Gill’s last post is dead on...Not only is it our fault for the continued zombie-esque trampling of academic writing into FYC, it is also still so entrenched in the textbooks. Although many of the textbooks are slowly incorporating multimodality, it’s an uphill battle and they are not there yet. I’m also realizing, however, that I really couldn’t start to really build or teach a composition class that emphasizes multimodality without first having tenure. And you can bet that it will be my tenured position that will also protect my part-time colleague. However, it will be his tenured position in the high school that will protect his status when he teaches the course to his dual-enrolled seniors.
As I’m designing the class for next fall, I’m also starting to prepare my arguments for when fellow faculty, administrators, and even students (or their parents) start asking “what the #$!!?” I’m doing in this class. The first set of examples that I plan to point to is the increasing amount of amateur journalism that is being welcomed by news agencies with requests for web/blog submissions (especially via replies) as well as video submissions (especially during breaking events). Don’t we want civic participation to not only think and say something important, but to compose it in an appropriate and meaningful manner as well…and these are not your daddy’s letter to the editor compositions.
Are you teaching multimodal composition in your FYC classes? If so, how are you justifying it to yourself, your students, and your colleagues?
1 comments:
VUVOX is starting to show up as curriculum in a number of schools. Just yesterday I gave a lecture about VUVOX's new collage tool to the Berkeley School of Journalism.
It's a great endorsement of the technology that the faculty give assignments using it.
www.vuvox.com/collage/home
I'll pass this along to you as well as your readers. It certainly speaks to you 'ease of multimedia authoring' comment.
I think it is great you are bringing this into the classroom!
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