The Teacherless Classroom

It was refreshing reading Elbow again. He’s a little bit more informal, while Williams is “textbookish.” Elbow has a lot of great theories and ideas, and the teacherless classroom is another one of those great ideas. Sometimes it seems difficult to implement Elbow’s ideas, and I found this one to also be one of those ideas. Like some other people have said, I wasn’t real sure which age group he was targeting when describing the teacherless classroom. While reading this chapter, I kept picturing adults in my head taking part in an activity like this. I can’t really imagine students in middle school and high school taking part in the teacherless classroom. Can this type of thing be implemented in the classroom with a teacher? What would the teacher’s role then be?

I really don’t see this type of thing working for young students. I know that when I was in middle school and high school, I was reluctant to share my writing with my peers unless it was my best friend. Also, I think with being that age, the reader is also reluctant to give constructive criticism because they don’t want someone to be mad at them or come across as being better than the other person. On the other hand, I think peer editing is very important for that age level, but not to the teacherless classroom extreme. It seems like this kind of thing would fall apart, as Elbow mentioned, because of commitment issues and other such things. I don’t even think I would have the time to participate in the teacherless classroom; it seems like a long process.

The thing I did like about this chapter was the discussion of “showing.” I think that is a very unique way of describing what you thought of someone’s writing. I know sometimes I can’t explain myself in words to make something make sense, but it helps when I can illustrate it in another way. I loved the idea of describing someone’s writing as a body part, the weather, clothing, etc. All of those things can have human characteristics, for example, a storm cloud could have the personality of being angry. If you use a storm cloud to describe a piece of writing, it could illustrate that the writing is dark, gloomy, etc. This would be a great activity to use with students because it also lets them use their imaginations.

I also think it is important to read your writing out loud. I know when I read my writing out loud, I catch mistakes that I wouldn’t have caught by simply reading it silently. I think this also helps your readers. It puts emotion into the writing, and they can also pick up if something doesn’t sound right.

This chapter really showed me how I can handle criticism. I’m the type of person that hates when people criticize my writing, so Elbow discussed some things I can keep in mind when people talk to me about my writing. The one thing I have an issue with is just sitting there and listening; I always interrupt to try and justify my reasons for doing something, but I never thought that that would stifle the reader from giving any further comments that might help me. In addition, I must remember that I am the final judge of my writing and not everyone sees a piece of writing in the same way.

So although the teacherless classroom seems difficult to implement, Elbow (like always) gave some really good ideas that I would like to try in the future.