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Rebekah Naler

Dominic Ashby

ENG 405

November 29, 2018

Expressivist and Feminist Pedagogy Brought to the Classroom

I believe the best practices in the classroom does not mean that one practice is better

than the other or that one is the correct way; finding the best practices for my own classroom

will take time and effort in order to keep the passion alive for the students. Practices in

teaching revolves around the different pedagogies available in order to relate to students but at

the same time show students the endless possibilities in which composition and language have

in our society. I would use the pedagogies of expressive and feminist to emphasis the

importance of pre-writing techniques to develop their own writing to break the limitations of

society.

Expressive pedagogy takes the stance of personal opinion in students writing because of

the experiences brought to the assignment. Experiences in which students bring to an

assignment allows for students to have the encouragement to express themselves within

composition. I would use expressive pedagogy when it comes to having students response to

reading assignments or even prompts that are either student or teacher centered. The

differences with student and teacher centered when it comes to students expressive writing

styles differ. I as a teacher would like to limit this barrier between the student and teacher

center prompt to ensure students have the encouragement to continue writing and reach an

audience other than the teacher but also classmates.

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Personally, I have never experienced a expressive pedagogical classroom until I made it

to my junior year of college. In high school, using any personal pronouns was considered non-

academic and unprofessional but let me tell you- the transition was harder than most realize.

Not only did I have trouble writing in an expressivist ways but listening to professors tell me to

use “I” to show more connection with myself and work I was responding to; I also was

struggling with not using the academic verbiage that makes all college students more

intellectual than we probably are. Although I struggled with understanding the expressivist

language, I do not want my students to feel like voice does not matter in writing either personal

or academics. Reflecting on my personal experience before and during college pushes myself to

ensure students understand the importance of personal voice in the classroom either with

papers or just opinions based on readings or assignments.

An assignment I would use to allow students to show that personal experiences create

stories and excellent writing is with a personal or literacy narrative. The idea of the assignment

is to help students break out of their comfort zone and experience a writing world that deals

with success and failure, no matter the situation. With this assignment, having students write

based on a vague or non-existent prompt to enhance deeper and creative interpretations to

answer and reflection personally on the writing itself. My hopes for this assignment would be to

allow students to understand that everyone experiences life differently but also creating

community among the students for a strong and effective network around young writers for

future ideas of be listened and questioned effectively.

Feminist pedagogy contributes to the students understanding of different perspectives

of the society around us. Feminist has taken on a different context when it comes to
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determining the importance of standing up in what students are believing in society rather it be

political or personal topics. Even though feminist activities were promptly female, today we

have become intersectionality. Intersectionality allows for students of all race, gender, and

sexuality to join for a single cause of support in equality. With using the feminist pedagogy in

my classroom for instruction, creating a gender neutral and bias environment to reach any and

all students to realize the importance of opinion. The feminist pedagogy is so unique and

constantly changing that applying it to instruction would allow for myself and students to

experience education different every day.

The idea of feminism did not get introduced to me through political means instead it

was through literature. Literature tells a story just like students within their writing. Using the

feminist pedagogy in my classroom will be difficult because of all the different political

standpoints and opinions on controversial topics intertwined in our society. With the feminist

pedagogy does not mean that all literature and opinions are right or wrong but instead

introduced different perspectives of the topic. Personally, I did not experience a feminist

pedagogical classroom instead all the readings and opinions of high school students are based

on old white men that did not have to experience oppression like women over the centuries.

However, the idea of using feminist works to compliment students writing and intellectual

abilities with their own opinions in writing would create an additional layer to developing

students to become aware of the society around them. Students in my class would hopefully

understand the importance of acceptance of the differences of their own classmates but to

further their own understanding of different sides of controversial or debatable conversations.

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Creating assignments for feminist pedagogies could be more difficult due to the

diversity of students within the classroom. Assignments are possible but multiple assignments

would be needed to research different gender, sex, and race but reader response writing allows

for students to take a reading and response either agree or disagree. Not only could use

literature to form an opinion from writing but taking their favorite movie, song, or actor/actress

to take a stand on what society has created, the actual meaning and how it does not represent

accurate sex or gender expectations, and finally giving a possible review based on the director,

producer, or outside viewers to create opinion of how it should have been presented to an

audience. With feminist pedagogy, allowing students to have a more student-centered prompts

to writing assignments instead of teacher-centered prompts that seem to limit students voice,

opinion, or insight they would rather talk about about literature or other material for prove a

point. Creating writing assignments for feminist pedagogy would allow myself as a teacher go

past the expectations and the societal beliefs of literature interpretation and turn it into

something greater than limitations placed on students. Writing assignments that allow students

to express opinions and beliefs boost acceptance and understanding of the world around them

as they develop as writers.

With both of these pedagogies, teaching students the importance and power of pre-

writing techniques to benefit for more audience relation through students writing is exactly the

expose students need to the real world. Thinking about all the times I just sat down and started

typing a paper without pre-writing lead to tears and deleting the paper half way through but

also it created a sense of confusion while I was typing the paper: “What am I really trying to talk

about?”, “What points am I trying to make?”, and “I do not even think I am following the same
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idea throughout the entire paper.” Pre-writing techniques opens up a new world of

understanding of students own writing like with expressive pedagogy, writing out the conflict or

papers is about and how it relates to them as a student or just a citizen of society and feminist

pedagogy allows for students to understand that opinions matter and writing for someone to

understand your stance on something is more important than just conforming to the societal

expectations of religious, political, and personal beliefs. Pre-writing techniques have turned my

writing around for both assignments and personal writing, inspiration can spark anywhere at

anytime and just writing down key words or phrases to input into papers makes more

difference than new writers know.

This semester I have learned about different pedagogies to use in my classroom to apply

to composition overall. Even though I believe the best practices are expressivist and feminist

pedagogy because of the personal voice students bring to the writing, these pedagogies allow

for students to experience the world differently than when they are told what to do, think, and

write about. As a teacher, ensuring my students understand the importance of composition and

that academic writing does not mean not having personal experiences inbedded in their

writing.
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Works Cited

Burnham, Chris, and Rebecca Powell. “Expressive Pedagogy: Practice/Theory,

Theory/Practice.” A Guide to Composition Pedagogies (2nd ed.), edited by Gary Tate,

Amy Rupiper Taggart, Kurt Schick, and H. Brooke Hessler, Oxford University Press,

2014, pp. 111-127.

Lindemann, Erika. A Rhetoric for Writing Teachers. Oxford University Press, 2001.

Micciche, Laura R., “Feminist Pedagogies.” A Guide to Composition Pedagogies (2nd

ed.), edited by Gary Tate, Amy Rupiper Taggart, Kurt Schick, and H. Brooke Hessler,

Oxford University Press, 2014, pp. 128-145.

“The Urgency of Intersectionality .” Performance by Kimberlé Crenshaw, TedTalks, Ted,

Oct. 2016, www.ted.com/talks/kimberle_crenshaw_the_urgency_of_intersectionality.