PEDAGOGY AT THE CROSSROADS

Instructor Identity, Social Class Consciousness, and Reflective Teaching Practice

Aubrey Schiavone and Anna V. Knutson

While composition instructors are frequently encouraged to recognize the intersectional identities of their students, including social class identity, we assert in this chapter that it is equally critical to recognize the identities of composition instructors. Too often we assume instructors of college composition classes are universally middle- and upper-class individuals who must be attentive to the needs of their working-class students. While this, in many cases, may be true, we would like to make two related assertions: (1) socioeconomic diversity exists in the ranks of composition instructors, and by overlooking that, we miss a major puzzle piece central to our understanding of class in the composition classroom; and (2) regardless of socioeconomic status, instructors must be reflective about how their own social class background might influence their relationships with their students. In other words, we challenge all composition instructors to consider rigorously the role socioeconomic status plays in how they empathize (or, conversely, don't empathize) with their students.

As two teacher-scholars of writing who identify with working-class identity in varying ways, we believe reflections on the role of social class in our own teaching practice may provide a useful example for other composition instructors. We both recently transitioned from teaching at universities with high concentrations of working-class students, with whom we largely identified, to teaching at a more privileged institution with a low concentration of working-class students. In light of our assertion that composition instructors should reflect rigorously on the role of their own social class identity in their relationships with their students, we believe our transition into a more privileged institution provides a unique exigence for reflecting on how we interact with various student populations.

In this chapter, we explore the intersections of our identities and students' identities across specific classroom and institutional contexts in order to advocate for teaching practices that are at once reflective and contextually sensitive. We discuss the demographic profiles of three institutions, analyzing the contexts in which we have taught and presenting parallel trajectories of instructors who began teaching writing in universities particularly hospitable to working-class students before moving to Midwest University (MU), where the campus climate tends not to recognize or welcome working-class students. We then use student texts composed at these different institutions to reflect on the results of transferring our respective pedagogical approaches from one institution to the other. Ultimately, we advocate for pedagogies responsive to student demographics and for self-reflective teaching practices that view class-based tension as a potentially generative site of teaching and learning. We argue that these two goals — reflective teaching practice and contextually sensitive pedagogy — are linked: reflective teaching practice allows instructors to consider their own identities as well as how these identities may be enacted within the local conditions of particular institutions. As we argue for broader adoption of reflective teaching practices, we also demonstrate this practice throughout our chapter, reflecting on our own teaching and learning narratives.

THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK

As teacher-scholars of writing, we recognize there is much work to be done in helping working-class students make connections between their experiences in higher education and their experiences in their home communities. We are particularly interested in helping students reflect on and value both these spheres of experience even though they are at times disparate and even conflicting. More specifically, we seek to learn from our students how they use the strengths they bring with them to their college environments even as those environments might overlook or discount working-class students' strengths. In essence, we view students as experts on their own identities, home communities, and attendant literacy practices, and we organize our pedagogical approaches so as to access and encourage that student expertise. Through narrative and reflective writing assignments, we hope to make space for students to reflect on and express their home literacies and to view those literacies as strengths that can aid them in their college experiences.

Working-Class Students

Existing literature recognizes working-class students' experiences as distinct from those of their upper- and middle-class peers. For example, literacy learning can be especially fraught for working-class students who may perceive that they cannot successfully draw from...