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Two Teacher Friends Take off the Kid Gloves
teaching composition
Print Version of Teach. Write. Now Available
The print version of the 2023 spring~summer edition of Teach. Write.: A Writing Teachers” Literary Journal is available for purchase. Go to this link if you want to order a copy.
Also, an updated online version is also now available here.
I am currently seeking submissions for my first post-retirement edition of Teach. Write. Submissions will close on September 1, 2023. Click here for submission guidelines. I would love to see your work, especially if you are, or were, a writing teacher.
2023 Spring~Summer Edition of Teach. Write. Is Now Available
Thank you for your patience! I am grateful to all of the wonderful writers who made this edition–the last one before my retirement–so special.
Click below to access the online journal. A print version will be available in about two weeks.
Teach. Write.: A Writing Teachers’ Literary Journal–Spring~Summer 2023
No April Fool! Teach. Write. Delayed a Few Days
The 2023 Spring~Summer edition of Teach. Write. is supposed to be published today, but my impeccable timing led to a large number of essays and other assignments I have had to grade just as I was preparing to work on the final stages of putting the journal together. Therefore, I have been teaching and writing (notes on freshman comp. essays, responses to discussion forums, and e-mails responding to unhappy students after they receive the grades on their essays) like crazy, but not editing and proofreading my journal.
I have written to my contributors about the delay, but I want to let all my loyal readers know that the journal will be here soon and that it will be worth the wait! I am excited about this edition. Please come back to take a look at the next edition of Teach. Write. I’m predicting Friday at the latest.
And that’s no April Fool!
Do I Help Too Much?
Simply put, yes!
Of course, I tell myself that I help so much because I care, and I do; more than that, I truly like my students–no matter what their age or socio-economic status. However, just like a too-permissive parent, sometimes I help simply because it is easier to do so than not. Yes, I could say that I’m being pushed to help my students more and more, but the reality is, I am helping more to help myself feel better. If I work more and they work less, while they still maintain an A, or in some cases a B, then maybe they will like me, and they, or their parents, won’t complain to the administration or give me a poor evaluation. Maybe I can keep my retention and success rates up so that the administration will see me as a good and effective instructor because the data will prove it, right?
Therefore, I assign work due on a regular schedule and reinforce the due dates with reminders in the morning on the day something is due. These reminders appear on a Course Announcements forum and in the students’ college e-mail, but I am aware that many students do not check their college account regularly, so sometimes I go to our college’s retention management system where I can send messages to the student’s personal e-mail as well. If their grades get too low, I report that to the student through the LMS, copy that message, and send an alert through the advising and retention system, which sends messages to a team of people, including a “success coach,” an advisor, and sometimes one of the counselors. BTW, students can access their gradebooks at any time through the LMS and know exactly where they stand as I make sure to keep up with my grading, especially recording zeros when students miss work.
I also answer student e-mails and messages during each work day, usually within minutes, and often after 8:00 pm in the evening, on weekends, and vacations. If students say they need the assignment explained more clearly, I explain it again. They miss class and need to have more explanation than the thorough instructions already given on the LMS? Okay, I supply that explanation in an e-mail.
Why am I over-helping? I never did it before the advent of the early college or before so many online classes. Perhaps I never helped this much because all of society knew that to be successful in college, students would have to take on more personal responsibility for attending regularly, reading important material, following instructions, working diligently, and meeting deadlines. You know, like they will have to do in real life. For whatever reason, I’m helping too much, and I need to stop because it is bad for my students. Now that I’m teaching seated classes again, including a large number of high school students, I can see that doing too much leads to dependence and a lack of confidence, something I began to see in my students before March 2020.
The pandemic only exacerbated a growing tendency to lower our expectations for the sake of younger or underprepared students. High school students should be treated differently than college students, apparaently. I mean, how can we expect them to perform as college students when they are facing so much and times are so hard? Almost all of our students have to work, so we shoud be more understanding and offer more extensions on assignments when many of us already offer a more than generous late work policy.
