Peter Farrugia
On the future of writing
Prof. Ann Dobie. Photo: Matthew Mirabelli
Professor Ann Dobie, keynote speaker for the Malta Writing Programme convention, talks to Peter Farrugia about the application of American teaching techniques in Malta and the importance of educated writing.
Celebrating its 10th anniversary this year, the Malta Writing Programme presented a teacher’s convention on the theme, ‘Developing Writing Skills across the Curriculum’.
Ann Dobie was invited to participate as keynote speaker at the convention, and share her expert feedback with organisers and participants.
Dobie taught at the University of Louisiana, US, for over 30 years and currently directs graduate studies in rhetoric and the university’s writing-across-the-curriculum programme.
As the author of several college-level textbooks, she is perfectly placed to give guidance to Malta’s reinterpretation of this American initiative.
“The project is based on a national writing programme in the States,” Dobie said, “and applying it to a different culture has proved that it’s an easily adaptable model. Basically, it’s all about teachers teaching teachers. This isn’t a remedial effort. It’s about creating a time to write and reflect, to share ideas with each other and exchange a repertoire of teaching practices.”
Fundamental to the programme’s success is this dynamic mix, a tested template for sharing writing of all kinds – be it academic, personal or creative writing.
“It’s the writer’s choice to share and explore key themes in writing that can be applied across the curriculum in all subject areas,” she said.
A broad mix of Maltese teachers from state, Church and private schools in many levels of education have participate.
“Many nurses are interested in participating too,” Dobie said; “perhaps it’s the caring side of their profession that attracts them to writing.”
More women than men attend the programme but Dobie said that the men who did attend were among the best teachers and writers. The profession “attracts more women at the levels we’re dealing with, but that might be changing”.
Participants are encouraged to write continuously for four weeks. “It’s empowering and exciting for teachers,” she said. And through these techniques, new perspectives become apparent, fostering the development of an essentially student-centred class room.
Educators create ways by which students can become responsible for their own learning. By pushing students to take ownership of their education, a shift in power that sees the teacher become a guide and mentor, comes into play with benefits all round.
Since her last visit to Malta, Dobie has noticed a higher level of sophistication in writing and a new understanding of the unlimited possibilities in teaching practice.
“When I was here in 2004 there was a more rigid, play by the rules attitude. Now, educators seem more experimental and open to ideas.”
The convention concluded with a 90-minute presentation by each teacher, in English and/or Maltese, synthesising the knowledge they’d acquired over the course.
Dobie’s critical review of the programme in Malta includes her observations of teaching practice itself. “There are not many differences between teachers in the US and Malta, but over time the writing process gets deeper. It makes children think, gets kids to be more reflective,” she said.
Initiatives are in place to encourage writing with children themselves, asking students to “think about their writing and their lives. The emphasis is on developing their craft and forging an equality between poetics and rhetoric.”
During the 19th century, academia saw literature become a dominant concern at the expense of linguistics and language. Dobie and her colleagues would see a new way forward, with the two working together as a united discipline.
“Reading is what teachers already know how to teach,” she smiles; “We need to make writing accessible, not an elitist pursuit but open to everyone.”
Even at university level, the teaching of English has taken some strange turns. The study of literary theory, Dobie said, has gone beyond being useful. “We’ve got to get back to the craftsmanship of writing and that will teach its own skills of thinking, ways to understand problems.”
Indeed, the next step will be forming a writing niche in the community with family and parent writing groups. By helping students at home there is a valuable opportunity to engage parents, to let them see themselves as writers.
Events planned at Girgenti Palace have already begun inspiring participants, creating a dynamic where connections between reading and writing, both in and out of the classroom, are allowed to mature organically.
“Writing doesn’t just take place in classrooms and reading can be a fun activity. We must demystify writing and give children practical ways of applying these lessons to their academic and life writing,” Dobie said.
Working towards this end are events led by Clare Azzopardi and Adrian Grima. Azzopardi meets with students and discusses their stories, creating spaces for young writers who show talent.
The programme releases anthologies of work from students and teachers and periodically presents the work in ways that validate their effort. The Maltese programme has been supported by the government, and this has helped it grow over the years.
Although the programme has been characterised as an exercise in amateur psychoanalysis by some critics in the US, Dobie is not so sure that’s a bad thing.
“There is a therapeutic element to the workshops but that only means the end results are stronger and the whole person is being addressed.”
The fundamental concern is that participants, whether they’re teachers or parents, students or members of the public, are made to feel relaxed when working with words.
The more comfortable we are when communicating, the easier it is to make meaningful connections with one another. And ultimately, that is what’s at the heart of this programme’s message.
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Jesmond Micallef
May 4th 2011, 15:55
Thanks Profs. Pule',
The final year projects you have mentioned are all very interesting and exciting too. I guess, you really must enjoy yourself participating in all those projects these young engineers come with. Supervision and exchanging of the minds sort of to say. Young people are cool as they have so much potential in them and you should feel proud that with your participation you encourage their own light to shine through.
