Deathly Hallows, All Hallow’s Eve, and The Forest Again

Tonight is one of my favorite nights. But this will be the first Halloween in many years that Deb and I don’t celebrate with pumpkin lights, cider or wine in skeleton glasses, Nestle Crunch bars, brie cheese, our friends, and our friends’ kids in costumes. I’m 230 miles south of home, smack dab [...]

luxurious two-day vacation!

Deb drove down from Yakima to spend the weekend with me.  And I actually took almost two whole days off from studying — woo hoo!  On Saturday we drove and hiked up to Mary’s Peak. It was a clear day so we could see Corvallis and the Willamette Valley to the east and almost to [...]

my alma mater writing center

Found out yesterday that the YVCC writing center had made the local paper last Monday: $3 million grant will help YVCC expand Hispanic enrollment. Yay!
(That’s my former counterpart, Brad Smith, in the photo.)

ANDY SAWYER/Yakima Herald-Republic
Brad Smith of the Yakima Valley Community College writing center works with student Judith Johnson earlier this month. The college recently [...]

Annual Leaf Collection Program!

I was just reading in the Corvallis city newsletter that The Annual Leaf Collection Program will run from November 5th to January 4th. How cool is that! An Annual Leaf Collection Program! Okay, I know — I’m a little too easily entertained. But I love fall. It’s still such a new [...]

[journal entry] on Lindemann on Cognition

October 22, 2007
Journal Entry on Lindemann’s “What Do Teachers Need to Know about Cognition?” (86-108)
By far the most interesting parts of this chapter were Lindemann’s discussions of James Moffett’s pedagogical theories and of Marcia B. Baxter Magolda’s research on the cognition of traditional-age college students.
Moffett’s theories may shed some light on the question of [...]

Some language needs to be impersonal

I’m gathering and organizing my in- and out-of-class assignments for WR 516 Advanced Composition, to put together in a sketchbook to be turned in to Chris Anderson. They’d gotten out of order and mixed in with my class notes. Anyway, I thought I’d post this paragraph. Chris loved it. And I [...]

project proposal for WR 511

I just finished with my project proposal for WR 511 (Teaching of Writing), rhetorical preces [is preces plural for precis?] and bibliography included. Spent that last seven hours on it. My topic is the role of personal/expressive writing in the composition classroom. Anyway,I remember reading in Michael Faris’ blog before I came [...]

[journal entry] on Kolln and Hancock’s “The story of English grammar in United States schools”

October 21, 2007
Journal Entry on Kolln and Hancock’s “The story of English grammar in the United States schools” from English Teaching: Practice and Critique (December 2005, 4.3, 11-31). http://education.waikato.ac.nz/research/files/etpc/files/2005v4n3art1.pdf
This article explains a lot. While at the YVCC Writing Center, I wondered a lot about the place of grammar in the teaching of writing. On [...]

[journal entry] on Lindemann’s “Teaching about Sentences”

Wish I had more time to post extracurricular things on this blog, but oh well…
October 15, 2007
Journal Entry on Lindemann’s “Teaching about Sentences” (from A Rhetoric for Writing Teachers 163-174)
Lindemann suggests three ways to teach about sentences: 1) use examples to discuss how readers perceive sentences (e.g., how the beginning or end of sentences indicates [...]

[journal entry] on Lindemann’s “Prewriting Techniques”

October 7, 2007
Journal Entry on Lindemann’s “Prewriting Techniques” (109-129) [Chapter Seven of A Rhetoric for Writing Teachers]
In this chapter, Lindemann surveys various prewriting techniques and suggests ways they can be best used in the writing classroom.  I was already familiar with and had used most of the types already (mostly, in my writing center work): [...]