Wednesday, March 16, 2011

Initial thoughts on a ENG273 course

It's been almost half a semester since I last posted. Being busy with various manuscripts, submissions, editing for Hawaii Review, M.I.A. Art & Literary Series, and so on doesn't mean I haven't been thinking about teaching. In fact, most of what I think about this semester is related to the classroom, and even more specifically the ENG273 classroom (Introduction to Contemporary Poetry--writing intensive).

Things I've been thinking about...in no particular order...related to teaching a ENG273 course and taking my last, ever, graduate workshop in poetry:

1. Writing intensive classes--why does the English department "own" most of them? Are we doing students justice by requiring a certain # of Ws that are only available in English Depts?
2. A literature/writing class in contemporary poetry
3. Contemporary poetry in Hawaii
4. Athletics and creative writing
5. Poetry as activism as a way for students to understand the value and importance of language uses/misuses.
6. 200-level expectations/concerns
7. The workshop model--what "level" should we implement this model (if ever at any level?)
8. Accessibility and undergraduates--which poems will move to students to read. They are already writing.
9. Generational lapses in poetic "study"
10. Performance poetry in the academy.
11. Reading series/events as requirements and/or extra credit (why is extra credit necessary in a Creative Writing classroom?)
12. "Safe" environments
13. Genre cross-over
14. Creative writing is "fun"...yes, but only play?
15. Rigor

More on these soon.