Text Reflection 1-4
Again, I am writing about Jennifer Fletcher's book Teaching Arguments.
One concept that I think is essential to the third chapter of Fletcher's book is context. She mentions that students are often taught to memorize the definitions of the words author, audience, and purpose, which they do so easily, but they aren't able to use and analyze those terms in different contexts to the greatest extent. Fletcher herself reflects on this when she says "...part of what is hard for teenagers to understand about the threshold concepts of occasion, audience, and purpose is how dynamic and interdependent they are," (53). Basically, students can accept the dictionary definition of these terms with ease but have difficulty applying them outside of ideal situations (ie. when an author may have a primary purpose and a secondary purpose for writing something or creating something).
I really like Fletcher's section on the word Kairos (especially as someone who enjoys learning about etymology) because I've never even heard that word before and therefore have never necessarily knowingly applied it to anything. It is "the immediate social space and situation in which arguments must be made," (58). I think it basically means context. I do really like Fletcher's examples as they are age appropriate and from different mediums so it could easily break up the monotony of lecturing or would be a great introduction into the lesson. Eminem is a pop-culture icon, Roger Rabbit is familiar to just about everyone, and gay marriage is a topic very popular in the media right now and so all of these things (individually or together) could peak a student's interest into the lesson.
One question I would pose is at what age should the lesson on author, audience, and purpose become a lesson on context? Immediately or once students get into 7th and 8th grade?
One concept that I think is essential to the third chapter of Fletcher's book is context. She mentions that students are often taught to memorize the definitions of the words author, audience, and purpose, which they do so easily, but they aren't able to use and analyze those terms in different contexts to the greatest extent. Fletcher herself reflects on this when she says "...part of what is hard for teenagers to understand about the threshold concepts of occasion, audience, and purpose is how dynamic and interdependent they are," (53). Basically, students can accept the dictionary definition of these terms with ease but have difficulty applying them outside of ideal situations (ie. when an author may have a primary purpose and a secondary purpose for writing something or creating something).
I really like Fletcher's section on the word Kairos (especially as someone who enjoys learning about etymology) because I've never even heard that word before and therefore have never necessarily knowingly applied it to anything. It is "the immediate social space and situation in which arguments must be made," (58). I think it basically means context. I do really like Fletcher's examples as they are age appropriate and from different mediums so it could easily break up the monotony of lecturing or would be a great introduction into the lesson. Eminem is a pop-culture icon, Roger Rabbit is familiar to just about everyone, and gay marriage is a topic very popular in the media right now and so all of these things (individually or together) could peak a student's interest into the lesson.
One question I would pose is at what age should the lesson on author, audience, and purpose become a lesson on context? Immediately or once students get into 7th and 8th grade?