TO: Dr. James Dubinsky

FROM: Student

DATE: 10/4/99

SUBJECT: Apprenticeship Reflection Report

This report conveys the results of my apprenticeship to the Teacher’s English 3764: Technical Writing class at Virginia Tech University. My apprenticeship was comprised of two parts. First, I observed the Teacher’s 12:00-12:50 class on Monday, 9/13, Wednesday, 9/15, and Friday, 9/17; this block of instruction focused on writing technical instructions. I then completed my apprenticeship on Tuesday, 9/28, by taking part in a one-hour discussion with the Teacher and co-observer X about the pedagogical considerations paramount to teaching technical writing. Finally, I have provided two appendices to which I will refer at various times throughout this report for clarification's sake. For more information about their usage, see the final section of this report headed "Usage of Appendices."

Class Observations

Monday 9/13:The Teacher began her unit on writing technical instructions with an exercise illustrating the importance of clarity and precision when writing technical instructions. She selected one student volunteer who was given a rather simple drawing and was told to instruct the rest of the class how to draw the figure using only verbal instructions. The drawing looked as follows:

The students trying to draw the figure were allowed to ask questions about the instructions they were receiving. As these questions were asked, the Teacher wrote them on the board to facilitate a subsequent discussion as to what went into giving clear and precise instructions. While a few students were able to reproduce the drawing exactly, the vast majority were not, thus indicating some of the problems involved with giving even relatively simple instructions. Problems that the class came up with included the lack of visual aids, not knowing what the final product was supposed to look like, and having trouble interpreting terms that the instruction giver used. Thus, the Teacher very effectively demonstrated the nature of the problems her students would be facing as they composed their own set of technical instructions over the next two weeks. This exercise worked well because it got everyone involved and forced them to interact with the lesson firsthand.

Wednesday 9/15:The Teacher began the class by making connections back to previous classes that focused writing memos. As she handed back a memo assignment, she reviewed the format for writing a neutral news message. I thought it was very useful to use this opportunity to reinforce what was previously taught instead of handing back the assignments as if that section of the class was done and over. I did not hear her make a specific connection between writing memos and writing technical instructions, but it seemed apparent to me that one thing connecting the two in her class was that both had their specific formats. At the same time though, I could tell that there was at least an implicit connection also being made that the format one choose was determined by the situation and audience; this came through explicitly in her mentioning of persuasive news messages and negative news messages, in distinction to a neutral news message.

The Teacher then continued her instruction on writing technical instructions by giving a PowerPoint presentation focusing on the basic superstructure for creating an effective set of instructions (See Appendix 1).

Friday 9/17:The Teacher continued her PowerPoint presentation. Having class in a computer-integrated-classroom allowed students to follow along on either the large screen at the front of the room or their own computer. In this case, students may become more actively involved in the class simply by having the ability to control the speed at which their individual presentations would unfold in PowerPoint. The Teacher also displayed her willingness, if necessary, to be very firm as to what standards she expected her classes to perform. I was asked to leave five minutes early so that she could have a frank talk with her students about what they weren't getting done in and out of class that they needed to do.

Pedagogy Discussion

In order to get a better idea about exactly who the Teacher was teaching, I asked her what departments and majors accounted for the majority of her students, to which she responded “engineering.” Of all her students, she said that english majors generally have the greatest difficulties in technical writing. In part, she thinks that this is due to their being used to writing literary criticism and essays instead of writing in technical forms. She also feels that students from the engineering department, as well as other science or business related fields, are more motivated to do well in the class and that English majors are often less sure about what they want to do career-wise. Thus, the engineer sees the class as something that he or she needs to learn in order to do well in his or her field, while the English major often has less of an idea as to his or her particular field of emphasis or career plans.

She thinks that the biggest challenge facing technical writing the Teachers is getting students engaged with their work to the point where they want to improve both their skills as a technical communicator and the quality of their finished products. Ultimately, she thinks the class is working at its best when students are actively engaged in their assignments by routinely participating in in-class workshops. Students can bounce ideas quickly off of both the Teacher and each other in this situation, and it ensures that writing is taking place as a process. However, for this focus on drafting in class to occur, students must complete reading assignments regularly and already have a grasp of the basics before they come to class. Repeated need for extended review of the day’s assigned reading keeps workshops from taking place.

Unfortunately, the Teacher has found that her current classes are not doing their reading assignments, despite the fact that she gives quizzes and an exam on material from her textbook, Paul A. Anderson’s Technical Communication: A Reading-Centered Approach (See Appendix 2-Texts/Materials). Thus, she feels forced to spend much class-time going over the information contained in the reading. While she doesn't enjoy doing this, she feels that she has no choice because the fundamentals must be understood before classes which build on the readings or writing workshops will work.

In the Teacher's opinion, the fundamentals of technical writing are the various formats for different situations--memos, instructions, letters, etc. While the Teacher does discuss the reasoning behind using various formats, such as the situation at hand and the intended audience, she does not go into the heavy theoretical considerations that concern many technical writing scholars. For instance, one would not find a discussion of communication as either transmission, translation, or articulation. The Teacher thinks that one of the things that makes technical writing such a practical course is that you can teach these forms that, while they may be tweaked to fit a particular situation, will more or less fulfill most of the writing situations a student finds him or herself facing in the workplace.

