http://blogs.setonhill.edu/MikeArnzen/ A personal inquiry into the scholarship of teaching by Michael Arnzen en-us 2008-07-24T17:01:45-05:00 http://blogs.setonhill.edu/MikeArnzen/027562 Paul Miller has posted an excellent entry on his blog, PaulsPen, called "Thou Shall Have Balance: The Ten Commandments of Teaching Creative Writing." Here they are. Each is explained in great depth on his blog, so be sure to visit his site: I. Thou shall teach both theory and practice... Theory arnzen 2008-07-24T17:01:45-05:00 http://blogs.setonhill.edu/MikeArnzen/027556 My essay, "When the Professor Wrote the Textbook," just went live on the Text and Academic Authors Association website so I thought I'd give the TAA a plug. The TAA site has a free preview, but the complete site is only open to paying members. However, if you plan to... Praxis arnzen 2008-07-21T19:09:28-05:00 http://blogs.setonhill.edu/MikeArnzen/027548 "Student Outcomes" is a new, ongoing series of interviews with my former students who are now living life after college. Considering how much of our work is based on the assumption that "learning outcomes" will be met, I thought it would be a good way to catch up with them... 'Student Outcomes' arnzen 2008-07-17T22:38:55-05:00 http://blogs.setonhill.edu/MikeArnzen/027533 Teacher Magazine has a fun list of Six Word Memoirs by teachers. It's a sort of homage to the pop mini-memoir book, Not Quite What I was Planning (click through that: apparently you can submit to the sequel!). Although such things are terribly reductive, they're pithy. A few quick examples... Praxis arnzen 2008-07-10T10:56:36-05:00 http://blogs.setonhill.edu/MikeArnzen/027530 I'm trying to compile a bibliography of books on the art of teaching creative writing. There are a wealth of titles on how to write for publication, and a lesser-but-still-rich number of books on how to teach writing -- but the latter are predominantly about teaching composition skills or scholarly... Praxis arnzen 2008-07-09T10:49:31-05:00 http://blogs.setonhill.edu/MikeArnzen/027522 I'm building a new weblog called THE POPULAR UNCANNY. It's a supplement of sorts for my upcoming non-fiction title from Guide Dog Books by the same name. The book is a critical study of theories of the Uncanny/"das Unheimliche" as they appear in advertising, film, bestsellers, and online. Chapters include... FYI arnzen 2008-07-04T16:49:01-05:00 http://blogs.setonhill.edu/MikeArnzen/025746 "Student Outcomes" is a new, ongoing series of interviews with my former students who are now living life after college. Considering how much of our work is based on the assumption that "learning outcomes" will be met, I thought it would be a good way to catch up with them... 'Student Outcomes' arnzen 2008-06-24T22:03:05-05:00 http://blogs.setonhill.edu/MikeArnzen/025733 The forums over at Teacher Magazine have a great conversation going on right now about the advantages and disadvantages of reading text aloud to students in the classroom. Apparently a high school teacher was given a hard time by his administrators, who overheard him and felt he was talking down... Praxis arnzen 2008-06-19T10:49:59-05:00 http://blogs.setonhill.edu/MikeArnzen/025718 I adored reading Christian Long's recent article, "Mapping Literary Highlights, Highlighting Literary Maps" at think:lab yesterday. In it, he talks about adopting a class rule that students write in the margins of their books: Nothing says, "Yes, English class rocks!", than the early-in-the-year lesson on highlighting our books. Like a... Praxis arnzen 2008-06-12T07:17:49-05:00 http://blogs.setonhill.edu/MikeArnzen/025708 Are we bending under the oppressive rule of children? Do kids have too much power? There are days, I think, when every teacher wonders this, even at the college level. Dennis Jerz posts a good response to this idea, particularly in terms of catholic teaching, as raised by Joseph Epstein... Theory arnzen 2008-06-09T10:41:01-05:00 http://blogs.setonhill.edu/MikeArnzen/025696 I'm humbled to be featured in the June issue of Pittsburgh Professional Magazine, and they've kindly given me permission to post a .pdf of the article on my horror website. To check it out, visit: "Ghoulish Goals: Seton Hill writing professor keeps collecting awards for his horror fiction" by... FYI arnzen 2008-06-06T12:20:48-05:00 http://blogs.setonhill.edu/MikeArnzen/025683 I was browsing through a list of open source academic journals on the web this morning and found Critical Studies in Improvisation -- a journal of music and performance theory, mostly -- whose latest issue [Vol 3, No 2 (2007)] is a Special Issue on Improvisation and Pedagogy. Having studied... Theory arnzen 2008-06-01T08:26:37-05:00 http://blogs.setonhill.edu/MikeArnzen/025660 "Student Outcomes" is a new, ongoing series of interviews with my former students who are now living life after college. Considering how much of our work is based on the assumption that "learning outcomes" will be met, I thought it would be a good way to catch up with them... Praxis arnzen 2008-05-22T00:20:39-05:00 http://blogs.setonhill.edu/MikeArnzen/025576 The "Munch Piñata" pictured above was created by my wife, Renate Müller, as one of the "prizes" students could win in a live "writing contest" held in the final session of my fun "Horror & Suspense Writing" course this semester. She did a knockout job emulating Edvard Munch's "The... Praxis arnzen 2008-05-01T19:38:05-05:00 http://blogs.setonhill.edu/MikeArnzen/025528 I've been reflecting on an approach I consciously employed last week in two different class scenarios -- an online chat with graduate students and in a discussion of a literary reading with advanced writing students -- just to see how it might stimulate the conversation. I launched both by being... Praxis arnzen 2008-04-27T10:30:05-05:00