"I Was Forced To Think"

by Anne L. Legge

from VCCA Journal, Volume 8, Number 1, Summer 1993, 4-10

-anonymous student comment

True or False: Stephen Crane never saw a battle before he wrote The Red Badge of Courage.

Multiple Choice: In Of Mice and Men, Lenny and George were

(a) cousins,
(b) friends,
(c) brothers.

Short Answer: What state is associated with John Steinbeck?

For years I opened my community college Survey of American Literature class with a quiz composed of such questions based on the current reading assignment. I used the quizzes to prompt students to read the assignment prior to class. But I was never comfortable about the kind of information elicited by the quizzes or the message conveyed by this emphasis on trivia, and I thought hard about what I really wanted students to take away from the survey course. They need to remember some specific facts, but these individual threads and slubs of information should be woven into a whole and meaningful fabric.

Another thing that bothered me was the passive role of the students. They didn't do anything with these bits and pieces of information except memorize them. I wanted them to scrutinize the fragments, to hold them to the light, to compare them and find relationships, to try them on, react to them, and evaluate them. Furthermore, I felt I was under-utilizing the experience that my students bring with them to class. The average age in these community college night classes is around 35, and I thought of the untapped resources sitting there in my classroom drowsy and dormant!

When Lord Fairfax obtained a SCHEV grant for a two-year Thinking-Through-Writing program, I jumped at the opportunity to participate as one of ten faculty members from different disciplines. As a result of working with various consultants and my colleagues, I decided to experiment with a "Thinking-Through-Writing" strategy in my two American literature classes. Each of these classes met one evening a week for three hours, with 30 students in one section and 32 in the other. I wanted to try using informal "think writing" assignments instead of trivia quizzes. I added two journal entries per week to the syllabus, specifying that the entries should be about a page long and that they should be written before coming to class so that we could make use of them in class activities. In order to do the journals, students had to read the assignments carefully and thoughtfully.

In class, I often asked students to read from their journals as a take-off point for class discussion. Sometimes they worked in small groups, reading their writings to each other and pooling them in a report to the class. At the end of each class, I collected the entries and took them home. I read them and wrote responses on them as thoroughly as time permitted, always addressing the content of the writing. I emphasized to the students that these were to be informal, raw "think-writings," and I never marked editing errors in spelling, mechanics, or grammar. I checked the entries off in my grade book and gave credit for them, but I did not grade them.

Here are some examples of the weekly journal assignments:

(1) Is Puritanism strictly (no pun intended) a seventeenth century phenomenon or is it alive and well today? How? Where?

(2) In what ways can Poe be described as a Romantic?

(3) Copy and discuss a passage from Walden that touched you personally.

(4) "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock," freewrite for about a page.

(5) How do Eliot and Pound portray the modern world? Is it a nice place to live or even to visit? Point to some specific lines that back up your assessment.

(6) Based on the poems you read, what are the hallmarks of a Frost poem? What characteristic forms, subjects, techniques, and themes would help you to identify a poem as his work?

(7) What is your favorite Frost poem and why do you like it?

(8) Compare and contrast the poetry of W. C. Williams with that of Cummings. What influence do you think Williams' profession had on his work?

(9) (To be done after viewing film on Steinbeck) You are an Okie who has lost the family farm, and you and your family, with all your worldly goods tied onto a Model A ford, are heading for California hoping to find work and a new life. You have stopped for the night. Write an entry in your journal.

(10) After reading the handout on Existentialism, freewrite about it. If there are parts that you don't understand, you are not alone! Try writing about what you don't understand.

(11) The work of Baldwin and Brooks focuses on the black urban scene. What problems do they present? What solutions, if any, do they suggest? Does this material help you to understand current racial tensions in American cities.

The excerpts from student journal entries, noted below, give a variety of perspectives on these questions. To begin, an 18-year-old student responds to question 2; his consideration of it prompts him to speculate about the motives behind the characteristic subject matter and structure of Poe's stories:

Poe seems to be not necessarily illogical, but definitely a little, well, very strange. His life and the manner he lived seemed very depressive. I think this drove him to write "illogically" sad or even fearful writings. He seemed to write to relieve his feelings and enjoy death. As with romantics they build ruins in gardens...And, still yet illogical is not really even a proper description. He did develop detective stories. He got the idea to get the ending first and develop the plot around it...Poe is definitely very exciting to read and very enjoyable.