The boat mould without a plug is intriguing. The traditional construction is a typical sandwich where the plug reflects the inner volume and wonder how would one go about in building a plugless mould. Cool...!!
Isn't there a water tank at the University ? That would be a valuable addition for investigations involving open channel hydraulics and the hydrodynamics of hull shapes in boat design, for example.
The dynamics of the helicopter are also quite fascinating. The tilting rotor head (not all) and the swash plate pitching changing mechanism has always been one of my favourites.
Is your aerial survey platform just a technology demonstrator ? There is plenty of potentially good applications for aerial RPV technology today but also the same for deep sea robotics in this regard, too.
Well, for an autonomous flight across the Atlantic by a "model" airplane, one would prefer to called it a DRONE !! It has already been done on a previous occasion.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/3145577.stm
Do most of your students produce thier own electronic controllers, Profs. Pule' ? I have been reading up abit lately about simple Digital System Design using Logic circuitry. The book is by Neil Story and called "Electronics - A Systems Approach". May I wish you good luck with all your current undertakings and student projects, Profs. Pule'.
Who knows, maybe we should meet oneday !!
Mr Carmel Pule'
May 1st 2011, 17:18
Some years ago while I was examining students, it occurred to me that some reading and writing submitted by students was not up to standard and I asked a few students how they feel about it. In their answers I could detect a common factor on which I worked on for the next few years.
It appeared that when we look at a scenario, we do not just see what is in front of us , but we operate on the scenario in front of up to create another scenario depicted from the first. I am going to refer to this operation as “detecting the rate of change of the scenario”
Let us take writing, for a minute, every symbol we write involves our pen being changed in direction. This change does not only have a change but it carries a difference in the rate of change we move the pen or the pencil. There are some alphabetical symbols including numerals that have a constant rate of change in the same direction as a zero or an “o” (oh), there are symbols which include reversals as the “q” the “t” and the “w” and the “5”. What I did was to treat each symbol as a scenario and deduce the rate of change of the symbol. I deduced the rate of change of the symbol with respect to the horizontal and also the rate of change of the symbol with respect to the vertical. Also I deduced higher rate of changes which is equivalent to moving from differentiating a distance or a position to achieve a velocity and then differentiate the velocity to achieve acceleration. What it is I am trying to say that all the symbols that we write and the noises that we utter have a rate of change. It is interesting that by using these operators on alphabetic symbols one does not only find how much complexity there exists in each symbol but by higher differentiation of the scenario containing the symbols on can detect the point or the centre of interest within the symbol.
For each symbol use in the alphabet and also the symbols of the numerals from zero to ten, I differentiated the symbol twice and the complexity that resulted was interesting. It came out that some symbols have a smooth rate of change throughout their contour, but other symbols have a very complex impulsive rate of change which is aggressive and difficult to create. As an engineer I know that in sound we can deduce the Fourier transform of sounds and conclude that every sound has a group of frequencies that make it up. When we sing if the throat and other voice boxes cannot handle these frequencies and their rate of change then we just cannot sing it!
When it comes to writing I concluded that the some of the alphabetic symbols have within their contours difficult trajectories which a newcomer to writing would find it difficult to navigate through. I concluded writing the letter ooooooooooooooo is quite easy as it has a simple rate of change, but writing the qqqqqqq, pppppppp, ttttttttt and kkkkkkkkk and bbbbbbbbbb are not so simple.
With all this in mind I decided to formulate simpler drawn symbols which are not members of the alphabet but they are related. I chose to simplify the symbols so that I minimise the rate of change that they contain and is included in them. My colleague tested these new symbols on dyslexic people and he found that dyslexic children can handle symbols which contain easier and smoother rate of changes than the conventional alphabetic symbols.
The other day I went to Marsaxlokk and met an old man who said that he could not read. I asked him to relate the alphabet and in running through “abcdefghij etc” I noticed that the sounds he made for an “a” was “eh” I corrected him that it is an “ahhhhh” in Maltese at least. Then I did not present single letters but syllables as is found in tools used by fishermen , “Martel” Ma…… rtel” “Tnalja” Tn…..a…..lja”. The old man soon came up with a beautiful expression and he told me , “I know, you are singing what you see,, you are singing the symbol!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” I was bewildered with his expression, yes indeed I was singing , Tn…..a…….lja Ser……..riq. mun…………….xar.
Mus…mar. Tur…..na……vit and so on. Writing the name of tools on the back of two cigarette packets he went home and asking his grand daughter he came back the next day singing all the words I would write on cigarette packets found at Marsaxlokk.
I shall not go deep into what I am going to say , but would you believe it, this old man was trying to weld a steel trailer and I saw that his welding was not up to standard and I asked him if he would like to learn to weld . “Ma Nafx Skola Hi” was his answer. Then I took the challenge and dropped my finger in seawater picking up a few drops on the tip of my finger and explained to him how water form in spherical globules which stay put. Then I brought close the finger of my other hand and slowly as I got closer and closer, the water drop coalesced with the two fingers. I told the old man that is what is required for good welding; you must bring the metal globule close to the solid material. Having one pair of dark goggles, I let him use it to see what I was going to do. I struck the arc and I could feel my way through blind welding and he could see through the goggles. I swung the welding rod for I could feel what was necessary and after a few welding rods the old man looked at me and told, me, “ Hoi you are sewing with the welding rod, inti qieghed tthejt bil virga tohoda fejn trid inti biex twahhal il qatra fejn trid!”
