Attitude towards students:
Dr. B. also empathizes with the students. One student wrote, "All of a sudden, my mind went blank," and Dr. B. said, "That's terrible if it happens up here." Cloe, 9/1 notes
Students learn better when their interest is captured. This translates into using literature as a major part of class text. "[History]'s not as much fun to me . . . History just gives you the facts. . . . [F]iction is about something that's real . . . and it's interesting to read. 9/28 notes
She reflects her own feelings and emotions on sytudents. If seh is not interested . . . really preoccupied and . . . rather be doing soemthing else, then they'll pick up on that. They'll feel the same" (6) So she plans class topics and writing assignments to encourage interest and enthusiasm and encourages discussion to keep the students involved in what is being taught. (6)
Dr. B. did say that the classes did not get exactly the same quiz. Cloe, 9/6 notes
Dr. B. says, "I'll try to bring things into class to lighten up the readings."--presumably because the book being passed around is funny while Jubilee is serious. Cloe 9/9 notes
We are listening to a tape. Dr. B. says, "Listen to the tape and pick out what is relevant on the tpae for the readings. My last class didn't take notes during the tape. Taking notes helps me to concentrate." Cloe 9/9 notes
Verbal cues:
Next, Dr. B. selects significant passages froma book to read a loud. She reads and then clarifies the excerpt. At one point Dr. b. says, "We are being so quiet; I'm suspecting there aren't any Southerners in here." Cloe, 9/1 notes
Next, she suggests that the class look up words in several dictionaries, implying that meaning is not static and dictionaries differ in the way they define various concepts. She goes on to discuss connotations and sound of words and a student says, "I'm getting confused. Do you want us to define it as what it is or as what as I feel . . . think?" Dr. B. replies, "Conventionally, the definition of 'lady' has a different definition." Cloe, 9/2 notes
Dr. B. seems to offer wake-up calls when things are dragging such as, "You guys look puzzled," every few minutes. She odes this either to try to get peoples' attentions or ot encourage a question. Cloe 9/17 notes
Body clues:
The class ends with students shifting in their seats and closing notebooks. Dr. B. ends the class by saying, "I can tell you guys are ready to leave; it's almost a quarter after." Cloe, 9/2 notes
The September 2nd class began with the students being quite talkative . . .As the teacher came in she said, "You guys have a lot of energy today. Sometimes the teacher gives energy to the students, and sometimes the students give energy to the teacher." Cloe, 9/2 notes
Class use:
The last thirty minutes of the class is the quiz . . . Dr. B. begins the quiz, significantly I think, by saying, "Just show that you've read the abook." She seems to want to make it clear that the purpose of the quizzes is not to test students critical thinking skills as much as it is to make sure they have read the book. Presumably the paper, which ocunt for a much higher portion of the grade for the classs, will test the students' ability to think critically. Cloe, 9/3 notes
Goals:
One of her major goals as a teacher is to "get them to reason. I think that's a lot of what we teach in all our classes. How to think, you know, how to read." She tries to get the students to move beyond their present ways of seeing and to see another world, another way of thinking. (6)
The summary generates some discussion about mulattos and missegenation. The black woman looks up, as if she is on guard now. Dr. B. tries to be diplomatic. She says, "You have to talk about very touchy issues with this topic. These are good questions; this class is thinking." Cloe 9/9 notes
When asked what she saw as the best thing about her teaching style, she wrote "Students are forced to think for themselves. This is very hard. Some students will never be able to come up with their own interpretations of the material. Writing is always hard. . . . The best thing about the way I teach is that it is AMERICAN STUDIES. The personal is political. It is also real." 13 Oct notes
I was first captivated by Dr. Barn's personality when I first phoned and asked the receptionist of the American Studies Department to give me her office phone and hours. "Here!" she exclaimed, "She can give them to you herself!" A voice still laughing from some shared joke welcomed me to sit in on her class in Southern Women. When I went to her office to see her, I witnessed how sincere her welcome was. With a disarming, unpretentious grin (yes--grin), she admittend me to her office and invited me to make myself at home while she described her Southern Women class and ate a ham sandwich--her lunch.
She sees herself as teaching from a broad theoretical approach that unifies her varied interests: Americans writing about themselves, popular music, American regional differences, literature, portait photography and history. She seeks to present to her American Studies students the inter-realtion of culture and social stucture. She writes that one of the things she likes best about teaching her subject is that the "personal is political. It is also real."
Her personal research is also very real. Her publishing experiences and research studies are funneled into class content. She researches blues and Country singers and writes about the affect that they have had on others outside their own personal circle of acquaintance.
She also encourages her students to reach beyond themselves and bring their lives outside the classroom into the class. In a class discussion, "a student describes a South Carolina friend. The friend belongs to the sorority described in the a book being passed around the class, and generally reminds her of the qualities being humorously described in the book. Dr. Barns says, 'I like it when you have comments. See, you can have some role here.'" (Cloe, 9/9 notes)
One of Dr. Barn's stated goals for teaching is to "emphasize critical thinking and effective communication, especially through dialogue and writing." (p 6) In class she purposfully limits the scope of material covered in order to cover the present elements under discussion. On the third day of class in her Southern Women class, she had brought a short tape presentation for the students to listen to. "This discussion is really going good. We can put the tape off until next class period so that we can finish talking about how you see the myth of the Southern Woman," she smiled at the class and then turned the rest of the time over to a guided discussion of the subject. One of the five quizes planned for the semester was cancelled so that there would be time to finish talking about one of the novels that she had assigned.
