Using Myers-Brigg to Teach Writing: Part 1

I just read "Personality and Individual Writing Processes" by George H. Jensen and John K. DiTiberio. I really should have read it before making my final blog post for English 620, as it relates importantly to my own teaching philosophy.

I'm splitting this post into two parts because I have entirely too much to say. Part 1 is just going to be me analyzing myself and part 2 is going to be me applying type theory to teaching writing. At least, that's the current plan. I have a tendency to become dissatisfied with my initial choices in organization.

All right, first, I don't like thinking of the four dimensions (Introversion/Extraversion, Intuition/Sensing, Thinking/Feeling, Judging/Perceiving) as functining independently. Jensen and DiTiberio, though they point out the problem in doing so (296), do so throughout the entire paper. I also disagree with the way they present "interaction"--as a simple hierarchy--but I understand the limitations of the scope of their paper.

I do not believe that Introversion/Extraversion and Judging/Perceiving are "functions"--I don't believe that they are ways of approaching the world or the self. Rather, I believe that they are ways of using the actual functions, Thinking/Feeling and Intuition/Sensing. Hence, I think it's problematic to speak of a "judging" way of writing.

I usually identify as an INTJ, but that's more than simply being introverted/intuitive/thinking/judging. Instead, let's divide it into the functions and how they are used (in order):
Introverted intuition
Extraverted thinking
Introverted sensing
Extraverted feeling

Major disclaimer: That's not the "proper" INTJ personality profile, it's my personality profile.

You see, it doesn't simply matter what order the functions come in. It's not that I go around prefering to using introverted intuition. I actually hate to use that function--in extraverted contexts. The direction of the functions is crucial.

For example, my husband is an INTP (again with a slightly rearranged profile). So we have the same preferences but in different directions:
Introverted thinking
Extraverted intuition
Introverted feeling
Extraverted sensing

As an extraverted thinker, I have to talk out every decision. I have to reason out loud why one brand of salsa is preferable to another, which annoys my husband, an introverted thinker. On the other hand, he is much better at theorizing in extraverted contexts, having extraverted intuition, where in an extraverted situation I stick closely to analysis, as an extraverted thinker.

I think the theory has a lot more predictive value when you think contextually. Preferences have a lot to do with the situation. Everyone is able to use each function (T/F/N/S) (though their fourth function usually causes or results from anxiety). But we often almost lack the ability to use a function in the opposite direction from our preference.


Work Cited

Jensen, George H., and John K. DiTiberio. "Personality and Individual Writing Processes." College Composition and Communication 35.3 (1984): 285-300.

Imitating Identity

Robert Brooke argues that imitation is a viable way of learning to write well not because students internalize forms, but because they identify with writers they respect. Students want to write like a specific writer, and they follow the person as a model, not the person's works.

True, the works are usually the only way that they know the person, unless they are imitating a classroom teacher. But it does seem reasonable that social creatures find it more intuitive to model their writing identities after another writing identity than to model their behavior after a written product.

I'm not convinced, however, by Brooke's case studies. He seems to be testing the students, not the pedagogy. For instance, of a student who disliked the text for the class Brooke says, "As a reader and writer, Clark seemed unable to handle the kind of thinking about experience Laurence's book provided" (29). I see. Clark is mentally handicapped; that's why he wasn't as excited about the course as Brooke expected. It might have been more fair to cast the sentence in terms of the pedagogy's failure than of Clark's.

Brooke's conclusion is not entirely prepared for. For the entire paper he's insisted that building an identity based on a successful writer is an effective way to become a good writer. But in the end he says that "the teacher, no matter how exciting a model she presents, just isn't in control of the identity the student will develop" (38), using the fact that the method wasn't as successful as he had hoped to justify giving instructors the job of molding students' identities.

Works Cited

Brooke, Robert. "Modeling a Writer's Identity: Reading and Imitation in the Writing Classroom." College Composition and Communication 39.1 (1988): 23-41.

