Is the Very Old Man With Enormous Wings a Flaming Rooster?

So I taught Marquez! I would like to go on record that Ryan is a liar. And he informed his group to “not do it like Jennifer’s group did” so that they partake in the preparation of the discussion. However, I did meet with David, and he said if they wanted to prep with visuals and the like they were welcome though not required. Moving onward!

I read this short story on my own and wasn’t entirely sure what angle to take when teaching it. It’s hard because in my world, Marquez can do no wrong. I had a long list of things I wanted to talk about, but I managed to fill the hour with relative ease so all’s well that ends well. I attempted to give the class a basis in magical realism, or specifically that it has a backdrop of realistic elements with instance of the magical for the sake of an unconventional reality. Most of the story is grounded in reality but it is punctuated by the fantastical in a matter of fact tone. I will say that on the whole they seemed to hold back as a group, there were only a few who had something to say about it. And while it makes me giddy with delight, perhaps it’s not everyone’s bag. Still, I’m curious about how the ambiguities of story are generative, and at what point is the reader put off. Are readers satisfied with not knowing? When is the writer/ reader contract violated?

I am curious about how it differs from the surreal, from science fiction and I had hoped there would be more engagement with that distinction. There was hesitancy with identifying oneself as a sci-fi geek, but maybe that’s because I totally put people on the spot. I think of science fiction as prescribing an alternate reality for the reader. It’s a vested creation in another world, its specific, and it outlines the rules explicitly. Magical realism tends to leave greater gaps and ambiguities, it requires that the reader makes decisions and fills in the gaps. I think that’s why I love Marquez. I wholeheartedly accept the magical elements, and they work on a subconscious level for inserting one’s interpretations into the work.

I will say I felt like I dominated the conversation a bit, though I had resigned myself to the awkwardness. It felt a bit like a performance because I very clearly am not the instructor, but I enjoyed the practice of generating that discussion. Even though I did not in fact do it wrong (cough bateman cough) if I had to do it again, I would have been specific with group expectations so there were other jumping off points. The visual art opening is working really well in the class, so I wish I had used that method for starting the discussion so that I wasn’t solely responsible for generating topics of discussion. Anyway, long live the flaming rooster!

Finding the "In" When Starting a Workshop Conversation 3.22

So I am looking through my notes from 371, and one thing that has been on my mind is how as an instructor one can pose a question in workshop that gets the student thinking, but doesn’t serve as hand holding through the process of workshop. What I mean to say is that there are moments when David asks a question and multiple people have something to say, but there are also moments when the question falls flat—this is not to say silence is indicative of some failure to ask the right question—because they seem almost stumped, unsure of what exactly he is getting at. What I’m curious about is, how we as instructor guide the discussion and help students to articulate matters of craft, or to theorize the choices the writer is making, without turning the workshop into a specific set of “issues” with regard to a particular story. I appreciate the way the workshop is often framed with regard to a particular discussion that is presented in all the submissions for the evening. I think there was a lot to be said for the discussion on tension when group two was workshopped and discussion the inverted check mark as a representation of dramatic tension. Having one idea to touch back on is nice because it keeps a central focus for the workshop, and a touchstone for the class period.

I’ve been attempting to keep track of the phrasing used to open discussion and am considering language used when beginning discussion. On 3/22 we did the first groups submissions. For the first story, David opened things up by laying out his agenda right off the bat, “Really what I want to talk about here…” We discussed the journey itself, as compared to the placid serene more quiet moments in the story. He also began with, “Lets talk about compliments, what is the story doing genuinely well?” This all feels very non-threatening and I think everyone can easily look to their notes for something they noted as working well within the story. We went on to discuss the foreshadowing with the rain, how the use of 3rd person past tense implies we’re being told this story for a reason. David asked “What do other people think of the slowness of the rest of the story?” I like that there’s a specific calling out for students who are more quiet, or who default to the chatterboxes of the classroom. We discussed why it’s important to show the main character making choices, and David said “The best characters embody those contradictions.” Also when hinting at something he hoped to discuss he might say, “I’m curious about…” We also discussed what a flashback adds to the story. These are all helpful ways to probe some of the central concerns with the story, but they also allow room for multiple interpretations. In this particular class we workshopped the remaining stories and switched gears to Annie Proulx and her use of language (ie fingersnap, landforms, yatata yatata ya, sagebrush, kangaroos, young man’s scalding anger, a fools world).

