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Articles Conference Reviews |
2007E10JohnsonE10: How to Create Your Own Composition Program in a Few Simple Steps—A User’s Guide This presentation focused on the First-Year Composition Program at California State University Channel Islands (CSUCI), notable for its directed self-placement system, holistic team scoring and collaboration within the writing center. Guelcher and Anderson represent two of the six composition faculty at the University, and Klompien serves as coordinator of the Writing Center. Together they provided an overview of these key components of their program. John Guelcher: “How to Help Student Writers Identify Their Own Needs: Directed Self-Placement in First-Year Composition.” Guelcher introduced the notion of Directed Self-Placement (DSP) as it functions within the First-Year Composition Program. DSP is a form of placement that asks students to decide for themselves how they will fulfill the University’s Composition course requirement. This is a novel approach, as the other campuses in the Cal State system use the English Placement Test (EPT) to place students into either developmental or standard first-year composition classes. Before classes begin in the fall, students at CSUCI choose to take either a year-long “stretch” composition course (English 102 and 103) or its semester-length counterpart (English 105). They are given a brochure detailing information about the two options and provided with an opportunity to ask questions at a summer orientation session. The stretch option is designed for those students who are not as confident as they might be regarding their writing skills, while English 105 is similar to more traditional first-year writing courses focusing on developing expository and persuasive prose. In Stretch Composition, students can elect to work with the same teacher throughout the year, and they work at a much more relaxed pace to develop the skills necessary to pass the year-end portfolio project and thus be prepared to succeed in their other courses at the University. Guelcher made the point that this freedom of choice has a powerful impact on classroom dynamics, as students are aware that they have chosen to be in a particular class as opposed to having been placed there as a result of their performance on an exam. Students seem to really appreciate this opportunity to place themselves, as evidenced at the school’s most recent orientation session, when incoming students actually cheered when the stretch option was presented and discussed. Further attesting to the popularity of the stretch courses, a large majority of students (66%) elected to forego a potential elective and instead take the Stretch Composition option. Stacey Anderson: “How to Rethink the Dual Identities of Mentor and Judge: Holistic Team Scoring in First-Year Composition” Anderson discussed the Holistic Team Scoring strategy that the CSUCI Composition Program utilizes, and she discussed the impact that it has on student and teacher relations. Students in the Composition Program at CSUCI are required to submit a portfolio at the end of the term, which is evaluated by at least two composition faculty members – but never their own teacher – who each give it a score from 1 (below standard) to 6 (excellent) as defined by the First-Year Composition Program’s Holistic Scoring Rubric. The scores are then combined to give students an overall portfolio grade. Anderson cited a number of benefits to this approach for both students and faculty. For students, holistic team scoring provides consistency in grading across the Composition program. For example, Anderson provided data from the 349 portfolios scored in Fall 2006, revealing that the scores for each of the six Composition teachers averaged around 3.9, with a range of 3.8 to 4.1. (A score of 4 is considered adequate writing.) This consistency is closely related to the objectivity involved in this type of scoring, since students are being assessed by individuals other than their own instructors. Students are thus encouraged to see their audience as wider than just their instructor, which in turn helps them to develop greater confidence in their writing. For faculty, holistic team scoring inherently defines instructors as coaches, rather than as judges, and provides ample opportunity to emphasize the writing process as students work to revise their papers and prepare them for their final portfolios. In addition, the team aspect of the scoring enables faculty to develop collegiality as they engage in assessment, because they score the papers in a group setting and thus spend time discussing particular papers in relation to the rubric. Kathleen Klompien: “How to Create Your Own Writing Center.” Klompien spoke about the University Writing Center and its service to the Composition program at CSUCI. The Writing Center is a stand-alone program with no ties or funding to the English Department, but, since its inception, it has been viewed as an integral tool in improving students’ writing—thus making it a useful tool for the Composition program. Under Klompien’s direction, the Writing Center is striving to meet its goal of helping students with their writing skills by providing a tutor to each section of Composition offered at the University (schedule permitting). Tutors attend classes weekly and work with instructors to help address students’ needs. By all accounts, this alliance seems to be working very well. It keeps the tutors active and involved, even in those times when the center itself is being under-utilized, and the Composition faculty clearly appreciates the tutors’ engagement in the classroom. Moreover, surveys disseminated to students at the end of last semester indicate that the vast majority of students (93%) viewed their interactions with the tutors as positive. But just as importantly, Klompien reports that some of the greatest benefits of this program are for the writing center tutors themselves. By working with students in their classrooms, tutors learn from composition faculty and are also provided with valuable opportunities to share their impressions of students’ writing, an important function in a program such as this one that uses team scoring to assess students’ work. I came away from this session intrigued by the innovative approaches that the panelists presented. And for me at least, some of the most convincing evidence of the CSUCI Composition Programs’ success was the infectious collegiality demonstrated by the presenters themselves. It is clear that these individuals all respect one another and appreciate each others’ company, and this was reflected by their easy interactions with one another throughout the session. In fact, another member of the school’s Composition faculty, Clifton Justice, was in the audience, and he was invited to contribute his perspectives throughout the presentation. As a result, more than half of CSUCI’s Composition faculty was involved in the session. Based on all that I saw and heard here, there is no doubt in my mind that the University does indeed have a winning Composition team. Comments? |