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The Power of Transformation
“When I entered 5004 [writing pedagogy course], I was too precious in my assumptions about the discipline of writing. The teacher I would become was screaming to be released, and through that class, my radical/transgressive pedagogy was born, hot and inspired and passionate. But it meant that the old me, the me who came from creative writing and teacher-centered pedagogy, had to die. For a while last year, I hated the person that I was before I was enabled through my coursework to reinvent and honor who I’d been all along. I’ve since made peace with her, accepted her passing, and realized that without that cycle I could not have become the teacher I’m still evolving to be now.” -- A reading response from my composition theory course, dated October 3, 2022
Around a year after those first archival snippets of my own reflection, I was prepared to call my journey of (un)growth what it was: a cycle of death and rebirth. This response is raw, and honest. I was precious in my assumptions, denying my own identity its wings, and as a result, looking back, I was somewhat horrified with who I had been. By this point, I was teaching independently, carrying the weight of the conflict around my grading strategy, drafting a model of radical teaching in first-year writing for my thesis, and applying for PhD programs to continue that work.
Even a year prior, I never would have imagined I would be taking any of those steps, aside from the teaching, which was only by mandatory assignment. The work of the teacher is a continual work of internal and external transformation, continuation and discontinuation (Akkerman & Meijer, 2011; Locke, 2014). This cannot be understated for graduate students, who exist in a fraught ecology of career and personal invention amidst composing their teacher identity.
Pedagogical Strategies: Transformation for Students
When we think about the classroom, we might automatically associate the space with transformation. Afterall, students do not emerge from the semester in precisely the same headspace, nor with less knowledge than before. There are dozens of ways we might foster transformation during a semester of first-year writing (Price, 2020). For my students, I frame the semester as an opportunity for growth, for exploration, for finding their footing, whether they are just beginning their college journey or preparing to graduate.
Most importantly, I frame this transformation as an invitation. I do not mandate change in their writing, nor do I promise to shift the way they write. What I mandate is that they make an attempt to think in interesting ways, and I promise to provide support therein. We explore different genres; I offer choice within those genres. I give contract boosts for cover letters written, for applications filled out, or even for coming to office hours. Transformation is always radical, and does not need to be monumental. In teaching, I recommend prioritizing student growth, and valuing that growth no matter how small it seems to you and whether it has immediate appearance in their writing or not.