UWP's Conference Pedagogy, Practice and Philosophy at University of Florida, Gainesville was a great learning experience! It was extremely well-organized and offered a host of topics at different panels and roundtables. Since most participants were associated with the university's writing program, it was good to hear their experiences as writing instructors and their suggestions to make writing pedagogies more accessible, relatable and innovative.
Some of my favorites were Panel: Writing Across Environments -- “(Don’t) Just Tell Me What to Change: A Practical Approach for Implementing Self-Directed Learning into Conferences”, Roundtable: “(Un)Plugged In: The Writing Classroom As Part of and Apart From Digital Culture”, Panel: Composing in Digital Environments -- “Writer’s Identity Map or iMap: Reframing Digital Environments in ePortfolios” and Roundtable: Multimodal Learning in First-Year Composition.
I was happy with the feedback I received for my presentation and it was also a good networking opportunity. Instead of having a keynote speaker, all participants and organizers did an activity where we answered questions such as:
"How can college composition use ideas of space and place to help students understand different perspectives and rhetorical goals?"
"How can we create a diverse and inclusive pedagogical approach? What would that look like?"
"How have your specific writing and teaching environments influenced your pedagogy?"
Discussions followed and it was interesting to see the different perspectives and approaches to these pertinent questions.
The UoF campus is also absolutely gorgeous! I didn't realize Gainesville had such beautiful trees, and the rain just made everything look even more lush! I didn't get to see a lot of the city because of the bad weather and busy schedule but I visited the Florida Museum of Natural History and the delightful Butterfly Rainforest. Overall, it was a great experience and now looking forward to New Mexico!
