About Michael J. Faris
I study rhetoric and composition as a PhD student in the English Department at Penn State University.
This blog serves as a place to think through things, record thoughts, share interesting stuff, and hold conversations. Welcome!
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- Max Spiegel on 584: Weekly Position Paper #6: Why Do White People Claim They Have No Culture?
- two teaching things + a little peer review « info-fetishist on Meh Kitty: Online Forums Allow the Tricked to not be Tricked
- hayley nuttall on Memorial graffiti for Amy Winehouse on sidewalk outside Only…
- Drew Kopp on Call for CCCarnival: Sirc’s “Resisting Entropy”
- Russell, David. “Activity Theory and Its Implications for Writing Instruction.” In Reconceiving Writing, Rethinking Writing Instruction. Ed. Joseph Petraglia. (Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum,1995): 51-78. « New Seeds on Call for CCCarnival: Sirc’s “Resisting Entropy”
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- Watching Idol and Glee with Amy. Many viewers will probably cry. I will offer snarky commentary instead (@ Chumley's) http://t.co/b3VfRTSl 11 hrs ago
- Wait a minute. If there is another copy of Lefenvre's Production of Space at a PSU library, why was mine recalled? #annoyed 12 hrs ago
- The sun comes out and the shirts come off #collegetowns 14 hrs ago
- DC's going to have a gay character. Marvel says, "eh, we had a gay character in 1992. and now he's getting married" http://t.co/NH3ZQDYv 17 hrs ago
- Masayuki and I talked on the phone last night, and we realized that single lesbians are a dying breed in our social circles #fb 18 hrs ago
- RIP-OFF! RT @jorge_lingo: $650 bucks for the official PSU doctoral regalia!!! I had no idea it was that expensive! 20 hrs ago
- My Top 3 #lastfm Artists: Rufus Wainwright (36), Chris Crocker (15) & Bright Eyes (9) http://t.co/Pg5TIKUH 21 hrs ago
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Monthly Archives: June 2006
Macrorie on the Socratic Method
From Uptaught: A couple of years ago I attended a general education conference where a young leader of a new school at the University of Chicago told of his supposedly radical methods of teaching. He had found the Socratic method. … Continue reading
Posted in Socrates, Teaching Composition
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burn!
Graduate school needs grades to determine whom to admit. Nonsense. What graduate school needs is an expectation that the students it accepts will do independent, mature work. The last place to find out whether they can do that is a … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
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Macrorie: Student as Slave
In my previous post, I discussed Macrorie’s book Uptaught and how, in the chapter “Discipline,” the student essays didn’t have the criticism (or analysis) that I would like: they were enjoyable to read, but that’s it. I just read a … Continue reading
Posted in Teaching Composition
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Macrorie’s “Third Way”
I’ve read about a quarter of Ken Macrorie’s Uptaught, and I like some of the sentiments he expresses. For example, he gives an example of how a textbook might start: If you are a student qho desires assistance in order … Continue reading
Posted in Teaching Composition
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Keeping Young Persons in Line
This way of keeping young persons in line, of making sure they do not speak in their own voices of anything that counts for them, goes back to Roman times when schoolboys declaimed on proper topics in weekly themes. It … Continue reading
Posted in Education
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