Well, this article definitely made me think about interior design in a whole new way. As a huge fan of interior design programs myself, I have never thought lightly of the talent that interior designers possess. But I had not ever thought of it as composing.
It was interesting to take a close look at Dee, an 11th grade student, and the composing process she went through when working on her assignment. The article demonstrated how intricate Dee's assignments were in which she had to design the interior of apartments for hypothetical clients. Dee used three types of tools in her composing 1. concrete--materials such as her calculator and paper, 2. representational:symbolic tools such as drafting symbols, and 3. schematic--abstract tools such as logic. The fact that the majority of the tools that Dee used was schematic is huge support for how complex this kind of assignment is. There are examples of her using logic, synthesizing academic and experiential background knowledge. math, problem solving, etc. The authors do a great job of illustrating just how demanding this course really is.
The design course required things that a good writing program would--work with peers, teacher scaffolding through conferencing, flexible and open ended..the use of symbols--just not necessarily text. I am sold that designing is composing and a symbol system...and a valuable learning experience!
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Cat! I felt the same way after reading this article. I saw Anna B. at the library on Wednesday and told her that I was only going to skim that article because it looked bull... But when I actually read it, I was shocked that I could see the similarities between designing and composing. I have a lot of trouble getting past the idea of writing as traditional academic writing. I need articles like this week's to remind me that other forms are not only acceptable and rigorous, but also necessary in preparing our students to compete in the world today.
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