Has anyone tried
to do a version of any of the exercises in “Opening New Media To
Writing” by Anne Frances Wysocki? The postcard one is the most
familiar and seems to work the best. I was going to have students
bring in their our photographs when we get to the last unit (creating
a visual essay). For homework they will have previously read a
chapter from Roland Barthes Camera Lucinda and we were going to talk
about images and their meanings. I think there are some similarities
between this activity and the one Wysocki suggests, and I think it
could work well, but it's the others that I have concerns about,
especially the eye-witnessing one. I don't know about students in any
of your classes, but mine don't take well to classes that are
structured out of the ordinary. Although the activity does seem
entertaining, I'd be worried that after all was said and done, the
students wouldn't be able to make the connection with the concept
trying to be expressed. I mean, maybe. That's why I'm curious if
anyone has done something like this? Is anyone considering doing this
exercise in their own class? What do you all think?
I think it would be worthwhile to attempt to incorporate at least one of these exercises into a class and just see how it goes. However, like you, I am convinced that most of my students will a) not get it b) just not actually do the work to begin with c) be somehow unintentionally disturbed and/or bored out of their minds with these activities d) be so preoccupied with how this is "not what I think should be happening in English Composition" that they are unwilling to go along with the concept. If Wysocki and Selfe's students are actually doing these projects and getting into them, I want to know what I am doing wrong and why I am failing so miserably as a teacher.
ReplyDeleteTanya,
ReplyDeleteI am in a similar position as you about the exercises that Wysocki suggests. I am not sure if it would go as well as it does for her. I want to try it in my classes, but I want someone else to try it first, as I am really not sure if the students will get it. Why is this relevant to a writing classroom. I feel like I will have to give them a lecture about the use of the activity in a composition class, before I can get them to be invested in it.