Illustrator, Photoshop, and/or InDesign—or some other professional equivalent. I encourage students to use these programs when available and offer brief tutorials on how to use them effectively; however, since many of the students at NIU come from underserved urban populations, access to such well-reputed and expensive software is limited. Some computer labs on campus carry access to the Adobe Suite, but NIU’s student population is also largely commuter students who would not have access to these technologies on their home computers. As such, few students have accepted my offer to learn Adobe software, and even fewer have used them to create their infographics. Instead, I encourage students to use Canva, a free online program that not only offers a wide array of options for customization, but also allows unlimited free PDF downloads of certain documents. Although a technical communication course should provide students with not only the ability to design professional documents but also the proper software through which to design them, I have found that with budgetary limits it is better to use equally sufficient and accessible technology to help students learn core design skills.
In other projects, free and accessible technology is an asset. In the meme/counter-meme project I explained above, the focus is on entering the public sphere through a vernacular text. One of the main draws of memes is that anyone can make them with little to no training. As such, using easily accessible software like Microsoft Paint—which comes free with any computer running on Windows—or online versions of something similar is key to genuine production. To enter public discourse through memes, one must use the public’s tools.
Through these projects and many others, I work to make my classroom a space for students to practice real-world writing, produce effective digital documents, explore and establish their identities, and gain experience with accessible technologies. In all of these assignments, students learn the rhetorical power and importance of their work, both inside and outside of the classroom.