We educators breed some of these problems because we want, we need, our students to perform better, on paper anyway, because that is how we are judged as educators by our data-driven society. We can’t afford to let the students figure out how to do things for themselves because then they might receivie less than desireable grades, withdraw, or fail, and if that happens, it is a poor reflection on us, so we provide as much as we possibly can. To do anything less would be wrong, wouldn’t it?
But now I ask myself, isn’t it equally as wrong to deny my students the opportunities to build the all important life skills that will mean more to them, and their employers, than anything else–skills like reading comprehension, time management, clear and concise communication, problem solving, critical thinking, respect for authority, persistence, and resilency?
Students acquire these skills only by being challenged. In order for that to happen, I have to stop trying to make the way quick and easy by smoothing over every trouble and answering every question. I must take the much harder route of leading them, sometimes painstakingly, to answers they discover for themselves.
Is Convenience Overrated?: An Educational Fable
So let me tell you a story:
The English instructor was in a rush that day, like too many other days, and she needed convenience. She hadn’t eaten much, and as a Type II diabetic, she needed to, but there was no time to go in, sit down, and have a decent meal, or so she thought. She decided, against her better judgment, to stop by a fast food place. She had heard that some places were offering more healthy options and that nutrition information is listed for the customer’s convenience, so she could just quickly get in line and get a salad or something.
That wouldn’t be too bad, would it?
The first place she saw she just passed on by because the line was so long. The next two places were no different, but the fourth place was a charm–short line. She got up to the board and found out why. The choices were limited–not really any healthy options as she had hoped– and the service was extremely slow and unfriendly. She didn’t blame the worker, though. Who wants to work for $7.25 an hour at a burger joint? And with the staffing problems these days, probably working double shifts as well.
Finally got her food. A Combo #1 because she mistakenly thought that would be the most convenient. Not exactly the healthy option she had hoped for. On top of that, it wasn’t really the kind of food that she could safely eat while driving, so she pulled into the parking lot to eat it while sitting in the car.
She thought it might be good to check her work e-mail while she was eating in case a student had a question or concern. For the convenience of the students, the faculty had been told to answer questions for students as soon as they can, you know. She reached over to grab the phone, accidentally hitting the lid of the container that held her food, including the three packets of ketchup that she had squirted out to put on her French fries. All of the ketchup and some of the greasy fries ended up on her skirt and blouse.
Therefore, when she returned to the college, she had to go to the restroom to clean up. Fortunately, she thought, she had a convenient little emergency laundry pen she carried in her purse for just such occasions that would take care of that ketchup in a jiffy. However, once she got to the restroom, she couldn’t find that little pen anywhere, even after searching through her purse for a few seconds, so she just gave up and did the best she could with a wet paper towel and a bit of soap.
Smelling still a bit tomatoey, she headed to her English composition class for workshop day, an opportunity for students to read each other’s essays and ask for advice, but before the workshop could begin, one student informed the instructor that he would have to leave in thirty minutes for a doctor’s appointment. Two students came up together saying they were up late the night before closing at the restaurant where they worked, so they didn’t have time to write the rough draft. Could they have an extension?
The instructor, having been told by her supervisors to do everything possible to accommodate the customers and to “find a way to say ‘yes,'” took the first student’s essay and told him that she would do the workshop herself, scan her feedback, and e-mail it to him, and of course, she would give the other two students their extensions. Then, they packed up their computers and began to leave, saying it would be more convenient for them to work on the essays together at home since they had the same work schedule. Of the remaining ten students in the class (there were 18 enrolled), two had partial drafts written in their notebooks and four students had rough drafts without the required in-text citations and works cited list. Only four had completed rough drafts with the proper documentation.
The instructor passed out the workshop worksheets and went to the computer closet down the hall to bring two students who had forgotten to bring computers despite numerous convenient reminders during class and through the LMS (Learning Management System). She came back to find that another student had packed up and left. “They said their hand was raised but you ignored it and then just left the room, so they went to ask last semester’s teacher for help,” said another student.