Because of the content of her American Studies classes, she frequently encounters conflicts between her students because of regional stereotyping and racial discrimination. "I have specificaly designed my classes to work toward eliminating these problems. Issues surrounding Southern mythology and Southern culture are particularly sensitive and need to be confronted and explored."
She describes herself as an idealistic teacher who emphasizes communication and dialogue. She is often disappointed by her students as they shrink from being self-critical and active learners in the college setting. She does not pretend that she can force students to learn, but conscienciously tries to involve the students in her classes. She nots that a sense of humor, class discussion, films and photographs and music all have been successful before in helping her to capture her students' interest.
During one class she begins to introduce the subject of the day--a novel called Jubilee. "How shall we say the name? Vee-ree?"
A few students chorus "Vi-ree!"
"Vi-ree it is then," she smiles at the class, involving them in the most elemental details of the class.
In another class she begins by reading outloud. The pages of the essay she reads from reflect on the lower part of her glasses. Framed in gold ovals, her bright eyes peer out at the class as she raises her head to comment on the text. She plainly tells the class why she has chosen to read the class background material on the novel and author being studied: "I think this is interesting." She talks with her hands after that--covering her mouth in an involentary motion when she says "300" instead of "3". "I like to exaggerate," she laughs with the class. "You know, to make sure that everyone's paying attention!"
She defers to a student who wants to add a comment to an ongoing discussion, "Deborah wanted to talk so I'd better be quiet!", and praises thoughtful additions to a discussion, "Sometimes students come up with new ideas that I haven't had before. I think that's great."
She also projects her own feelings and preferences onto her students, bringing to class books and papers that she enjoys and passing them around during class time. She encourages students to take notes during a tape that she has brought for the class to listen to because "taking notes always helps me to remember." If she is not excited about class, she sees no reason why students should look forward to coming. "[I]f you let the students know that you're not interested, that you're really preoccupied and you'd rather be doing something else, then they'll pick up on that. They'll feel the same, you know, 'Why should I be here if the teacher isn't interested?'"
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Her attitude towards her students and her classroom teaching methods have been distinctly molded by what she has learned from her students. She is idealistic, yet has learned not to trust her students implicitly. She wants students to be idependent thinkers, but recognizes their relative immaturity.
She has had students plagarize--not often, but often enough that she now keeps an eye out for the problem. Once she recognized an article that she had read recently in a small literary journal and turned the student in. Her eyes look sad as she tells about the indcident, but her sorrow is because a student decided to avoid an opportunity to learn rather than because a student got caught doing something that she knew was wrong. She does not give the same quiz or test more than once. Even though she evaluates with essay questions, she believes that a student in one section might easily share test questions with a friend who might be taking the class during a different time or different semester.
She is pragmatic about her expectations for her students. She sees them as developing people rather than mature, independent thinkers. "They're real self-adsorbed at this age. So . . . if they're freaking out then the whole world must be freaking out. . . . There's another interesting thing I've learned about, that supposedly 20 year olds are at a certain stage of moral development . . . that everything is up to the individual, everybody has their opinion, . . everything is relative." She sees one of the biggest hurtles in teaching is to challenge students to get over that stage and reach some kind of moral hyarchy for viewing the world. She encourages students to see the people that they study from a vantage point that allows them to appreciate the circumstances and the limitations that exist in other cultures and times.
She described herself as a "mother of 20 year olds." She desires to nurture students by challenging them--and the students help her to find out how to do this. "I adjust, like when the student asked about style, then I try to adjust for the next class to deal with that. . . . [I]n a sense they're always affecting the wya you teach. . . . I try to be responsive to them."
When the student expressed a real concern about style requirements on the first paper that had been assigned, Dr. Barns took the entire next period to detail exactly what she needed her students to do for her. She brought in handouts and went through each--with a surprising amount of humor. At the end of the class, after someone had said something funny, she smiled at the class and told them "I don't think I've ever had so much fun talking about style before!"
She stresses discussion because she wants to know that students are "out there thinking about something." When students become too aggressive during a class conversation, she asserts her form of "gentle authority" and distributes time to talk to less vocal members in the classroom. "You really have to be on your toes with a class like that 'cause you have to come back at them--if they say something you think is wrong and they're aggressive, you hvae to come back at that. Some people . . . would think that was inappropriate student behavior . . . I don't think it's meant to be malicious . . . they're just being themselves."She doesn't revert to lecture because she doesn't feel that students learn from just listening. When she lectures, the papers that students write for her show less thought and less attention to the subject.
She also pays attention to the body signals her students send. Dr. Barns offers wake-up calls when things are dragging and students are quiet. "You guys look puzzled" solicits student attention and encourages student quesitons. The class ends with students shifting in their seats and closing notebooks. Dr. Barns ends the class by saying, "I can tell you guys are ready to leave; it's almost a quarter after." Another class begins with the students being quite talkative. As the teacher comes in she says, "You guys have a lot of energy today. Sometimes the teacher gives energy to the students, and sometimes the students give energy to the teacher." Cloe, 9/2 notes
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