Her views on the practical nature of technical writing led to a discussion of the question of replacing freshman english with technical writing. While she didn't want to come out wholly in favor of replacing freshman english, she did feel that it needed to be rethought. She thought that a lack of guidelines as to what must be taught in freshman english had led to classes which, at the risk of sounding cliched, had become "touchy-feely" discussions of cultural issues; in the meantime, the focus on developing writing skills sometimes gets overlooked or pushed to the background. This led me to think that though the cultural issues raised in freshman english are very important in my opinion, these issues are often presented in a forum such that no distinct action is taken. While essays are often written relating to these discussions, essays are rarely, if ever, written outside of the academy. Writing that gets things done in the world, by-and-large, consists of letters, proposals, memos, reports, and other such documents. The Teacher pointed out that the Communications department has proposed an introductory course that would serve as a substitute for freshman english. She thought that its focus on skills necessary in the workplace such as public speaking, memo writing, report writing, etc., would make it a more practical and valuable class for the majority of students.

My opinion is that changes do need to be made in the way freshman english is taught. I would start by bringing in a good bit of classical rhetoric, but also modern models of logical structuring for essays such as that developed by Stephen Toulmin. I think that these models serve as a useful framework for dissecting, understanding, and synthesizing arguments about cultural issues. I do feel that it is important to keep discussions of cultural issues alive in freshman english because I don't think students get to take part in open discussions about these topics in many other places. I would, however, borrow from technical writing the focus on creating final products that might more closely resemble formats that the students would still be using after they graduate; for instance, instead of solely writing essays, they may write a letters and proposals as well. Perhaps a tentative assignment would be based on creating informational topics for two opposed sides on the same issue, to force them to consider the social and personal interpretations we bring to any issue.

Apprenticeship’s Effects on My Tentative Teaching Strategies

I agree with much of what the Teacher said during our pedagogy discussions as well as with the major goals that she expresses in her syllabus (See Appendix 2); however, I want to do everything I can to avoid creating a class in which I must review material that should have already been digested in class. One teaching approach that I think might help in this respect is to include more theory in the class. Some students would probably become very fascinated by theories of communication, and these should at least do something for shaking everyone's certainty in the power of forms to account for all situations. I also think that if students are given a better sense of why we use certain models, as well as their limitations, that they are more likely to become engaged in the writing process.

Teaching technical writing as primarily a form-based class seems like it might encourage students not to get engaged with the writing process; that is, it seems to teach the usefulness of forms, which is real I think, but without teaching their limitations. If students feel that they can always just refer to their handbook and whip out the necessary form, then what point is there in taking the time to read about or memorize the form? If however, the form is taught as a guide that cannot account for all of the situations that we encounter, then the student seems more likely to pay attention to the form and be familiar with it so that he or she can alter the form when necessary. For this reason, I think it would be beneficial to purposely give students an assignment that requires them to come up with solutions differing from those given by traditional forms. At the very least, a class exercise demonstrating the inadequacy of a common form seems worthwhile.

Other than bringing more theory into the class and insisting on the limitations of forms as well as their benefits, I agree with the concepts driving the Teacher's class. I think that it is very important to encourage students to tailor their work to the kinds of things that they are doing in their own fields. This makes it much more likely that the student will want to do his or her work and actively participate in the writing and learning process.

I also like her use of writing groups. This seems to replicate much of the collaborative writing that students will do as professionals. On the other hand, I think her inclusion of ethical issues is important because this is something that will very likely be downplayed or absent from the work they do as professionals. In these two cases, I think that the Teacher is walking the fine line between providing her students with the types of skills that they will need in the workplace without letting the private sector dictate what she should teach--i.e., that profit is the bottom line in business and ethics interfere with its pursuit.

My interaction with the Teacher has also provided me with a few insights that fall outside of strictly teaching technical writing. For one thing, as discussed in the pedagogy discussion section above, I will strive to include writing formats other than just the essay in any freshman english classes I teach from now on. Most importantly, I feel that this will make it more likely that what we learn and discuss in class will actually make it into the world outside of the class, and possibly in some form more likely to gain public consideration. Furthermore, I have begun fairly convinced that to be most effective as a The Teacher of technical writing, I should get into the workforce and obtain practical experience as a technical writer. Having done so, it should be much easier to determine what does and doesn't belong in a class designed to produce students that will be well prepared for the writing demands of the workplace.

Usage of Appendices

The first appendix consists of computer print outs of the PowerPoint presentation that the Teacher gave during the classes that I observed. The pages are numbered in the order in which they were presented--page 1 and page 2. Page 2 is broken down into five parts labeled 2.1-2.5 to indicate the order n which they were presented. Because section 2.1 contained a number of internal links, I've indicated the order in which these links were presented with the lower-case letters, a-f. In each case, the Teacher went back to page 2.1 before jumping to the next internal link.

The second appendix is a copy of the Teacher's class syllabus.