Then, there was Greg. Unbeknownst to the instructor, the previous day Greg had worked until six as a pharmacy assistant. He had taken the job to see if he was interested in becoming a pharmacist. It wasn’t easy balancing the job with all of the other things he had to do, but he was saving up to transfer to UNC-Chapel Hill, his dream school. After work, he had gone by to pick up his little sister who is a junior at one of the local high schools. She was at basketball practice, and his mother, a widow, didn’t get home until late some nights, so he was glad to help. He had to wait for his sister a little, but it gave him time to check on his classes. He saw the reminder from his English instructor that the rough draft of one of the class’s major essays was due for a workshop the next day. He hadn’t even started.
At home, he and his sister whipped up some whole wheat spaghetti noodles and heated up a bottle of his mother’s homemade spaghetti sauce that she had canned the previous weekend since she knew it was going to be a busy couple of weeks. They made a salad with some fresh vegetables from the garden to go along with it. Since their dad died, they were on a pretty strict budget, and the vegetables from the garden their mom started saved them a pretty penny. Even better, working in the garden was a good chance for them to relax and be together as a family. His sister loved it so much she was planning to take a class in horticulture at the college in her senior year. Right now, though, she wanted to concentrate on doing well in her high school classes, playing basketball, and helping out around the house.
Their mom got home about the time Greg and his sister sat down to eat. She joined them and they had a nice meal, talking about their days and laughing together, but Greg could tell how tired his mom was. She was a nurse and the long hours at the understaffed hospital where she worked were really getting to her. Plus, she was still grieving for their dad. They all were. His sister had some tough discrete math homework to do, and he remembered how hard that was, so he volunteered to do the dishes while his mom went to watch some TV and have a little downtime. His sister sat at the table and shot him questions when she ran into a tough problem. After he finished, he sat down beside her to help some more. It felt good to get off his feet.
He had some other homework to do and a test to study for, so it was getting close to midnight when he finally started working on the essay, but he knew it was only a “messy” draft, and as long as he met the basic requirements, a complete three pages, double-spaced with at least two sources cited in the text, and works cited list, he would get full credit. He was pretty tired and tempted to just not worry about the draft, but then he remembered his dream of going to Chapel Hill and becoming a pharmacist like he promised his dad he would. He went back to work and finished the paper around 1:30 am.
The next day in class, Greg waited patiently for his English instructor to look at his essay, but time was running out. Finally, she came around to him with about five minutes of class left. “I’m so sorry, Greg,” she said, “Now that classes have been shortened again for the convenience of students, we’re almost out of time.”
“That’s okay.” He tried to sound cheerful but was a bit disappointed. She had been an English teacher for a long time, and he valued her opinion.
“But I feel bad.”
He believed her.
“Listen, do you have time to stay and come to my office? I could take a better look at the essay and give you some feedback.”
“Sure,” he said. “If you don’t mind.”
“I don’t mind at all.”
They went to her office, and she spent thirty minutes with him talking about organization, sentence structure, and word usage. He even started understanding comma splices better, finally. He was definitely sleepy from staying up late the night before, but in the end, it was worth it.
After Greg left and his instructor turned to the dozens of assignments she had to grade before she could allow herself to go home, she smiled, thinking the same thing. Definitely worth it.
The End
And the moral to the story: A homemade education slow-cooked with care and concern by students, faculty, and staff beats a fast, “millions sold per day” credential designed, not to satisfy, but to placate. That kind of education wears off awfully fast, leaving the “customer” malnourished, yet ravenous, once again.
If You Ask Me…
When state performance measures came out this year and the Credit English Success (p.7) rate was below the average band, my first instinct was to become defensive. “It’s not my fault!” I wanted to scream and quickly blame someone else. Another instinct was to point the finger at society’s focus on data. However, after the initial flare up of self-protection, I calmed down and began to reflect more completely on the entirity of the report, which helped to put things into perspective. I want to be prepared to offer suggestions for improvement should anyone ever show any interest in what a retiring English educator with 33 years of experience thinks.
Although our college is considered below average in Credit English Success, we are above average in College Transfer Success (p. 17.) This is encouraging to me because it says that despite extraordinary circumstances such as the pandemic with its accompanying economic and cultural effects, our students who transferred to four-year institutions were well-prepared to continue their education.
