The end is in sight

Well, I spent all day Friday commenting on Intro to Poetry portfolios, all day Saturday grading English Comp portfolios, and I am now done grading for the semester. All that's left on my to-do list is to write my teaching philosophy, which I have clearly been putting off.

I did take a little time to go through some of my old Comp stuff (remember, I did a year in the comp program before I switched over to the MFA) and I'm really struggling to put it all together. I wish I'd had an assistantship that first year. It was so hard to take comp classes without any teaching experience, and now it's really difficult to write a philosophy, using comp theory to back it up, when it has been 2 years since I took a class. I mean, there was practicum, but my prof for practicum is a social constructionist/social epistemic/critical pedagogist (I'm not really sure which label is exactly right, but he does a little of them all, I guess) and I am definitely not. Hence, the reading we've done this semester is kind of off.

Don't get me wrong. There's some stuff from these camps that makes sense: democratic classroom, sharing authority, etc. But I don't want my class to become a political forum, and I don't want any unneccesary conflict in my class--the kids are already set up to be competing against each other and testing my authority. Let's not help them out.

I fall in more with the Expressivists (Dr. Svehla always calls me a writer teaching writing, which I love the sound of) and maybe a little of the pragmatists. I think personal narrative is the best way to learn to write because it allows beginning writers to focus on craft, rather than on complex subject matter. I think if you learn to write well about your own experiences, learn to use examples from your own life to support your opinions, then it is easy to transfer those skills to a more academic topic. I don't think my class was all fluffy bunnies, but I do think my students excelled when I asked them to analyze themselves, their lives, and their beliefs rather than some arbitrary topic.

But who can I quote to back this opinion up? Probably Murray, Elbow...who else? It's been so long I'm already forgetting the names. Which means I have a lot of reading to do (rather, skimming and reading what I highlighted two years ago) to get to where I'm ready to write this philosophy paper. My goal is to have it done on Tuesday, so that break can officially start on Tuesday night, but maybe that goal is too lofty. Maybe I should take my time and turn it in on Thursday or Friday, after I've had some time to incubate my thoughts.

At any rate, blogging about it isn't going to help, so I guess I should sign off. The next time you hear from me, I'll be on Christmas break. Hallelujah.