As a collector of fragments of language, here are some other useful phrasings of questions I’ve noted:

“What kind of suggestions do we have for this story?”
“Whose story is this?”
“If Rick Bass wrote this story what would he do?”
“If a character’s looking closely, what’s interesting to them? What specific details?”
“Is the reader situated, is it enough, are we too comfortable?”
“Is the main character facing conflict, actively making choices?”
“If dialog complicates or provides a slant for the story, how is it packaged here?”
“Has the character found redemption?”
“Should we talk about that ______ moment?”
“I really like_____, so lets just dive in.”
“What’s working well here?”
“How does time operate in this story?”
“A lot seems to revolve around this idea of _____, how does this function in the story?”
“Does ______ apply to this story?”
“Are you satisfied with the puzzle not being solved?”
“How does he give us solid footing, and encourage trust?”
“What is being held back, what’s being included? Some narrators are trustworthy, sometimes Judge Judy is required.”

I guess I’m just curious about how as instructors we determine the basic premise or content of discussion, and guide the students but still leave room for them to articulate the choices they think the writer is making. How do you guys think this is done in a workshop?

3/8/12 Class: Small Group Revision

On Thursday, March 8, ENGL 371 did small group revision workshops.  The students brought revised drafts of their first workshopped short story.  This process gave them a chance to implement the feedback they had received from their peers.

It was fun to work in the small group and hear how the students interacted with each other in this more intimate forum.  The workshop followed much of the same format as the large group sessions.  I gave my group members the option of talking about how the revision process had gone for them before hearing their peers’ comments, but they opted out of this.  On reflection, I think it was a good move.  Students did ask each other about writing choices they had made between first and revised drafts – why keep this? why cut that? – and so those discussions of the revision process came up naturally.  Writers also asked their peers about how certain changes appealed to them between the two drafts.

As is to be expected, there was quite a spectrum in the amount of revision that the writers had done.  On one hand, J. had made only minimal changes –adding some details for characterization.  In our small group discussion, it came out that his peers felt that there were still some foundational conceptual decisions about the story that had to be made (more focused), which would in fact require larger scale revisions.  Not having been present at the initial conversation of J.’s story, I don’t know if these issues were addressed in the large group workshop and J. had chosen not to incorporate the feedback, or if this was new input.  Either way, J. seemed open to these critiques. Even though the revised draft did not show much initial revision, it doesn’t seem like this is because of a resistance to feedback from his audience on what is working/what is desired.

On the other hand, S. had done a major overhaul and rewritten her story from a different character viewpoint.  She’d also switched from third person to first person narration.  One of the students commented, “I feel like this is almost a totally different story.”  S. talked about the reasons for the major shift.  Her peers delineated the benefits of both drafts and how these might be combined in a third draft.  They felt that the details of the situation were more clear in the revision, but that the first draft had been more driven by scene and the second sacrificed this to exposition.  In the end, it seemed like S. would likely have to do another major revision, trying to find a middle ground between the first two, but S. did say that the second draft had helped her get a better sense of the story and characters.

The other two students presented moderate revisions consisting of added, deleted or elaborated scenes.  The discussion on these two drafts focused mainly on how the revised scenes affected the overall arc of the story or thematic and character development.

Overall, the students provided each other with constructive feedback, encouraging and challenging, expressing what they appreciated about the writing in both original and revised drafts, and offering suggestions that responded directly to the author’s concerns or vision for their story.  In terms of my moderation, I think I probably could have done a better job of asking students to reflect on what the next step would be for their drafts (ie. what feedback they would focus on in the next revision).

The class session also raised questions for me about the process of revision.  I think it is a great practice to have the students revise a piece within a short window of time.  This helps develop the discipline of revision and also allows the students to receive feedback from the same people on a piece at different stages.  Since the students need to hand in revisions in their end-of-semester portfolios, it also provides them with the time to allow some of those major revisions to happen, rather than waiting till the last minute and not having sufficient time.