Another encouraging factor is that while we are below the average band, only by .03 index points, I know we, and I don’t mean just the English department, I mean the entire college, WE can do so much more to help our students perform better in their English classes. One thing is already in the works, and that is a push to encourage, or even to require, students to take their English classes early in their programs. However, there is more that we as a college can do to help improve College English Success. Here are a few ideas:
- Normalize high standards for reading and writing. If students heard from every instructor across divisions how important reading and writing well is to success in school and the workplace, and if instructors incorporated more reading and writing assignments in all classes, our scores would go up.
- Improve the writing assessment skills of instructors. Although most instructors have advanced degrees in their subject area and are experts in writing within their discipline, few have had any formal education on how best to assess reading and writing skills. Understanding ways to incorporate reading and writing assessments within instructors’ particular divisions based on the writing assessment techniques already used in the college’s English department would be a way to permeate all programs with a consistent standard without violating any instructor’s academic freedom. Topics of professional development could include
- incorporating vocabulary and other reading lessons into any course
- adding consistent writing criteria into advanced grading methods such as rubrics, checklists, and marking guides.
- composing engaging writing assignments with clear instructions.
- teaching best practices of composition teachers and explore how to translate these techniques into the non-English classroom
- how to save time when grading written assignments while maintaining high standards of written communication
- Promote the importance of communication skills throughout the College, maybe even plan special events that highlight the importance of reading and writing in all disciplines. Many organizations are eager to partner with community colleges, groups such as PEN America and the National Writing Project that declares, “Writing is essential to learning, critical thinking, and active citizenship” (NWP).
- Across the campus, teach not only students but also faculty and staff the importance of strong reading and writing skills for school and for the workplace. Here are just a few facts.
- Reading well improves the ability to follow instructions, and reading complex texts, like literature, peer-reviewed scholarly articles, and professional journals, increases critical thinking, a skill highly prized by today’s employers according to World Economic Forum.
- An August 2022 article from Business News Daily, reports on the professional benefits of reading books, fiction as well as non-fiction, including fostering empathy and creativity as well as developing problem-solving and cognitive skills. According to the article, reading can even lessen stress and build perseverance, skills students definitely need now and in the future. Imagine if all instructors were curating interesting and engaging readings for their students. They would be expanding their knowledge of their own disciplines while encouraging their own students to develop their reading skills.
- The importance of strong communication skills in the workplace continues to be of high importance in 2022 as reported by major educational institutions like Harvard and MIT as well as career-seeking sites, such as Indeed, Monster, Zip Jobs, and Linked In.
- Another thing we can do to work on the problem is to develop a college-wide system for remediating students who need extra help with their writing. For example, when I was a graduate student at Western Carolina University low these many years ago, I worked as a graduate assistant in the Writing Center. I would often tutor students who had received a “CC” on their essays in a course other than English. I can’t remember what CC stands for after all of these years, but I do remember that professors gave CC’s to essays that did not meet basic college-level English standards. Students who received two CC’s would be enrolled at no expense in a remedial English program. The word was that no student wanted to endure that class, so they would come to the Writing Center for help. I remember receiving a thank you note from one grateful student whose scores on all of his essays improved upon just a few visits to the Writing Center. Our college might do something like this–develop a system to identify students in non-English classes who have writing issues and allow them to complete revisions for a higher grade only if they visit the Student Success Center to work on that revision. We already have a referral system in place, but if all instructors could be more proactive in addressing the need to improve writing skills campus-wide, then our success rates would increase.
Just a few ideas of what the college as a whole could do to improve our English scores. Next time on Hey, Mrs. Winkler I’ll offer some suggestions on ways the administration can help English faculty as they struggle to help improve retention and success for our students.
Even if they don’t ask me.
Higher Education?
i
I know college costs too much–not my fault. Anybody who sees my paycheck can tell you that. I know community college is often seen as pseudo-higher education–I have no control over people’s perceptions. I only know that I will continue to hold my students to a high, but reachable, standard. I know some instructors do not expect college-level work from their students–I’m not one of them. I know some advisors and administrators sincerely feel sorry for those with difficult life situations that often interfere with student success. I understand. I empathize with them as well. However, I can’t allow that to affect my judgement. I cannot, repeat cannot, let any of these considerations interfere with my assessment of students’ performance in my class.
