accidentals and substantives

art of participation

A few weeks back on Palimpsest, while gearing up for the start of a new semester, George asked the following:

When you've assigned 2 or 3 articles of secondary reading for one class meeting, how do you provoke, manage, promote, (what-have-you) class discussion?

I struggle with George's question every semester, and too often, rather than confront the awkward silences of a discussion that never really gets off the ground, I simply change horses in mid stream and launch into lecture mode.

The question, though, reminded me of a handout I created for my undergraduates five or six years ago. I went in search of it today and found it buried in an old teaching file on my desktop. The premise behind the handout is this: that the ability to participate effectively in class isn't hardwired into our genetic code but is instead a specialized skill that must be taught and learned, just like literacy.

Feel free to adopt and modify the following for your own purposes. Among other things, the language needs to be updated for the digital age (all the references to hardcopy sound a little anachronistic to me now that I assign more and more softcopy . . .)

Art of Participation

If only we could all read (or even skim) a text once and then wax eloquent on it during class discussion. While a fortunate few possess this skill, most of us don’t. No need to despair, though, for you too can sound brilliant in the classroom. The trick is to cultivate the rarefied art of Sprezzatura: "well-practiced naturalness" or "rehearsed spontaneity," a trait possessed by the most gifted conversationists, debaters, politicians, intellectuals, teachers, socialites, and others whose business is serious discourse (scroll for a good definition). Here are some tips:

1. When preparing for class, first read your assigned text once, commenting in the margins as you go along. This is a highly idiosyncratic process. Your jottings are personal—don’t fret because others can’t decode them.

2. Selectively review your text, returning to those passages you found most significant, compelling, and interesting. Familiarize yourself with the style and language of these excerpts. Here’s an idea: memorize a favorite line or passage. The idea is to really interact with the piece, lingering over details and technique.

3. Use your dictionary to look up unfamiliar words.

4. Here is the challenging part: Start to make connections among the different passages you review. Actively seek out patterns: of thought, tone, language, intention, imagery. Build your own system of cross-references in the margins of your text to help you reaccess (during class discussion or when writing a paper) those interconnections.

5. While identifying patterns is incredibly important, don’t be afraid to address contradictions. A willingness to grapple with inconsistencies is the sign of a sophisticated mind. Mark those places in your text that seem to belie other passages. How can you account for these contradictions?

6. Don’t hesitate to bring in outside knowledge when it is relevant: Does a particular word, phrase, sentence, passage, or chapter in the text under consideration remind you of another text (or movie or painting or piece of music) you have encountered elsewhere? Consult that other text (movie, etc.). If you have time, take a few notes on it, and then give some thought to how you might relate it to the class reading.

7. (The most difficult part of all): Be a prophet! Anticipate (in advance of discussion) others’ responses to, concerns about, and interests in the text at hand. Consider how you might intersect with their comments in class. The ability to follow up on a peer’s (or teacher’s) response substantially contributes to the quality of classroom time.

8. Finally, learn to support general assertions with textual evidence. Direct the rest of us to a particular passage in the text that illustrates your point (use your marginal annotations to help guide you in this pursuit).

Posted by karik at September 20, 2004 1:35 PM | TrackBack