Educational Methods Commons^™

The Difficulty Of Believing In Writing Across The Curriculum, Anne Ellen Geller

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

What would happen if we tried to consider writing-acrossthe- curriculum work through the lens of Peter Elbows methodological believing? If we were to believe that every faculty person in the university is a writer, thinks about writing, and teaches writing in his or her own way, what virtues would we find that doubting leads us to disqualify?

Front Matter

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

Editor's Message.

Believing And Doubting As Hermeneutic Method: Reading And Teaching Paradise Lost, Sheridan Blau

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

Using a variation on Peter Elbow's believing game, I help students discover the degree to which Milton in Paradise Lost succeeds in his explicit attempt to justify God's ways to man and in that success also offers us an account of human happiness and misery that is psychologically sophisticated, spiritually illuminating, entirely rational, and supremely wise as a guide to living a humanly satisfying life. Such an approach to Paradise Lost also fosters an experience of the text through which many students undergo a modern version of the spiritual transformation and enlightenment that Milton explicitly aimed to make possible for …

Before Belief: Embodiment And The “Trying Game”, Donna Strickland

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

I use my experience of teaching "Mindful Writing" to reflect on the pre-cognitive act of "trying out" new ideas. It seems that there's an important piece of the believing game that happens before the cognitive act of belief and that involves the body as much as the mind.

Reviews, Julie J. Nichols, Charles Suhor, Edward Sullivan

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

Reviews

Julie J. Nichols - Meaning and The Evolution of Consciousness: A Retrospective on the Writing of Owen Barfield

Charles Suhor - The Great Transfonnation: The Beginnings of Our Religious Traditions

Charles Suhor - The Chalice and the Blade

Edward Sullivan - The Art of Learning: An Inner Journey to Optimal Performance

Believing, Doubting, Deciding, Acting, Clyde Moneyhun

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

I used Peter Elbow's believing and doubting games and cooked up two games of my own, to structure a first-year writing class aimed at teaching students to read and reason critically. The first new game has been hinted at by Elbow himself: the deciding game, in which students used their exercises in believing and doubting to make up their minds about a topic. The second new game, which my students called the living game, asked them to extend their intellectual decisions into the world and take or recommend actions based on them. This was all enacted through a series of …

Friday Writes: An Exercise In The Believing Game, Stephanie Paterson

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

I introduce the basic principles for the practice of proprioceptive writing and describe the experience and outcomes of incorporating this ungraded writing into three undergraduate compostion classes. I offer this as a case study of a writer, teacher, and reflective practitioner emboldened by Peter Elbow's believing game, and I point out some of the intellectual and pedagogical discoveries that emerged in my fourteen-week experiment.

Connecting, Helen Walker, Andrew Statum, Vic Kryston, Jie Li, Dominique Zino, Joonna Smitherman Trapp

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

Connecting - Helen Walker

Andrew Statum - The Question

Vic Kryston -Conflict Resolution

Jie Li - Teaching with Accent

Dominique Zino - Space

Joonna Smitherman Trapp - Composition Class 7:45 AM

Literacy Initiatives In The Urban Setting That Promote Higher Level Thinking, Karen C. Waters

Education Faculty Publications

How does an urban district become a twice-nominated candidate by the Broad Foundation? In a district in which 72 languages are spoken, 38% of the students live in homes in which English is not the dominant language, and 91% of the population is minority (African American, Asian, and Hispanic), this largest school district in Connecticut not only made student learning a priority, but focused on higher level thinking as part of the process. This chapter provides insight to grassroots implementation of district and department initiatives over the course of five years that emphasized cognitive and metacognitive strategies in advancing the …

Strategy Instruction And Lessons Learned In Teaching Higher Level Thinking Skills In An Urban Middle School Classroom, Karen C. Waters

