Smagorinsky and Rief

 

Smagorinsky advised to "plan backward in thinking about assessment" (69).  A number of experienced teachers have underscored this approach, so it appears to have some efficacy.  I also agree that planning ought to be based on the unit focus.  What else would the teacher be focusing on other than the unit at hand.  Although Smagorinsky does not seem sanguine about the teacher as primary decision maker, I ask, "Who should be?  The students?"  If I visit a physician, I trust his advice and judgment.  Yes, I can get a "second opinion," but that would still be obtained from another physician.  I would think it not only presumptuous, but downright foolishness, to decide what surgery I need or how I should perform it.  The physician is the expert and professional in the field of medicine; thus is the teacher in that of education.

 

I find the implementing of diverse assessements over the course of the whole year to be a very fair and effective way to determine growth in teaching and learning.  In addition, I like giving many opportunities for low-stakes vs. high-stakes grading.  Now, I realize that grading is not popular today, but I believe in it.  I believe in grading based on growth and outcome performance, but to be fair--all should be graded and assessed by the same rubric.

 

I understand the aversion to teaching as we have been taught (72).  I also understand that there is research to support new pedagogical approaches.  However, what if the way we've been taught was effective?  Why should we reject what may have worked?  I learned how to teach myself--without the need to rely on machines to do my thinking for me.  Self-education I received from those who taught me the importance of learning on your own.  Learning, however, meant book-learning.  Once you learn how to read, you can learn pretty much anything on your own if it is printed in a book.  Not so with a computer.  You must learn HOW the machine operates.  Once you learn to do that, you can forget about nearly everything you were taught after a short period of two years or so.  Why?  Because "technology" is always changing.  What I learned about how to use computers in 1992 has totally changed over the past 20 years.  But what I learned about books and reading 44 years ago has--hold on, now--remained exactly the same!  Yes, and I am still learning from books this very day, and it is far less stressful and more pleasurable than any machine ever could be.  In fact, the biggest oxymoron out there is "personal computer."  What's so personal about a computer.  It's the most IMPERSONAL thing imaginable.

 

Smagorinsky's house analogy (73) does not convince me.  To quote John Keating from "The Dead Poets Society":  "We're not laying pipe.."  I agree.  We're not building houses.  We're opening minds and shaping lives (we hope).  I agree that we don't want a single product; we don't want robots.  We want free-thinkers, but these future "free-thinkers" must first be taught what clear, logical thinking is.  Therefore, we must give all students a shared literature, one from which we can have a conversation concerning the most pressing conditions of our shared humanity.  If we permit all our students to do their "own thing," no conversation takes place, especially if no one is reading the same works of literature. 

 

I perceive that students today claim that schooling doesn't provide dynamic engagement (74).  Although we should want all students to be excited about their learning, the fact remains that real learning is, according to Mortimer J. Adler, painful.  Painful learning can still be enjoyable.  Believe me, the study of Sanskrit, Avestan, and Old Church Slavic was quite burdensome on the limited memory-capacity of this aging fellow, yet I persisted because I loved the subject matter.  Conversely, things that come easy can become dull quickly and leave the learner without much motivation to press further.  I think that students today complain about their engagement factor because they are too comfortable with being entertained in all facets of life.  I would guess that some of that entertainment (called "engagement") is often a major part of the elementary school curriculum.  To be honest, it should be.  But by the time they are about to depart middle school/junior high, students should be weaned off this approach and prepared for the reality that not all their professors in college will be using "technology" in their lectures.  I know the argument already:  "Those old timers will soon all retire."  True.  But a number of even relatively young professors are more comfortable giving lectures "the old fashioned" way.  Should we not be preparing our students for this teaching approach too, or are we going to let them be shocked by this when they enter college?