To do so would be unethical.
Consider this: Let’s say I’m teaching a fully online foundational English composition course to a first-semester freshman. The student sends an e-mail the night the first major essay is due and says that they will not be submitting the assignment on time because they were working a double shift and were too worn out and sleepy to turn in their best work, so they are requesting, very politely, an extension.
Some people would say, “Oh, come on, give the kid a break!”
I say the kindest thing to do is, as gently as possible, deny the extension. Why? Because….
- I accept late work that carries a significant grade penalty, allowing the student to begin to learn important soft skills while still salvaging their grade.
- the student may begin to understand that in the “real” world, people are expected to meet deadlines
- the penalty stings enough to begin teaching the student a valuable lesson about time management
- the student may learn that making excuses and blaming circumstances are only short-term solutions
- the student has a better chance of developing a growth mindset, learning from their mistakes and becoming not only a better student but also a better person.
It is true that denying any student anything nowadays carries with it certain risks. There is always the chance that the student, or the student’s parent, will complain, not to me, an instructor with no tenure and little power, but to one of my many supervisors, saying that I am being unreasonable and that I should not only accept late work for assignments that students have known about for weeks or even months but that I should also award points for punctuality to an essay that was not turned in on time.
But I am willing to assume that risk for the student’s sake. I learned long ago that enabling students only helps make my life and the lives of my bosses easier. It does nothing to truly help the student or to foster the higher education that my college claims to provide.
Student Teacher–Teacher Student
If I can put aside my oh-so-fragile ego, I can learn a great deal from my students. I am trying to listen more to what they say. One way I am learning from my students is by requiring my first semester freshman English composition students to write a short researched persuasive essay on a topic that is relevant to our college specifically or to one of the communities it serves.
Students can choose from a list of research questions I brainstormed, or they can submit their own questions for approval. Most of the time, the students pick one of my groups of questions. One set that became much more popular during the pandemic has been about online learning:
- What is our college doing to help retain online students? Is it enough? Why? or Why not? What are some things that other schools are doing that our college might do to help retain online students? Is our college doing any of these things?
This short summer semester, without any prompting from me, two of my best students chose the same group of questions. After research, including separate personal interviews with the college’s Director of Teaching and Learning, my students argued two different, but similar, theses. Happily, both recognized the students’ role in their own success and offered suggestions for what students could do to help themselves complete online courses with the desired results.
However, one student emphasized the faculty’s role in improving online retention, and the other argued that the administration could take steps to help more students achieve success. I found both viewpoints interesting and insightful.
So, what did I learn?
The two big takeaways–Faculty should interact more with students, and administrators need to lighten instructors loads so that students can do so. Wow! I mean, my students didn’t teach me anything I didn’t know already. I’ve been saying it for years; however, what is new is hearing about the importance of interaction and building a personal relationship from online students themselves, one who has had six semesters of online classes at my institution.
Both students indicated how helpful it is when instructors quickly respond to inquires and return graded material as soon as possible. This is the first time, however, that I have had a student discuss the administration’s responsibility to be sure that faculty do not have an overload.
Their arguments are well-taken.
A case in point was my schedule this summer. I had three classes and a shortened semester of ten weeks instead of sixteen. Since I have been teaching sixteen-week English composition in eight weeks the past couple of years, ten weeks seemed like a summer vacation. With the lighter load, I was not only able to communicate more often and with more detail but also had time to develop my courses and further refine them for our mutual benefit. In addition, I was able to hold more live virtual sessions and record them for the sake of students who could not attend the sessions. Students mentioned how helpful these sessions were.
Both students mentioned the need for proper advisement when students are registering for online classes. Sometimes, they said, students are ill-prepared for the rigor of online classes and may not possess the time-management skills to be successful. I have found that some of my eight-week online students are not even aware that they are taking an accelerated English course and quickly drop out.