Balancing Expression with Structure

One of my students interviewed me a few weeks ago for another class. She asked me what one thing I’d tell freshmen. I told her that freshman needed to know that they have good ideas. My students might not always have brilliant ideas, but they always have something worth saying. They can’t write like scholars until they think like scholars. And scholars don’t think “I wonder what my professor wants my to say.” They consider their audience, but they write with the mantle of authority.

This week two of my students handed in papers with entire plagiarized paragraphs, and a third with plagiarized sentences. I had hoped that if I showed I believed in them they would take responsibility. I don’t know to what extent the plagiarism was intentional. But either way, it shows that my teaching philosophy isn’t fool-proof.

How do I know that they plagiarized if I showed trust in them? You’d better believe it was painful to get up and walk over to the computer to plug a student’s sentence into Google when my suspicion was based on the quality of the writing.

Either my students didn’t care that I trusted them or they didn’t believe that I cared about their ideas.

I sound like an expressivist. I want my students to use their unique subjectivity to tell the truth as they understand it. Although I like expressivism, I don’t know that it adequately describes my feelings about writing.

I believe that expressivism doesn’t work for all writers. I happen to find Peter Elbow’s methods helpful, but Muriel Harris cinched it for me--some people write just fine when they start with outlines and write every sentence carefully. Others don’t. So I can’t just teach them how to get in touch with themselves through writing. And I’m teaching academic writing. My course is designed to help students in future courses. So I owe it to my students to help them learn to write for teachers, not just for themselves.

I have tools to offer my students. I help them learn how magically topic sentences work to help your reader follow your argument. I can show them how important it is to keep lifeless words out of sentences. I can even give them outlines for how to structure their papers. I don’t think an expressivist would do that. But I don’t force my students to follow strict guidelines for how to write a paper. If they can come up with another way that works, I accept that. I rejoice at that. I write comments on their papers about how well they’ve expressed their subjectivity.

I don’t think that models suppress creativity. If I use models as tools while encouraging students to make their own way, I give them a starting place. Creative genius can be found when writers twist models to serve their own purposes or when they use readerly expectations to trick an audience. Even if there is mystery behind good writing, there are still tricks of the trade worth teaching. On the other hand, even if good writing is based in following conventions, playing by the rules too strictly without an attempt at creativity won’t result in something worth reading.

I'm disappointed that we're not going to be able to talk about Matt Barton's "The Future of Rational-Critical Debate in Online Public Spheres," because I felt this article was saying more than the previous articles this week.

Barton compares online writing to public communication in the 18th century, using Juergen Habermas's analysis of the past to explain the present. Blogs compare to letter writing and diaries (185). Blogs are directed to an audience, but have a very subjective nature. I hate blogging. Blogging requires being able to talk at length without input from others. I need interaction to have something to say. Sure, people can comment, but comments on a blog aren't a particularly good way to have a conversation. Blogs (according to Barton) build subjectivity, a necessary condition for the ideal public forum (185).

You want a conversation, use a message board. I still post at a message board for classes at Drury. Message boards encourage discussion, debate. People talk to each other, not at each other as in a blog. Message boards privilege arguments, not people. For this reason, Barton feels that blogs should come before boards. Before one gets caught up in arguments, one must have a clear sense of self. I think this is an issue of personality type. I think many people do fine jumping straight to argumentation. I feel that my time spent on Dr. Panza's discussion board helped clarify my sense of self quite well, as I'm an argumentative type. But I'm sure there are people who are more comfortable with a sense of ownership that comes with blogs.

But I love the lack of ownership in wikis. After a couple of weeks editing Wikipedia, I noticed that I didn't feel attached to my contributions. I was just giving my input, doing what I could to further the goal of the encyclopedia. But not every contributor feels that way, hence Wikipedia has a policy on the "ownership" of articles, to explain to newbies that it is not "their" article simply because they have worked on it.

I think these are great categories, but we can also remember that they overlap. Some blogs have active comment sections which behave much like discussion boards, with people talking to each other. I've participated in discussion boards which made use of "journal" threads, creating a thread author/owner, much like a blog. And Wikipedia has a strong behind-the-scenes community that features user pages (owned like blogs) and talk pages (for debates like discussion boards). So clearly we can't get away from all the different needs.