You Can't Take It With You: Transfer in FYC

Fishman, Jenn and Mary Jo Reiff. "Program Profile: Taking the High Road: Teaching For Transfer In An FYC Program." Composition Forum 18 (2009): 1-14.  Humanities International Complete. Web 29 Sept. 2013. 

My focus for this course, thus far, has been centered on exploring the role of FYC in the University. This post continues that exploration by examining what students should take away from FYC. In their article, "Program Profile: Taking the High Road: Teaching For Transfer In An FYC Program," Fishman and Reiff present that FYC should provide students with knowledge/skills that can be used (transferred) in courses beyond FYC. The authors site the knowledge transfer work done by D.N. Perkins and Gavriel Salomon as a core part of their curriculum revision. Perkins and Salomon, educational theorist, present two types of transfer (low road and high road). Low-road transfer refers to routine cognitive work and high-road transfer deals with analytic thinking. They also present two related pedagogies (hugging and bridging). Hugging teaches toward automatic response, whereas bridging teaches "through activities that promote problem solving and generalizing across disparate examples." Writing instructors, particularly FYC instructors, desire high road transfer, as it enables students to apply skills learned in FYC in other courses. 

The question that Fishman and Reiff pose is "how do we design a writing curriculum that creates the conditions for high road transfer?" The answer to this question is rhetoric, which they argue is the bridge between the program’s two goals of "teaching students core writing strategies and encouraging them to communicate confidently in multiple writing situations." The authors show how UT-Knoxville, a traditional English department where literature specialists hold the most of the tenure-track positions, transformed their program to one that is "both responsible and responsive to the writing needs of students beyond the first year." The new curriculum focused on the writing needs of the students. Through conversations with instructors about course goals and challenges, the new courses had common assignments and focused on broad knowledge areas of rhetorical learning, genre knowledge, and discourse community knowledge. In addition the curriculum also emphasized teaching transferable tools, such as rhetorical awareness, reading rhetorically, reading as writers, and developing strategies for writing to multiple audiences for multiple purposes, using multiple mediums and modes of expressions.

English 101 was presented as "(Re)Emphasizing Rhetoric." The course focuses on staring a practical foundation for English 102, focusing on general rhetorical strategies through sequences assignments (reading rhetorically, rhetorical analysis, contextual analysis, argument paper, and source-based argument. The English 102 course has a required structure that moves from field research, to historical research, and then academic research. Each course had a theme, which was chosen by the individual instructor. The article concludes, first, by presenting that the analysis of the new curriculum is underway, and second, by arguing that teaching for transfer is not the end of FYC but an opportunity for instructors to develop assignments/activities that meet students needs without falling into the generic assignments or forgoing the use of rhetorical concepts.

Fishman and Reiff present an interesting glimpse into what it is like to revise a FYC curriculum. I think this article is necessary because it gives rhetoric and composition instructors a chance to see how other Universities are tackling issues within rhetoric and composition. FYC is a contested space and often falls into a pattern of using victim rhetoric (underpaid labor, general education course, the homeroom of the university). This article does not focus on the administrative issues that surround FYC, but on the pedagogical issues connected to FYC. This approach, I feel, shows how all stakeholders in rhetoric and composition can benefit. The students are able to get the tools/skills they need to move on to other courses/disciplines. The instructors are able to teach courses in which they can use the knowledge they have and apply their personal interests. The administration’s general education requirements are met. It is important for instructors to consider transfer of knowledge when designing and implementing FYC courses.  Whether the purpose or goal of FYC is to prepare students to write in all disciplines or to write in academic discourse, it is important that they are able to take what they have learned with them.