Here is an adult student hesitantly writing her way to a better understanding of Eliot's challenging poem. "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" (question 4):

I don't understand what the yellow smoke is. The sixth stanza, I think, it is talking about how he will dress or look going to see his sweetheart or some lady. He talks about the lady's eyes, arms, and perfume. He is trying to tell her something important. What I don't know, maybe to ask her to marry him. He is too scared to, and I don't think he does. He mentions something about only being an attendant lord so maybe he doesn't think he is good enough...I think the mermaids have something to do with this (maybe symbolism somehow), but I can't understand what. Maybe since they are not real, maybe he thinks the love between him and the lady is not real.

In the next entry, a student tackles an affective writing assignment which calls for role-playing based on reading an excerpt from The Grapes of Wrath (question 9):

Today the baby's fever raged on. I am scared for her life. If she dies, we'll have to bury her here in the middle of nowhere with nothing but sticks and rocks to mark her grave. I cannot understand why a loving God would give me a good man, good home, beautiful children and threaten to take it all away.

Another student catches Steinbeck's style in some dialect (question 9):

Midnight. Pa and I have just said our good nights and the chillens they lie asleep, best they can with the desert cold night and Sarah's cough. Poor thing! It aint give her no rest since we been on this journey and my heart aches so's I gives her my coat to keep the chill off and sit here under the moon praying and writing and worrying.

A student writer creates a setting and uses it to set the mood in a manner reminiscent of Steinbeck himself (question 9):

Today the family and I walked the same road that we walked yesterday, moving one foot after another while the dry, sinister trees looked on and the dust from the road choked my lungs. Once a bus came along, filled with people, and going in the direction we were headed, but they would make no room for us but keep right on moving, kicking up more dust in our faces.

In the following entry, a student grapples with the concepts of existentialism and articulates a critique of contemporary American ethics (question 10):

Existentialism is supposed to be present in twentieth century thought, but the thought is not carried through in action. Existentialism is total honesty, such as, seeing clearly with the ability to set goals, and to make the proper choices in living, with the ability to accept the consequences that prevail. Most Americans can set goals, and make choices in living, but they have difficulty in the honesty department.

These student responses show evidence of careful, thoughtful reading and of several different kinds of critical thinking in progress, including application, analysis based on evidence and inference, drawing conclusions, synthesis, comparison, and evaluation. The entries also show students imaginatively projecting themselves into the literature and relating it to their own experiences.

I was excited about the thoughts and feelings expressed by my students in their journal entries, but I wanted to find out how the students themselves felt about this Thinking-Through-Writing instructional strategy. Accordingly, at the end of the fall semester, I surveyed both classes using an instrument which asked for narrative comments. Then, at the end of the spring semester, I used a survey instrument which called for the same sort of information in a form which could be tabulated as well as providing space for comments.

Of the students surveyed, 100 percent said that the weekly journal entries encouraged them to read the assignment before class. They also said the journal made them read more carefully:

It made me read the material and think about what I read.

I tend to procrastinate but writing the journal helped me to find the time to do the reading as well as helped me organize my thoughts later.

The journal entries forced you to really think about what you read and often to go back and reread some parts for a better understanding--in order to write about it.

The entries do help to let us know what we should be getting out of the writings and discussions.

The student survey also revealed that 98 percent said the journals encouraged them to think critically about the writing assignment. The survey instrument defined "critical thinking" as "thinking analytically, making connections, noting differences, and making judgements."

I sometimes get rushed and read sloppily. The journals served as a safeguard against this--I knew I would need to have thought about more than who was named what.

I was forced to think.

In understanding the literature, one needs to read and reread and concentrate. Therefore, the necessity of doing the journal entries forces one into analyzing.

I even read over my journal entries several weeks later and come up with new ideas each time.

Writing is a mind exercise.

The survey also revealed that 92.5 percent said the journals helped them to relate personally to the literature:

Journals make you think about the ways in which the work related to your own ideas and life.

With journal entries I am able to remember how I felt which helps me remember the facts.

Of the students surveyed, 95 percent said the journal entries enhanced their participation in class discussion, and some observed that the class discussion in turn reinforced the journal writing:

Hearing the views of others is helpful and interesting. The journal entries helped us to be prepared for class discussion.

I felt better prepared to participate in class discussions as a result of the journal pages.

The weekly J. E.'s [journal entries] were given thought while writing, then the class discussion brought out things missed or ideas not recognized.

After the journal entries the class discussion let you know if you had the right thinking.

For the mid-term and final examinations in the American literature survey courses, I assigned comprehensive take-home essay questions, hoping that these would build on the thinking elicited in the journal entries and class discussions. Here are some examples of the examination questions.

