I have learned more about genres in the past 5 weeks in this
course than I have my lifetime. During this course specifically, I was able to
take the new knowledge I was learning and directly relate it to previous
notions and many times misconceptions I had to develop a clearer, deeper
understanding of each.
During presentations and through reading Tompkins, I have
learned about many text structures that were never explicitly discussed
elsewhere in my education career. For example, although I had previous notions
regarding the text structure of a letter (whether personal or business), and I
understood text structures we find in most narrative writing such as plot,
setting, etc, I had no idea that biographical writing included specific text
structures as well. I learned that biographical writing contains different
structures that each have very specific characteristics. For example, personal
narratives, memoirs, and autobiographies all have different characteristics
however they are all considered biographical writing.
Most of the genre’s discussed I had a surface level
understanding of, but gained a deeper understanding as I read and participated
in presentations. My own presentation, for example, was on persuasive writing. Before
research, I knew the basics about persuasive writing, such as persuasive
writing has a beginning (stating belief), middle (reasons why you believe it),
and end (repeat what you believe). However, I learned that the above example of
the structure of a persuasive writing piece can be easily manipulated. For
example, a more complex student may choose to include the other side of the
argument and why that side is not reasonable. Although I had the baseline
understanding of what persuasive writing is, what I failed to realize, is that
persuasion is a part of my everyday life. Not a day goes by that I do not try
to persuade someone in my life (including myself!) one thing or another. That
is the umbrella idea that really hit home while learning about each genre: We were not just learning about reading and
writing genres, we were learning about how they are a part of our everyday
lives.
Letter writing is another genre I assumed I knew what I
needed to know about it to teach it, however I was drastically wrong. I knew
the basic text structures of a letter, and how they may change slightly to
become tailored to the specific audience they are meant. I learned that not a
day goes by that I do not write a letter, whether it is a text message, email,
etc. I learned that each text structure needs to be explicitly taught and
modeled, and no two types of letters should be taught on the very same day. In
fact, I think many of my misconceptions came from the fact that when I was
introduced to this genre as a child, it was all introduced at once. I learned
about personal letters, business letters, post cards, etc in one lesson, which
lent me to believe the different types of letters are more similar than they
truly are. These presentations not only helped clear up any misconceptions I
had to begin with, but they also gave me hands on methods I can use when
educating my own children on each specific genre.
Although I feel much better about each genre specifically, I
worry I may be using the wrong educational techniques to teach the genre’s in
my own classroom. For example, just this week in clinic I was told that compare
and contrast graphic organizers, as well as specific concept maps and KWL
charts, should not be used with narrative text. It makes sense now that these organizers
require specific information that a student cannot correctly obtain from a
narrative writing piece simply because they need concrete details. I student
taught, taught my own classroom, and worked with students in clinic over the
past years with that misconception that plays a large role in student
understanding. My biggest fear is that I am going to teach ‘wrong’, without
having the correct knowledge on a specific topic. Therefore, these genre
presentations aided in my understanding of writing drastically. I now feel
confident I can make decisions in my own classroom regarding teaching these
genres accurately and appropriately, and aid in students understandings of
each.