Education Faculty Publications

Through a compilation of standards-based lesson plans for small- and whole-group instruction, this chapter offers a humorous and heartbreaking perspective of the author's experiences during a yearlong university partnership “Book Bistro” in a 7th grade classroom with urban adolescent struggling readers. Using a combination of leveled, fictional, nonfictional, and culturally relevant text, the chapter is written as a personal narrative to address higher level thinking through systematic instruction in comprehension, vocabulary, fluency, and structural analysis. A step-by-step implementation procedure for each of the research-based strategies is presented, including concept of definition, discussion web, probable passage, pointed reading, semantic feature analysis, …

Lessons From The Believing Game, Tim Doherty

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

My essay reflects on different lessons I have learned in using the believing game to promote deliberative dialogue in first-year writing courses. I have learned that it helps not to be in a hurry: spending enough preparation time with students thinking about belief itself, listening to students' stories and sense of attachment to beliefs, and playing the game repeatedly. I also explore the believing game as a mode of play, especially the fruitful way that role-play can be integrated into the believing game.

Back Matter

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

No abstract provided.

The Believing Game In Mathematics: Stories In A Discipline Of Doubt, Shelly Sheats Harkness, Catherin Pullin Lane, Sue Mau, Amber Brass

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

Many people view mathematics as a discipline of certainty and rigidity. Answers are either right or wrong, and, when they are wrong, it is easy to play the doubting game. We invite readers into our mathematics classrooms as we story our attempts to play the believing game. We provide a lens into how we suspended our own logic, assumptions, and interpretations until we first tried to "unpack, " understand, and honor our students' logic, assumptions, and interpreta· tions. Within our individual stories, elements of tension, surprise, and wonder emerged as collective themes.

A Reflection On Habitual Belief And Habitual Doubt, Irene Papoulis

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

Some people are habitual "believers" while others are habitual "doubters." I' m a believer, but doubting others helps me believe myself I explore the idea that examining our individual habitual relationships with believing and doubting helps us think better and relate better to others and to ourselves.

A Highly Incomplete Bibliography, Peter Elbow

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

I’m nervous to include this because I’ve not read a lot of these books and articles, and the whole thing is so inadequate for such a large topic. Many are titles I’ve jotted down for when I “have time.” But the list also includes a few suggestions from the authors in this issue, though this list mostly doesn’t duplicate the valuable Works Cited sections they’ve put with each of their essays. I’m risking the amateur quality of this enterprise in hopes that it can help others to pursue an important issue. (At the end, I’ve listed my various essays about …

Dispositions Related To Successful Co-Teaching Teams At The Secondary Level: A Case-Based Study Of Three Secondary Co-Teaching Teams, Zabrina U. Cannady

College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to explore the dispositions of successful co-teachers in the Houston County school district in order to gain insight into the establishment of successful collaborative relationships. Data for this study was collected through multiple observations and follow up/exit interviews with six teachers participating in the co-teaching model in the Houston county school district. Findings indicated the presence of dispositions identified in the literature as essential for successful co-teachers, to include positive attitude, empathy, insight, and the use of pedagogical strategies. In addition to the four observed categories, the participants also identified administrative support, creativity in …

Profiles And Perspectives: Learning Through Descriptive Inquiry At The Cypress Hills Community School, Laura Ascenzi-Moreno, Cecilia M. Espinosa, Sarah Ferholt, Michael Loeb, Berky Lugo-Salcedo, Cecilia Traugh

Publications and Research

This paper describes the work of a collaborative study group on exploring the multiple literacies of students at one school in Brooklyn, NY. Through descriptive review, the group developed knowledge about how to support student language and bilingualism through responsive techniques.

Our Places To Tell Stories: Preliminary Program, Public Lands Institute

Our Places to Tell Stories

Our Places Tell Stories is an innovative conference for educators and others working at public lands, nature centers, museums, zoos, aquariums, and other nature- and heritage-rich places. By providing participants with successful educational strategies and techniques, this conference will meet the needs of those interested in learning how to effectively connect with audiences to create motivated stewards of the environment.