(1) (The following essay question covered half of the first semester and incorporated content from a number of journal assignments.) This is the scenario: You are working as a volunteer to help organize the holdings of the Library of Congress. In the depths of a dusty cupboard, you find three manuscripts. After you have read the manuscripts, you are able to reach the following conclusions, based on the forms, objects, themes, and styles of the documents: Manuscript #1 is from the Puritan period, the work of Jonathan Edwards; Manuscript #2 is from the 18th century, the work of Benjamin Franklin; Manuscript #3 is from the Romantic period, the work of Edgar Allan Poe. Explain the thinking by which you reached these conclusions, citing specific examples whenever you can.

(2) (Here is a shorter essay which draws from the journal entries based on the 19th century Romantics.) We have studied six great American Romantics: Poe, Hawthorne, Emerson, Thoreau, Melville, and Whitman. In your opinion, which one of them epitomizes American Romanticism? Explain, citing examples from the work of the writer.

(3) (The following essay deals with existentialism and focuses on selected 20th century writers.) Write a 2-3 page essay in which you explain existentialism and show how it is reflected in the work of Fitzgerald, Hemingway, Williams, and Cummings.

(4) (The following question calls for a 3-4 page essay which draws from journal entries such as the one on Pound and Eliot.) What portrait of the modern world emerges from the contemporary writers we have studied? What do they suggest or imply about how people can survive in such an environment? Give specific examples whenever you can.

I used my surveys to ask students how they felt about the essay examinations. In answer, 97 percent said the comprehensive take-home essay examinations encouraged critical thinking. Here is a sampling of their comments:

On an essay one must think and rethink the material which tends to make people remember or learn it.

You can memorize for objective (tests) but must have understanding to answer essay [tests].

Essays make me search and explain.

I learned more than what I already knew from the class when given time to research more deeply.

A number of students mentioned feeling more comfortable and less stressed with journals rather than quizzes and with take-home essays rather than tests written in class:

Quizzes promote stress and added pressure.

When on a time limit I tend to panic and go blank.

Journal entries do not put the pressure on to be `right' about something and let the reader think more on his own.

As an instructor, I have been pleased and excited about the results of using Thinking-Through-Writing in American literature classes. The journal entries clearly encouraged students to read their assignments before class and to think critically about the material. Students tended to talk about their own experience both in the journal entries and in the class discussion. The journals fed the class discussion, which in turn helped to prepare students for the comprehensive essay examinations. The course content "felt" more unified and coordinated than it had before, and there was a gratifying amount of cross-referencing between writers, works, and period introductions. One student put it this way: "The journal entries really helped with the reading. The essay tests seemed to finalize the readings and journal entries."

This project has made my teaching more exciting and more satisfying because of the new insights that emerged in the journals, discussions, and essays. I never know what will crop up, and I love that! I definitely do not want my lecture material to come back to me verbatim on the exams. What I want is evidence that the students have read the literature carefully and thought critically about every aspect of the course--reading, audiovisuals, lectures, discussion, and journal and essay writing assignments.

There is certainly room for refinement and improvement of these Thinking-Through-Writing strategies. Some of my journal topics are too general and need to be sharpened and focused. I want to work harder on my written responses in the student journals. Class discussion would be improved by some attention to communication skills--for example, questioning, listening, and summarizing skills. I need to work on my own questioning techniques to refine the class discussion because I think my students are capable of deeper insights and can become more articulate in explaining and defending their ideas.

A number of students complained that the work load of reading and writing was too heavy, and I am going to think carefully about that suggestion. Since I am asking for a higher quality of thinking, it may well be that I need to cut down on the quantity of reading and writing that I require.

As the year progressed, I felt that the classes had developed an atmosphere that was highly conducive to the free expression and exploration of ideas. Most students seemed to feel comfortable speaking up to ask questions and make comments, to say what they liked and what they did not. One student comment described our classroom as "a comfortable yet challenging atmosphere for growth." I attribute this ambiance partly to the establishment of a dialogue that went on as I wrote comments in the journals, as we talked and listened to each other in class, and as the students "talked" to me on their essay exams and I replied with comments and questions. A student commented that she liked the fact that I would sometimes say, "That's a point I had not considered before--that's a very interesting observation." Rather than my being in the position of an authority lecturing from the podium to subordinates, we had become a group of peers working together to explore the rich and wonderful fabric of American literature.

Anne L. Legge is Associate Professor of English at Lord Fairfax Community College in Middletown, Virginia. For twenty years, has taught courses in composition, business writing, American literature, and mass media. She has a B.A. from William and Mary and an M.A. from the University of Virginia.

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