 

I realize the five-paragraph essay is verboten, and those who teach it can expect swift ostracism and anathema from the elitist education ranks.  From my own experience with writing, I could never have learned to write without it.  This strict approach to writing taught me that writing has structure and purpose, that it must have coherence, that the audience must be considered, that there are rules to making your argument, and so on.  I wrote for an entire semester during my senior year in high school using this format of expository writing.  It was the training wheels I needed in order to go on to the next semester in which I learned how to write the research paper--based upon the principles of the five-paragraph essay.  Once I learned how to ride a bike, I didn't need training wheels anymore.  Likewise, once I learned how to write, I didn't need--or use--the five-paragraph essay.

 

I like Smagorinsky's discussion of the types of assessment because he gives a clear definition of what each assessment is and what it is designed to do. 

     1.  extended definition

     2.  literary analysis

     3.  argumentation (expository composition)

     4.  research report

We must give our students experience in writing that incorporates all these assessments, for they support and show critical thinking skills, skills they will need in life and in further levels of education.

 

Of the unconventional types of writing, I am not sanguine about portforlios.  They seem to be too labor-intensive for both student and teacher.  I do like journals, but mostly as a reading log.  The other types of journal I find to be problematic; I fear that they will but open up a can of worms, so to speak.

 

Of other assessments, the narrative knowing seems to have some possibilities.  However, I see so many problems with it (e.g.,  the believability of the student's account).  I've never liked collaborative learning, at least when I was pretty competent in a subject matter as a student.  I always have preferred to work alone, and if I ever needed help, would seek assistance either from the teacher or from a fellow students outside of class.  When I was incompetent, I hated collaboration too, for most of the time those in the group who knew what they were doing rarely explained anything in a way that I could understand and often would insult my lack of understanding.  Not a great experience for a kid short of stature, younger in appearance than others his own age, and easily intimidated by other, more aggressive and larger males.

 

However, I think the use of the children's book to be a brilliant idea and full of possibilities for students to learn while having some fun (though I hate the idea of learning strictly for fun.  Have fun, yes, but remember that learning is also serious business.).

 

I notice in the reading that Smagorinsky and Rief agree that feedback in vital in the assessement process.  I consent completely therewith.  Much of their advice on writing feedback reminds me of the principles I learned about being a writing coach in the Writing Intensive Program here at the University of Georgia.  In addition to feedback, prewriting is important because I see it AS writing.  Other important principles reminding me of the WIP program are:  peer feedback, writing conferences, emphasis on content and process over mechanics. 

 

I notice that rubrics can be seen as too mechanical.  I agree.  If our goal is to get students to write with more freedom and creativity, the rubric can be a hindrance.  I realize that there must be some way to measure achievement, and the rubric seems to fit the bill.  I am not opposed to them, per se.  I would recommend, however, that they be employed with caution.

 

Rief emphasizes quickwrites as a means to lead students to deeper and more sophicated writing.  I can see that as an effective approach.  I, however, am not very excited about her implementation of interviewing.  I would have experienced pure, unadulterated hell had I been compelled to participate in an interview, either as an interviewer or interviewee.  (Is this a real word?)  Her "positive-negative life graph" reminds me too much of a confession.  Do we really want to put our young, impressionable students through that?  I do like her "Writers-Reader's Poster," but only the memory and favorite books approaches.  The "autobiographical pieces" leave too much open to controversy and parent phone-calls about why I am not teaching grammar and literature.

 

Her principles on conducting conferences (starting on p.132) are very insightful, but I would caution about the idea of writing with students.  I think we should write and read with them, but not AS them.  Students need to see us as the authority, and not just a "pal" or "buddy."  We've got parents doing enough of that already, and we are beginning as a society to reap the whirlwind that has sprouted from the wind that has been sown, though with good intentions. 

 

I find her idea of "Reading twenty pieces of writing" to be decent, but also dangerous.  As a student, I would not want my teacher to let other students read and critique my work.  How about having students critique twenty pieces of short extracts from known literary giants.  Of course, the danger is that students will rate their favorite authors highly.  So what?  Rief herself admits that students rate writings in familiar and favorite genres more favorably anyway. 

 

One extremely important thing that I learned from Rief:  assessment does not equal evaluation.  I will keep that in mind when the time comes for me to assess and evaluate my students in regard to their grades.