The Way We Will Have Become:

The Future (Histories) of Computers and Writing

Topic: "The Computers *in* Writing"
Facilitator: John Barber
Participants: Hugh Burns, Cynthia Haynes, Jan Holmevik, Claudine Keenan, Fred Kemp, Dickie Selfe, John Slatin 

Generative Questions:

• What is the current mission of teachers and scholars involved in computers and writing in light of technological advances and shifts in worldview relating to the purpose of education? 
• What areas have shifted that may cause us to rethinkn our mission? 
• Where do we want to be? 
• How will computers help to promote and promulgate current composition theory? Will new composition theory develop in light o feducational technology? 

Claudine: pub school teachers. more pressure few opportunities to teach with technology. school board mandates to teach 'basics' to raise standardized test scores. building isn't wired. federal funding at stake w/ test scores. as we broaded definition of literacy to include technology we'll face disappointment. we should strengthen bridges to pub schools. see nat'l writing proj. 

Dickie: c&w should be in forefront in establishing new venues for teaching and learning using the tools we're exploring. include both structured and unstructured f2f interactions as well. should we abandon tech rich f2f sites? (as DE advocates would suggest) or make better use of combination of virtual and physical sites for learning. build connex w/ 2 yr colleges. student demographics changing fast. older. working. poor. be aware of and work to bridge gulf between tech haves and have nots. 

Fred: leaders in r&c have long espoused collab writing over current/trad pedagogy. practitioners have been not been profoundly affected. They look not to leaders but to their peers in next classroom for guidance. lore. (north). our prognostications about empowerment are bouncing off teachers, who seem to be bullet-proof to real change. our real job: influence education? the hope lies with the proles. (orwell) practitioners will change not because of reading CE or going to CCCC but because the ground is literally shifting beneath their feet. common sense approach. but teachers will revert when they return to the classroom box. the problem is not with the eggheads or with the teachersbut with the trenches. need to get teachers and students out of those 180 yr old trenches. 

Jan: needto rethink our missions. we should be critical thinkers about technology and take lead in the way technologies are shapedand constructed. one way is to become developers of technologies. think critically about them. improve them. the two cultures have merged into one, or we should at least facilitate that process. 

Cynthia: shift from one model of ed to multiple models, to recognition of multiple intelligences. shift pedagogical sensibilities. nothing is pedagogically sacred any more. massive burial mound of student writing that we have builtin the name of process pedagogy. from age of authority to age of ? we will leave conditions that force our students to write for burial mounds. 

Hugh: [I couldn't hear Hugh very well & didn't trust myself to interpret. Perhaps he can post something here to fill this gap? --EC] 

JohnS: our mission is to understand and articulate the impact of technology. as teachers, must help students thrive in knowledge economy. students will bring new literacies and practices into our classroom with them. they are developing those notbecause of school but in spite of it. video arcades. difficult for older colleagues to grasp, but it's not only for grayhairs that the bell tolls. the classroom is no longer sovereign space. the walls are now two-way glass. we are visible from the outside. no use fretting. cite zuboff. distinction btw automated systems and tools for people. simple perturbations in classroom are having large cascading effects. 

JohnB: tying together the themes presented: we must learn to build bridges using tools we have that will release us from locked box of classroom to open autonomous realm of rhetorical pings where we can learn to thrive in a new knowledge economy of print/digital media 

cindy selfe: one theme: houghton institute. help teachers integrate technology in their classrooms. mixed levels. mixed experience. disagree that public school teachers are so caught in the system that they can't exert productive agency. learn more from k-12 teachers. even though they have to answer to the tests and don't get credit for profdev and don't have access to tech, they tell us how to pay attention to the kind of action we want to take as teachers and avoid overly focusing on technology which us college folks tend to do. they are not dupes of the system. they have to contend with the system, and they are contending very well. 

Dene: works with middle & sec schools. every teacher has computer in classroom but has no connection to net and no training. sits on desk collects dust. training is desperately needed. might be diff in texas. 

Fred: not sayng they are dupes of the system, but MTU gets selective participation. visited 40 schools. ourstuff has not filtered down. they aren't dupes, but they aren't getting opportunities to learn from and enact new ideas. 

Gail: elem teachers and college teachers feel kinship not present between sec and col. we don't think they are dupes. we think they are in a system that doesn't allow them to act in productive ways. should work more with schools than we do. 

Dickie: need to work with students as colleagues. we're not capable of understanding new media by ourselves. need to work with students. need to work on student-technology assistance programs. students work with teachersto integrate technology. 

John: we as university teachers are astonishingly ill informed about what teachers do in schools. texas will institute huge, new curriculum that amounts to radical change. teacher educators aren't paying attention to changes. they know a lot more about what we do than we know about what they do. 

dene: as our colleagues across curriculum move to computers, what happens to this group? we set ourselves apart as innovators and we're not anymore the only ones. 

gail: we're still judged to be an innovative group by many. steve gilbert points to us as leaders. steve ehrmann looks to us. we have some historical credibility that I hope we'll carry into the future. 

catherine smith: the curriculum. might come from lots of places. but what do we want it to become. liberal arts tradition? are there other traditions that are richer and more relevant? 

hugh: grammar logic rhetoric (trivium) arithmetic geometry astronomy music (quad) word & number. philos standing next to lib arts. 

cindy: we need to pay attn to students. we're awfully tied to text. but look at what students are doing with an expanded notion of text. have to get past this limited notionof text. 

me: pay attention to another powerful constituency: parents. 

woman whose name I didn't catch: some see technology as a smaller box than the classroom. think of it as pre-packaged instructional software. 

cynthia: recently spoke to ap teachers. felt like a hostile witness. they wanted to prepare students to clep out of courses I want them to take. disjuncture. 

gail: we don't talk with each other. have to get conversation going. 

cathy null: process approach brought me to C&W. did survey of faculty in other disciplines. they aren't using email! this year, they have embraced technology. to them, embracing technology means putting syllabus on web and publishing emailaddress so students can make appts. gap here between what we think and what they think. they missed something along the way. I feel like a convert. Now I feel like I have to become an evangelist. 

Ty: I've been thinking about how far ahead we are in many ways compared to what's happening in business and govt. some of those folks would like to know what we know. what we don't see are the very things that are most needed in govt and industry. we attend to classroom, to innovation, to pedagogy, but they need help with learning how to communicate in new realms. 

Fred: not sure changing name of c&w is all that important, but changing the mission is. we were cheerleaders in the 80s, not have to understand more and be able to convey more to diverse groups. 

Ty: but is it writing any more? it's communication. 

Fred: but "communication" is a trap. to many people that means conveying information. 

kate: who is the 'we'? 

woman: fear of technology has kept us back. we learned that it's not so much technical thing as social thing.