At the same token, I know that sometimes in my own writing, I need to give myself some space to let a piece “cool” before returning to it with a more clinical, critical eye and willing spirit.  The time away allows me to see possibilities that I would not be able to see previously, due either to emotional attachment to certain choices or lack of relevant experience/knowledge.  Putting myself in J.’s position, for example – I may agree wholeheartedly with my peers that a certain conceptual framework needs to be committed to/clarified in the story, but it may take a year (or more!) before I can return to the piece with the appropriate distance, insight, energy, or inspiration to know, “This is the step I need to take” and carry out that major revision.  To what extent might it be detrimental to “force” a revision at an earlier date?

Of course, S.’s example suggests that even if a major revision is done, it doesn’t need to be committed to as the way forward – it may simply be an exercise in sounding out the shape of the story… What are people’s thoughts on this?

This is a smaller question, but one I’m also curious to hear people’s thoughts on: do small group revision workshops necessitate instructor moderation?  Would you be willing to give your undergraduate students a whole class period to discuss each other’s revisions if you were not involved in the discussion?

Class Journal: 2/9

Our first workshop session of the course has finally come, and I think that it has sparked a lot of questions for me. Throughout the class I kept thinking back to my own time as an undergraduate creative writing student. Particularly, I found myself thinking back to what I thought the purpose of workshop really was.

The answer that I've come up with is that maybe I didn't really know - that is, I had numerous understandings of what workshop was doing for me, some of them contradictory and others very cohesive. Of course I understood that it was for the purpose of critique, delivering constructive criticism to the writer. But it was other things too. A deadline was definitely a way of defining it. I needed some date that my piece had to be finished, or else I would fail to write anything at all. Last of all, somewhere in there, was this aspect of workshop as a kind of competition, aiming for successes in writing. I think unconsciously everyone is weighing the week's submissions - and there's a certain pride for writers in knowing that what they produced is good.

I bring this up because while viewing the workshop from a new perspective, I'm starting to see this amalgam of emotional and intellectual approaches to workshop in a more apparent way than I have in the past. I think that as educators, our understanding of what both students and teachers expect the function of workshop to be can directly relate to our pedagogy. I think that to truly develop a holistic pedagogical approach to running a workshop some of these tensions between student and teacher expectations, assessment, pride, emotional attachment to creative work, and craft must be addressed.

So I want to pose this question to you all: What do you see as the function of workshop? To frame this question, I want to bring up what David mentioned after class in reference to Heidi's piece. He stated (and feel free to correct me, because this is coming right from my often-flawed memory) that the best way to help someone with a highly emotional work is to give them very real feedback. He mentioned that eventually this work must be assessed, and that in the end we are trying to teach art here.

So what is the right balance? I think this is a huge question that has a lot of sub-categories: How do we critique writing in workshop? What role do craft, creativity, and emotional output play in critique? Are students thinking of their critiques in workshop as a way of learning about their own writing? How do they translate workshop comments into craft? How is creative writing assessed? What kind of reading and critique behavior are we modeling? Does that behavior translate into our assessment methods? How do we qualify 'growth' in a writer's pieces?

Last of all, I promised some Thunderdome footage in light of Dane's piece, so here it is:

Class Journal 2.2.12

Yesterday’s class followed a similar format to last week’s class. I really liked the in-class writing exercise at the beginning. It was straight-forward, low stakes writing, but was able to draw attention to Alexie’s hook without being overt. The students seemed to enjoy it, and I like that it was a formulaic easy approach to on the spot writing exercises.

For everyone’s viewing pleasure, I stumbled across a reading of South By Southwest wherein Salmon Boy is played by Mr. Potato Head.



I’ve really been curious about the use of visual art and abstraction as a window for discussing the story. The students seem to respond enthusiastically, and are willing to expand the way they talk about craft through this medium. This week’s art was excellent! There were stretching beyond literal interpretations, made some great selections and were able to explain their selections in detail. Maybe it’s just me, and maybe it’s too much time with the 111 students, but this seems like an exceptional group of students. They each seem to bring something unique to the classroom, and are really engaging with the texts. While not every assigned reading resonates with each student they’re reading very closely, which is of tremendous benefit in discussion.

One thing I am struggling with in my own class is leading a discussion. It’s challenging to no longer just fill a participatory role as a student, but to be responsible for what path the discussion takes. I am by nature not a lecturer, but if I let the students take the lead the class is often quick to jump to binary thinking. Meaning they are able to assess whether they think a piece of writing is “good” or not. Things are less grey, and to encourage this close reading without hand-holding is a delicate process. I’ve already gained a lot in watching how David organizes discussion, and in watching him find an angle or “in” that is of interest to them.