He tried it and he welded perfectly all that was a disaster beforehand.
So, introducing simple rate of changes in writing symbols and , telling student to sing it rater than read it and telling people to sew with a welding rod rather than move it, it seems that reading writing and welding become an easy manipulation.
All we need to do to newcomers introduce scenarios which do not contain a heavy and fast rate of changes and the rest is so easy. All symbols and actions must be looked upon as being a mathematical function and all we need is to chose those fuctions which are not complex to start with. It is a fascinating area of education that I tumbled upon and I tell you it would revolutionise even the sybols with which we would introduce reading writing and welding and other craft skills into a higher complexity at a later stage.
I must complement Professor Ann Dobie on her looks, a wonderful elegant lady whose mind seems to be so clear and so pure!
Jesmond Micallef
May 2nd 2011, 12:59
Greetings Profs. Pule',
How's your aerial RPV coming ? If I may but, have you ever considered setting up a website or a forum ?
I liked reading your piece here. The "sewing" with welding and the spectral nature of sound. You have a gift with making comparisons, and pretty good ones too. Language (words and sounds) and symbols (sylabi and letters) have so much in common just as much as sound and music have !! Its all there, Profs. Pule' and it spans across the glode. Mathematics is also a universal language just like music is. Consider vision and the spectral content of white light and the frequencies which "add" up to it. Moire fringes created by a monochromatic light source in engineering metrology, as a further example. Its all there, during each and everyday of our lives as the sun's rays hits the atmosphere in the morning and evening.
May I also greet Professor Ann Dobie and wish her very good success with her efforts. The human urge to write is magnificent. Thank you timesofmalta.com for this very interesting article.
Mr Carmel Pule'
May 3rd 2011, 20:17
Hallo Mr Micallef,
This last year or two, I have contributed to assisting many students at the Engineering Faculty, students who are conducting their final year projects. Here is the list I have been assisting in, note assisting for the students did work so hard to get good results.
*One experimental wooden boat, to act as test tow boat for model boats in the future.
*One fibreglass boat where we built the mold without building a plug, it was not easy, and this will include experiments on composite construction.
Here I must say that we launched these two boats in the fountain in front of the Rector's Office in the university Quadrangle, and we made quite a hit with all the students seeing two full scale boats in the fountain, they did some inclination , and buoyancy test and other CE approved tests. All this with the permission of the University autorities who were kind enough to accept our venture.
* a wind turbine to replace the old ones we have in our countryside pumping water. The student will couple this to an electric generator
* associated with the above another student is building a 15 metre steel structure to take the turbine just mentioned
* one student is making a quadcopter with full stabilization using accelerometers and cameras to correct drift.
* one student is making an autonomous helicoper which one hopes, it will take off on its own reach a height , hovers for three minutes and land safely, all on its own
* another student has a land vehicle on which he mounted a camera and the scenario is relayed back to base.
* the 3.5 metre plane ( which bit my fingers) is ready and all the experience we gained from the electronics projects mentioned above will be incorporated in it. The mavigation and GPS related information to load the waypoints it is to travel will be introduces. I am a little worried about the range of the relay back cameras as the link is at 2.5 giga and that is a line of sight communication system. We have to do better as I am thinking of a 10 to 20 mile range.
Recently I heard that they crossed the atlantic with an autonomous model plane. They uses a 10 cc fourstroke engine coupled to a small generator to power the electronics and it took about 35 hours to cross from America to Ireland. I should not have said model should I?
I also saw a winged airfraft perched nose up on a column in a hall. This aircraft started on its own, and hovered out of its perch. It slowly hovered away from the column and then at an apropraiate distance turned 90 degrees and changed from a hover to a flight , circling the column in the hall for 10 times where it resumed a hovering position and slowly it inched itself back on to the perch on the colum and reducing power the hooking perch was engages and the motor stopped. All this without the intervention of a human pilot. It was autonomous. This is the epitopmee of engineering in my engineering career.
And you know what all this was done at a Secondary School!!!!!
Now you know how I feel when in Malta we are still striving hard to teach our students how to read and write. Some of the University students are brilliant in their own way so I cannot grumble too much but in Malta we can do better if the primary and secondary schools realise that Malta is now an Independent country and our wealth generators must rely on ingeniosity to compete with other nations.
( note if all the teachers in the schools were as charming as Professor Ann Dobie, I am sure that the reading and writing would improve. The manner in which some local lady teachers dress up in classes, do attractt he studets' attention , but this attention is not compatible with attracting the interest of the students to learn to write, it is more of a cheap fashion show, they put up. In this regards I think Professor Ann Dobie, dressed up just about right , to leave room to retain the interest of the students on her writing lesson rather than the fashion lession, more compatible to attend Paceville!)