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Articles Conference Reviews |
2008K20TaczakStudent Expertise and Knowledge Transfer: Teaching Research Writing in the First Year Academic Writing Class
This panel showcased snapshots of three different approaches to teaching research in a first year writing classroom. Additionally, each speaker examined how knowledge of research methods might be transferred once done with FYC. The session concluded with a response by David Kellogg. The first speaker, Phillip Troutman, discussed the problems often associated with teaching research that surrounds library instruction. He offered his response to this by explaining the development of one of his research classes on comics. Troutman proposed three proto-disciplinary dispositions—you will never be the first to write about it, there’s always something new to say, and there is usually something distinctive to say. His four credit course had a research component and focused on the research of comics using a formal analysis/argument, article review and one project. Troutman suggested that the problem with research papers is compounded by library instruction, which for him is especially shown in comic research. Cary Moskovitz, the second speaker, addressed teaching research by using Bizzell and Herzberg definition of research-based writing as a “social act.” He wanted his students to walk away with enough knowledge so they could actually do something with the knowledge gained. Moskovitz’s classroom design represents what he called a research collective. He defined this as a common problem that would be inherently researched collaboratively and the instructor would be a model learner, someone who frames the question but does not drive the research. His class approached the central issue of “how should ticks should be removed to minimize risk of infection” and followed the sequence of library research, review and commentary. His class of twelve worked in groups of four to follow the assignment sequence. Throughout the assignment, the groups wrote, analyzed and researched together. As a class, they reviewed one another’s work and as a result could cite each other, as well as published authors. Moskovitz has three goals with this approach to research: 1) Student work has recognizable value, 2) Students share learning and research and analysis, which gives them greater subject-matter expertise (whether the subject-matter may be for the term) and more material to work with, and 3) Instructor can model key intellectual textual practices without taking over the classroom. These goals can lead to student empowerment and hopefully encourages transfer that can later be seen in key process skills. The third speaker, Joseph Bizup, discussed the shortcomings of conventional research assignments. He began by asking what about the rest of us with non-themed class not organized around a particular topic. His class chooses from what he called a “seed” text, which is an important quality for this approach to work. He defined a seed text as a prose piece that makes an argument, which can link out and link in and offer variety. Bizup’s example of a seed text was William Cronon’s “The Trouble with Wilderness.” He explained that this text allows students to link out with Cronin’s references and then link back through proximity searches (JSTOR, ProQuest and Google Scholar). Students begin with key word searches in each data base with “Cronin” and “wilderness” appearing within ten words of each other. Bizup wants students to identify interesting moments of “conversation” between the texts or rather allowing students to create a research network. He offered advantages of this approach as the following: 1) does not demand “exhaustive” research, 2) captures a mode of real-world research that is occluded by traditional pedagogy and 3) foregrounds dialogic nature of academic argumentation. Bizup suggested this approach teaches students research knowledge that is transferable to other causes but offered a tradeoff—it doesn’t help with library research because the students can do all of the research from his or her home computer never venturing into a library. David Kellogg concluded the session by stating students are often overwhelmed by the amount of work involved in research writing. Upper level students are not necessarily anymore prepared to research than freshman students. The advantage to the three approaches presented allows the research to be set-up in an environment that is highly constrained and can be less overwhelming for students. Overall, the session proved to be interesting because it offered three drastically different approaches to teaching research in first-year writing. Each presenter gave a unique perspective. However, I was left with questions on ways that research can be transferred outside of the FYC. The panel made brief responses to this, but did not fully develop and/or explain what can or should be transferred to upper level classes. |