One question I have is about the first workshop this week. I am wondering about our role as group facilitators in workshop specifically. Should I be providing handwritten feedback for the students being work shopped? Should I just be doing this for all students in the class? Or perhaps not at all? Or just my group? I am all for the idea behind having multiple perspectives when evaluating a work, but I am just wondering about the weight of our words as graduate students in an undergraduate classroom. I don’t want my impression or feedback to be deemed of greater merit because I’m in a pseudo authoritative role in the classroom. I also have told my group I have no stake in the grading process; I just think it’s a unique situation and am unsure of what my role is in this regard. I’d be happy to look over the writing and am eager to see what they are writing about, but I’m a bit unsure how to proceed. Sarah Jane and Ryan what are your thoughts? I guess part of this is that one of the students in my group has already eagerly emailed me her writing assignments, but they were not sent to the group, so she obviously wants my feedback and I’m holding back for now. Anyway, hope everyone is enjoying the heat wave!

Jennifer

Class Journal -- Jan. 26

The second class for the Short Story Workshop involved a good deal of class discussion, which worked to engage students more with both a) the elements and possibilities of the short story and b) each other.  I'd like to make some comments on how I saw this working throughout the class period.

The idea of the elements and possibilities of the short story came up right away, as David distributed the list that the class had created together last week concerning the components of a good short story and then immediately followed it with encouragement to the students to "try to break one of these rules during the semester -- we're talking about art here."  -- I admit, I was a bit surprised to hear David encourage this so early on the semester, but I think it also communicates a welcome trust and confidence in students' writing.  It also gives them a lens from which to consider what they appreciate about the example stories read in class.

After handing out the stories for next week's class and explaining that they were stories that "tweak" reality a bit, David went over the writing exercise for next week and collected this week's writing assignment.  Then class discussion began with student groups sharing the art pieces they had chosen as a reflection of one of the stories read for class.  David seemed to encourage students' responses to move beyond literal connections the art made to the story to the more associative or conceptual by asking "What about the style?"  This seemed to open up new ways of talking about the stories (ie. considering B&W vs. color to different perspectives).  This also happened when the groups presented the excerpts they had chosen -- David asked students to connect the authors' language to tone or possible subtext.  He also followed up on his encouragement from the beginning of class by asking "Do the authors here break any of the rules we've laid out?" and having students discuss this.

The second half of class, discussion centered on the Baxter essay from The Art of Subtext.  David selected one idea from the essay -- that of "obsessive characters" to discuss together and also to have students consider the characters in the Baldwin and Cheever stories.  (This seems like it was a good way to help get students in the mindset for the writing assignment they will have for next week.)  David wrapped up by asking students if there were stylistic things from either Baldwin or Cheever that they'd like to try in their own work, and had them do an in-class writing connected to the "projecting" perspective of Cheever's narrator in "Goodbye, My Brother."  (Was this something that David had planned beforehand or did it arise from class discussion?)

Another aspect of the class discussion I noticed was how David engaged students and managed it in such a way as to allow students to begin responding to each other rather than just him -- something that seems important to build up in a workshop class where students will soon enough be responding directly to each others' work.  In discussion, he would solicit responses from several members of the class.  At times, when two students seemed to either differ in their views or have similar views, he would then have the first student respond or follow up.  This translated to the excerpts the different groups brought in as well -- the two groups who chose "Sonny's Blues" were able to bring their choices "into conversation" with each other.  David was also good at holding a student's question/comment "to the side" and then addressing it later on in the discussion (ie. Nora's "Do you mean in these two paragraphs or the whole story?")  I am always looking for different ways to facilitate discussion and bring students into conversation with each other, so this was helpful to observe.

I'm sure I'm leaving things out, so I'd love to hear other's comments and observations.  But hopefully this gives us some to start with.  Cheers!

Welcome to the semester

Thanks for setting this up. Looking forward to reading your posts.

Test Post

Greetings and Salutations! I have set up a basic blog here to discuss our independent study this semester. Maybe we should begin by establishing a rotation or schedule for writing here. Hope everyone is having a nice week. I will see you Thursday, but until then enjoy this pic of Nancy Reagan and Mr. T.