A
10:002 or 10:003 Unit ~ The Myth of the Model Family
|
|
|
Schedule |
Formal Assignments
|
|||||||
|
Day 1:Discussion of Paper assignment: possible organizational strategies. Notes: I focus on simple organization, following the questions on the assignment sheet: First, narrate the incident. (Think of what makes a good story: a setting, with specific details...maybe dialog...whatever you value about narrative.) Then tell me why you were stereotyped (this is a form of analysis: students are reading the larger culture, and why they were perceived in one particular way). Then discuss the impact that incident has had on your forming character (a bit of reflexive writing—something students may or may not have had experience with). One thing I like about this paper assignment is that it begs students to bust out of the Five Paragraph Theme approach to organization—if they think in terms of these three sections, they’re almost sure to be experimenting with form beyond the 5P. I’m considering having a little ceremony, in fact, knighting them as people who’re now ready to move into more exciting forms of organization. This paper frequently helps them move along into that transition.
More discussion of rhetorical analysis In-class work: students work in pairs or threes. Each group is
assigned one point of rhetorical analysis (audience, appeals, etc.) Using
a one-page essay (such as a “My Turn” column from Newsweek),
each group addresses their analysis point in 3-4 minutes of impromptu
speaking. Notes: Again, any way Rhetorical Analysis can be made tangible is a good thing. This way students get to wrangle with just one of the eight points, and they get to do it in the company of their classmates. Assign: Danielle Crittenden, “About Marriage” (student-led discussion) Reader response (these were proposed by students): how does Crittenden define “the feminist approach to marriage”? How does the five-paragraph structure of her article work or not work? Notes: Again, see the hidden agenda of busting them out of five-paragraph structure? My students decided to ask that second question to help drive that agenda home. The first question helped students see the multiplicity of “feminist” thought—there’s not one specific and rigid list of what behavior or ideology is feminist. I support this question because so often, students this age reject anything labeled “feminist,” and as an instructor, I want to challenge that rejection.
Day 3:Student-led discussion of Crittenden Notes: Crittenden is a good one to start out with. Student presenters who do research will discover that she herself uses her maiden name, though she makes a big fuss in the article that women should take and use their husbands’ names. That fact alone usually leads to some great discussions about ethos. Also, this piece is short, straightforward, and easy to understand.
Day 4:Film: “Still Killing Us Softly” (Jean Kilbourne; available at the University Main Library Media Services) Notes: This film offers more practice reading visual text. It demonstrates close reading, feminist analysis, a chance to talk about subjectivity/objectivity, and the strategies advertisers use. Kilbourne’s analysis of gender and gender roles also contributes well to the “Model Family” discussion. Week 4
Day 1:Discuss: How do ads work? Use material from Kilbourne (who also has an essay in Rereading America), Adbusters, Media Awareness Network, and other sources. Notes: There’s a bit of a focus shift here, moving into
the world of ads. I do that on purpose: this Model Family unit is a very
long one, one students could grow weary if it seemed we never left that
content area. I like to build in departures like this. In my view, it’s
important for maintaining the class’ energy. Students exchange drafts of the paper in preparation for the upcoming workshop. In class, each student receives drafts of two other student papers; the paper workshop sheet is distributed by e-mail.
Day 2:Analyze print ads on overheads together as a class. (Two ads will fill the hour.) Notes: It’s amazing what the students see—there are always some who work visually, who are able to teach me about color and composition, or others who notice cultural references I hadn’t. In particular, one ad from Best Buy implied interesting things about gender: which shoppers were making their own decisions, versus which were surrounded by sales associates. My students also noticed a lot of cross-marketing in the ad for Best Buy, which featured TVs advertising a movie made by the same parent company. An astute student called out this relationship, and other students had a breakthrough moment in terms of audience manipulation. (This is what UI Communication Studies Professor Kembrew McLeod calls “Synergy” in a fabulous short film you might like: “Money for Nothing,” a view on corporate control of the recording industry.) Assign: Speech 2: Ad Analysis This assignment involves analyzing visual text. Students tap into themes of gender, race, class, culture. Notes: Again, see above: this could be re-focused to tie in more tightly to family issues. In the past, though, this assignment has been a good early-speech assignment: there’s plenty of material for the students to work with, and they get valuable experience in using visual materials (ie, putting overheads up the right way, making slides of advertisements, investigating the wonderful world of technology...)
Day 3:Discuss: Introductions and conclusions—what should they accomplish? How can they be used effectively in speeches? Papers? Notes: There’s lots of material on these topics in writing handbooks, but my focus is on moving them past the rigid Preview and Summary strategies from high school. A particularly interesting question comes up with the conclusion: how do you summarize in a way that’s not just repetition? The hallmarks of Good Form, outlined in The Little Brown Handbook, make a lot of sense to me and to my students. They also lend themselves well to concrete grading criteria.
Day 4:Paper 1 workshop: Students exchange written comments with others in their workshop groups, and spend classtime discussing their responses. Notes: I love this day. The students receive
classmates’ drafts and workshop sheets on Tuesday—they fill
out a copy for me and a copy for the author, and there’s so much
information on those sheets that they can easily have involved conversations
about each others’ work. I just sit back and watch. Relationships
build among students, and it’s great that they get a chance to see
how hard other people are working on their papers.
Day 1:Paper 1 due: Students write reflectively on the experience, responding briefly to prompts (“What was the most difficult thing about this assignment...what do you think you did well...what would you do differently next time...describe the workshop experience.”) Film: “How to Make a McDonald’s Commercial” (Normally available in the speaking center...though currently, it isn’t. Any film about the advertising industry would work here...look for anything suggested by the Media Awareness people at www.mediaawareness.com.) Notes: The reflective writing about Paper 1 usually gives me some good information about each individual student—I get their assessment of their performance, their thought processes, insecurities, and the little nuggets of learning they picked up along the way. These bits of info help me see the student behind the paper, and help me know how to respond with helpful comments. Assign: Patricia Hill Collins, “Black Women and Motherhood” (student presentation) Reader response questions: 1. According to Hill Collins, what is the “othermother”? 2. How might children benefit from this sort of parenting structure?
Day 2:Student-led discussion of Hill-Collins Notes: Hill Collins’ piece about the African American community is the class’ first stroll into issues of race—this is an important moment. First, remind everyone that race is difficult to talk about sometimes, and that this is the first of many discussions you’ll have. Remind everybody that you’ll get better and more comfortable with it as the semester moves along. I also challenge people to avoid terms like “Those people” and race-based generalizations in their discussion.
Day 3:Discuss: speech mechanics, organizational strategies, how to signpost, using visual aids effectively. Notes: I feel like I’m still searching for effective ways to teach speech mechanics. I’ve found that stressing authenticity—the student should sound natural, however “natural” is for that student—is a good starting place, and helps eliminate some of the wooden big-wordiness that can make speech-giving painful. Again, we focus a lot on organization: setting up a speech that reflects how the eye moves through the ad, for instance, beginning with the most noticeable elements and moving into the less noticeable ones.
Day 4:Workshop Speech 2 Notes: I have students get into groups of three, visual aids in hand, and practice their speeches informally. I encourage them to use their workshop groups in ways that will be most helpful. Some will have the entire speech ready to go by workshop day; others will still be hashing out their ideas. Some instructors collect copies of students’ outlines, to ensure that everybody has gotten at least that far. But I think that so often new ideas are still evolving during the workshop that students’ outlines change drastically during and after this day. So I’d rather wait and see the outlines later. |