One student mentioned in their essay the problem of recruitment taking precedence over retention. This point resonated with me. For example, on more than a few occassions, I have had developmental and other ill-prepared or otherwise weak students placed in my eight-week courses, or even worse, with advising restrictions removed since the pandemic, students are signing themselves up for classes, which can easily lead to misplacement. Most of these students withdraw; the expectations and pace are simply too much.
The hope is that administration will return to advising restrictions, but the lure of classes filled beyond capacity, and the funds that generates, so far seems to be too strong. As long as enrollment numbers are considered above all other considerations, including limiting the number of students in online classes, hiring more instructors, and better preparing them, I, and two of my most talented students, recognize that we will most likely continue to have low retention and success rates in online classes despite the efforts of even the most dedicated and talented faculty.
Mrs. Winkler Keeps Reading, and Thinking
I haven’t been writing like I should this summer since I’ve been working. It’s hard to read and analyze student writing all day and then come home and write. However, I do still find the time to read and have enjoyed an eclectic bunch of books.
I read Liturgy of the Ordinary by Tish Harrison Warren back in early spring–a high-stress time for me like so many educators, so this was a good find, loaned to me by the faculty advisor of our college’s Christian student group. It proved to be a good choice.
Being reminded of the value of appreciating the everyday events in my life and how these moments can become times of meditation and preparation for an increasingly tense working environment was the literary comfort food I needed, like the PB&J sandwich on the cover.
Warren takes us through a typical day with eleven chapters like “Waking,” “Losing Keys,” “Sitting in Traffic,” and “Sleeping.” Each one includes ways to not only appreciate the ordinary but also to find the spiritual force within it.
I especially liked Chapter 7: Checking Email because it discusses the value in our everyday work lives. One of the frustrations after almost 30 years of teaching is the sameness of my work. I still find joy in teaching, but I must admit to growing weary of answering so many of the same questions, marking the same errors over and over again.
Gratefully, my students do improve, but too soon they move on, and a whole new batch come in who need the same instruction. I’m not blaming them or anybody–nature of the beast. I’m just getting kinda sick of it, you know? I know, I know, I need to retire, and I’m going to–soon, but I don’t want to simply survive this upcoming year; I want to be a good, compassionate, not-burned-out composition teacher.
Having read this book will help me.
I also liked the chapter called Making the Bed. I hate to admit it, but for a long time, even though my mama taught me better, I wasn’t making up the bed. Then, I read this book about forming good habits (I blogged about it), and I started making my bed each morning. In the years since then, I’ve rarely missed a day, and it has indeed helped me to appreciate the value of routine–and the joy of it, even. Making the bed, preparing my desk for work, cooking, so many things I am finding pleasure in again.
Being 62 may have something to do with it.
For example, the opening chapter of Daphne DuMaurier’s Rebecca begins with the unnamed protagonist describing her quiet life now that all the drama is over, and she is far away from Manderly, the sprawling estate that she and her husband Max had loved so dearly:
“In reality I lay many hundred miles away in an alien land, and would wake, before many seconds had passed, in the bare little hotel bedroom, comforting in its very lack of atmosphere. I would sigh a moment, stretch myself and turn, and opening my eyes, be bewildered at that glittering sun, that hard, clean sky, so different from the soft moonlight of my dream. The day would lie before us both, long no doubt, and uneventful, but fraught with a certain stillness, a dear tranquillity we had not known before.”
I remember thinking when I was a girl and reading Rebecca for the first time how utterly boring it must have been and had no idea how an uneventful day “fraught with a certain stillness” could possibly be either dear or tranquil.
Now, I understand, and reading Warren’s book just solidified that understanding. She writes: “Without realizing it, I had slowly built a habit: a steady resistance to and dread of boredom.”
That’s it. That’s what I had been doing.
Now, I can’t say that I welcome boredom, but I am learning how to make peace with it and use it more as “me” time. Sometimes, I, a person who in the past always had to be doing something and “feeling productive,” just sit on the front deck with a cold beverage and (gasp) think!
It’s becoming my liturgy, but you know, it’s not really ordinary at all.
Hey, Mrs. Winkler! 