FYC is the course that, way back in 2004, got me into my current profession.
It is a privilege to teach the course.
The entire idea behind FYC is awesome:
Introduce students to the knowledge and skills required to write while in college.
I aim to make this a strong course offering - one of my strongest yet.
And I'm excited to report I have found material for a new and (I believe) cool way to open the semester.
Well, I didn't find it. My colleague Professor Julian Heather recommended this podcast episode to me after reading one of my recent blog posts.
The podcast is called StartUp and the episode is called "The Secret Formula."
The premise of the episode is posted on StartUp's website:
Gimlet is making a big, expensive bet. The kind of bet that could make or break the company. And it’s a bet that comes down to one factor: What is Gimlet’s competitive advantage? As the company launches its fourth new show, “Surprisingly Awesome,” we take a deep dive in to how the show was made. From the kernel of an idea to the final product. And, along the way, we look at what we believe is Gimlet’s secret formula for making podcasts.
It's an episode about creating an episode!As a composition instructor, the work that goes into creating a "text" is what I need students need to consider and explore.
The Secret Formula delivers great insights on pre-writing and putting together an initial draft, but it only gets better when they move on to some of the more difficult parts of writing: Revision & Editing.
There is a lot of useful material.
The podcast demonstrates the importance of collaboration via peer review. It shows just how helpful a critical reader can be during the revision process.
The makers of the podcast share early drafts of an episode and describe how and why they made changes.
There is constant attention on an imagined audience member.
The reality of shitty first drafts is explored (by someone other than Anne Lamott, who I admire greatly, but I've long needed to find at least one other person who has made that point about first drafts).
They even go into how the amount of work can sometimes seem like too much, but how that work pays off more often than not.
All that, and the episode is basically a massive reflective exercise. The podcast team spends much of their time examining what-works-and-why during the process of creating something for an audience, and then they work to abstract ideas from that reflection to better understand the broader process.
I'm a fan of Kathleen Blake Yancey's scholarship on reflection in the writing classroom, and it has shaped much of my approach to teaching. So, it's pretty cool to have a piece as accessible as this podcast to help me introduce those ideas to my students.
As a side note: The company producing the podcasts I wrote about today is called Gimlet Media. It was founded by one of the founders of the Planet Money podcast, something I've been listening to since 2008. That podcast has come up on this blog at least 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, times.
I really admire the work done by the people behind these podcasts, and I'm very happy to be able to use their work in my classroom.
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