The Believing Game Or Methodological Believing, Peter Elbow

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

Three arguments why we need the believing game: to help us find flaws in our thinking, to help us choose among competing claims, and to achieve goals that the doubting game neglects.

Front Matter

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

No abstract provided.

The Rhetoric Of Empathy: Ethical Foundations Of Dialogical Communication, Nathaniel Teich

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

Peter Elbow's "Believing Game" can function as an ethical strategy and can be understood in terms of humanistic rhetorical traditions from Martin Buber to Carl Rogers and Michael Polanyi.

Jaepl, Vol. 14, Winter 2008-2009, Kristie S. Fleckenstein, Linda T. Calendrillo

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

Essays

Peter Elbow - The Believing Game or Methodological Believing

Nathaniel Teich - The Rhetoric of Empathy: Ethical Foundations of Dialogical Communication

Mary Rose O'Reily - Splitting the Cartesian Hair

Patricia Bizzell - Faith-Based World Views as a Challenge to the Believing Game

Gina Briefs-Elgin - Lessons With the Mystics: Refreshing Our Vision in Mid/Late Career

Gesa E. Kirsch - Creating Spaces for Listening, Learning, and Sustaining the Inner Lives of Students

Sue Hum - The Persuasiveness of Pleasure: Play, Reciprocity, and Persuasion in Online Discussions

Reviews

Brad E. Lucas - Teaching Multi writing: Researching and Composing with Multiple Genres, …

Creating Spaces For Listening, Learning, And Sustaining The Inner Lives Of Students, Gesa E. Kirsch

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

This essay explores what it takes to "create a space in the classroom that allows students the freedom to nourish their inner lives," an issue raised by Mary Rose O'Reilly in Radical Presence. The author draws on work in composition studies, education, and her own teaching practices to illustrate the importance of creating such spaces.

Lessons With The Mystics: Refreshing Our Vision In Mid/Late Career, Gina Briefs-Elgin

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

This paper explores surprising and restorative responses to mid/late career burnout from the perspective of four of the world's great Eastern mystical traditions: Hinduism, Sufism, Zen, and Kabbalah.

The Persuasiveness Of Pleasure: Play, Reciprocity, And Persuasion In Online Discussions, Sue Hum

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

This essay explores the role of pleasure in facilitating diverse modes of rhetorical participation in online discussion.

Faith-Based Worldviews As A Challenge To The Believing Game, Patricia Bizzell

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

Elbow's "Believing Game" may help to make room in the academy for religious frames of mind, which encompass particularly dense networks of ideas and emotions.

Reviews, Brad E. Lucas, Heidi Estrem, Yufeng Zhang, William Fitzgerald

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

Brad E. Lucas - Teaching Multi writing: Researching and Composing with Multiple Genres, Media, Disciplines, and Cultures

Heidi Estrem - CoUege Writing and Beyond: A New Framework for University Writing Instruction

Yufeng Zhang - Reading Chinese Fortune Cookie: The Making of Chinese American Rhetoric

William FtizGerald - Geographies of Writing: Inhabiting Places and Encountering Difference

Connecting, Helen Walker, Louise Morgan, Danielle Sahm, Laurence Musgrove, Rae Ann Derosse, Joonna Smitherman Trapp, Beverly Faxon

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

Connecting - Helen Walker

Louise Morgan - Email about the Ego

Danielle Sahm - The Poet Rewritten

Laurence Musgrove - People Get Ready

Rae Ann De Rosse - Authority Issues

Joonna Smitherman Trapp - The Importance of Being Ernie

Beverly Faxon - Why I Read Them Poetry

Back Matter

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

No abstract provided.

Splitting The Cartesian Hair, Mary Rose O'Reilley

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

The "Believing Game," at its deepest level, protects a space where students and teacher can contemplatively ponder what they will choose to love.