Response paper on In our own voice. Chapter 7
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Laurie L Bower discussed the motivational style of teaching in the chapter, “In our own voice”. As a teacher how we can motivate our students to enjoy their writing classroom and motivate them intrinsically are the main points of discussion. Now one may ask, why do we need to motivate when students are already in the classroom, submitting assignments regularly and getting out with pass marks? So, here you go with the answer-
Because a large number of students enrolled in the composition class with least eager. They enroll because they are compelled to do so. They join the class with a negative attitude towards writing. This is because they have the concept in mind that a mystical symbiosis between talent and inspiration produces successful writers. Though writing is all about practicing, they think that successful writers are born with the blessings of writing power. So, they do the writing class reluctantly. They are completely unaware of the joy of writing. However, encouraging a positive attitude in students may rediscover the joy in writing among them. Man has an innate desire to learn (Aristotle) which gives the hope that we can bring changes to the attitude of these students. We can provoke their intrinsic motivation to learning discouraging extrinsic motivation.
Richard De Charms Introduced ‘pawn’ and ‘origin’ in his book “Enchanting motivation”(1976) to refer to these two different types of students.
Pawns are the type of students who are extrinsically motivated. Extrinsic are those whose end goal is getting a degree to get a good job. Performance is focused on more than learning. Extrinsically motivated students may never experience education’s intrinsic value. However, their end goal is the certificate. They are known as pawn people. The author emphasized, “Pawns are very much compound to take the class so their motivation can not be boost up externally unless they take initiative.”
On the contrary, we will also get some students in our classroom who are intrinsically motivated and named as origins here. Origins are the group of students who are self-motivated and they join the classroom with full enthusiasm and energy. It has been stated, “they exhibit high learning rates and their learning environment is mostly self-directed having less structure alike non-origin classrooms”.
Nevertheless, the facilitator can’t just account for those origins. It’s our responsibility to turn those pawns into origins. Now, the question arises, how we can do that?
Creating a safe environment, initiating fun writing exercises, and having them evaluate themselves, some favorable writing attitudes can be fostered. First of all, we have to convince them they are writers. We have to transfigure their writing self image. Otherwise they will neither try to improve nor enjoy the class. For that, we have to focus on fluency. Several studies found, writing skill links to fluency and ultimately a positive attitude.
This chapter gives some tips on that.
1. Introducing free writing- The author suggested the teachers to be the model in classroom. So that students get motivated to write seeing their teacher doing free writing along with them. When they will see teachers making mistakes, writing nonsense sentences, misspelling words, missing punctuation may inspire them to do so. So, in one sense modeling that thing might cheer them up.
2. The strategic use of praise- Praise your students’ writing. However, the author emphasized on the timely use of praise. Though acknowledging someone’s work and giving recognition of success (even light one) lessen the anxiety and help to boost up, again too much praise too soon can be detrimental to motivation. Students need encouragement without believing that they must maintain an impossibly high standard.
3. The use of personal writing- Personal essay can be easy and a self- directed start for them. They will enjoy writing when they will advocate their own voice. Starting without any extra pressure will easily stimulate them to enter in the realm of writing. Starting with confidence is really important. David Bartholme criticized this one though. He stated, “ by starting with personal writing, teachers neglect to situate students in larger social- context.
Again, if we think about the reality, personal writing is something that gives the writers the space to think independently. However, all my writing class students are not going to be professional writers at the end of the day. But they all are going to use this knowledge in their personal life where we can consider rhetoric and communication as a social endeavor. In their personal life, they are going to consider this acquired knowledge from writing composition classes. So, introducing them with personal writing will undoubtedly help them to see the practical use. So, It can be assumed that personal writing is a stepping stone to academic writing.
4.Peer Workshopping - This one is a great way to get students connected with their peers and to get them helped. Peer workshopping gives them some extra space to think critically about others' papers ( as they are required to give feedback) and develop their own critical thinking.
5.Modeling imperfection and
6.Allowing failure
The last two are very interesting to me and can really work better in motivating students intrinsically. Use “fairly good but still imperfect student essays as models” (183). Imperfections are the base of perfections. So, if we model some papers which are not up to the mark and show them the transition from that paper to the better one, that might remove that fear from their mind and assure them that they are not the only one. Every single writer goes through the same process. However, allowing for failure and giving them a chance to revise and do better will encourage them to think critically. However, writing is a process, if I talk about the process theory and this is a process for students to go through. If we acknowledge this thing at the very beginning that they might fail at first and that’s normal, probably they will feel more free and comfortable to write and get the motivation intrinsically.
Activity Plan
Later in this chapter, The author introduced some in-class activities under the heading “Keeping Students Alive in English 101”. Most of them are really intriguing. Some of them are very interesting and can be turned into very effective in class. Students will get to learn thing from that created structure so easily. For example- paragraph puzzle. However, One particular activity named “Special Guest’ was really surprising for me.
There are ways to engage students and help them see the value of learning introducing new and interesting things that can be exciting along with. However, there is a clear and distinct line between learning and giving a wow-factor for the sake of attention. In addition, if that wow-factor makes even one student uncomfortable or feel triggered in the classroom. That won’t be accepted. As per the scenario- this might turn into a disaster if students don't get it. There are a lot of potential risks in this activity. However, everything is planned to happen so swiftly, so students' reactions should also be assumed to start at that speed. I don't think, this would be a good idea to implement this in class. However, some students might get triggered at experiencing the instant accident. That might hurt someone mentally.
However, activities should be planned based on the students' and teacher's values too. Additionally, we should not incorporate something in a classroom that presents violence.
In essence, I would say, the discussion on how to motivate students is really useful and interesting. We can motivate our students and engage them in classes with those practices in class. But the activities should be planned according to your values and the need of your classes. You can adapt some but not all. However, you can modify those activities according to your classroom environment. Your objectives, your expectations for a classroom, your values would help you to choose and establish yours. Teaching is creative, you should establish your own values not copy what others are doing.
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