Thursday, February 28, 2019
William Covino
William Covino does not hold back in his review of past text books and authors strategies for teaching writing. His introduction to the topic was my favorite. The way he talked about the "rules for a successful paragraph" being impossible for the student to actually follow was spot on. I was taught to write paragraphs under a similar design and it was hard to do. He says," Thus situated, they seem awfully stiff and spare, and are intended to suggest that rules for writing are antiexpressivist, that they pale in comparison with the varieties of language play that can develop he imagination" (36). By pointing out that the imagination can fuel word play, and create more expressive paragraphs and better paragraphs is incredibly important. In today's public school there is a shortage of pushing kids to express their imaginations, and I think this makes students feel down trodden in there writing. This makes them in turn not enjoy it, and this is a real problem. The way writing is taught truly effects the experience of the writer. This means that it is important to ensure that we don't follow a one size fits all program. When Covino quotes Murphy saying, "those who do not study the history of rhetoric will be the victims of it" (38). There is a lot of negative connotation around "rhetoric" many people think of it as a form of manipulation, but after studying rhetoric in this class has shown that this is not the case. Covino makes the case that studying rhetoric improves writing. Overall Covino's study into several text books and several different teaching forms is important and revealing.
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Hi Julie,
ReplyDeleteLike we discussed in class, this piece was difficult for me to read. It was an exhaustive literature review and did not keep my attention at all. However, I did love what you said about imagination and how it fuels word play. Last year I worked in an elementary school as a teacher's assistant, and my lead teacher let me teach writing. I noticed that the kids loathed it. I mean, some enjoyed it, but the vast majority of my students had very low writing skills and hated the task. I tried my best to make it as approachable as possible, but teaching writing is just straight up hard. I'm looking forward to my CPR because it's on basic writing, and that is definitely something that I want to learn how to teach because so many people lack basic writing skills.