I wrote the following proposal draft in response to CEA of Ohio's CFP:
In their 2007 CCC article, Douglas Downs and Elizabeth Wardle question the ability of first-year composition (FYC) to adequately prepare students for various rhetorical contexts using a fictional cross-disciplinary discourse. They claim that “more than twenty years of research and theory have repeatedly demonstrated that such a unified academic discourse does not exist and have seriously questioned what students can and do transfer from one context to another (Ackerman, Berkenkotter and Huckin, Carter, Diller and Oates, Kaufer and Young, MacDonald, Petraglia, Russell ‘Activity Theory’)” (552). This suggests a need for what the authors refer to as “Intro to Writing Studies” pedagogy, which could lead to more WID programs, yet numerous institutional, theoretical, and financial concerns prevent many universities from implementing such programs. Thus, we must craft new and creative ways for students to investigate discipline-specific literacies within the FYC classroom. New media provide opportunities for students to explore and practice various literacies as they start to engage in the discourse communities within their chosen disciplines, even if those disciplines require multi-modal literacy (i.e. film and music majors).
My presentation will focus on navigating these concerns through the use of a multi-modal assignment that asks students to investigate the kinds of literacies and genres that constitute their disciplines and future occupations. Each student then constructs a wiki page in order to present their findings to other students new to that field of study. The multi-modal presentation of his/her findings allows the student to gain experience with some of the researched composition practices, including the use of images and/or sound within the discourse community. Furthermore, the use of a wiki not only provides students with a new means of composition, it also encourages collaboration and peer-review, and it allows the class to build a knowledge base that can be added to and revised by subsequent classes. Therefore, students will write both for an audience within the classroom and for future students who will benefit from previous research while revising it with their own.
Why a wiki? wikis are mainly for collaboration. Yours is individual, at least with the course. Maybe you can group students by discipline/college etc.
ReplyDelete"Activity theory" should be explained or dumped.
As I am sure JW covered, you spend a lot of time on Russell's points. I'd keep him, but only express the essence more briefly, using only what you need to set up your exigency.
I like R's game analogy. Use that and then maybe state briefly his point.
Possibly use other sources, but not absolutely needed.
Replace the "not only . . . but" of the last sentence with "will . . . and" with a few word alterations to make it work.
I suggest scoping out beyond disciplinary discourse to "professional," that is, outside of academic discourse of the field/occupations.
There's a way in which your statement ("to that end") about new media seems to assume assent. Try to answer why new media is necessary for this.