Make it Work

In the same way that Jules in Pulp Fiction is a vegetarian, I have found myself a viewer of Project Runway. I discovered a long time ago that I should generally avoid reality TV because I can't fight hundreds of thousands of years of primate evolution and be entirely indifferent when the bitch fights and backstabbing start--monkeys who failed to pay attention ended up on the wrong side of the petty and large intrigues that are the birthright of all apekind (as Animal Planet seems determined to make clear with its programming), and, as a direct result, had a much harder time passing on their genes.

Anyhow, I have definitely been pulled in, and I've got my favorites (I'm really hoping (despite the fact that nobody on the show seems to even consider it a possibility) that Chris can somehow manage to win the whole thing), but I think the strangest thing about it all is that this show has affected my teaching. You see, I'm convinced that Tim Gunn is one of the best teachers I've ever seen, live or on television.

This all comes at a time when I'm making pretty significant changes in my own classroom approach. I'm trying to design my composition courses so that (1) I don't have to do any grading at home, (2) my students actually receive and process my comments, and (3) I don't spend a lot of time yammering on about a process that is deeply individual and not especially easy to boil down to general comments. What it means is that my classroom is more of a lab than a lecture hall (something that I couldn't do when the dean wasn't scheduling me in the computer rooms). I meet with every student, every week (although this is a lot harder at the JC that it is at the business college, owing to the larger class sizes), and I essentially coach writing rather than teach it--eight students, eight sets of issues and eight approaches to teaching.

I've often compared teaching writing to psychological counseling (on a good day when I feel like I'm actually helping) or palm reading (on the bad ones). However, what I'm seeing is that it is, ideally, more like what happens every Wednesday night at ten. Students are working on a "challenge" where they have their own ideas, and I kind of stroll around the lab, nudging them in the right direction, being skeptical of the more bizarre or ill-advised choices that they make, and, generally, wanting them to "make it work."

This is where Tim Gunn is an artist. He's able to make critically important observations without ever projecting the doubts that he must have that the designer might not, or even probably won't, be able to pull it off. He starts with the assumption of competence, and it kind of becomes like begging the question. He doesn't give people the space in which to undermine themselves, and so they never do because they're caught up in dealing with the higher-level problems that Tim has pointed out. His good nature, intelligence, and expertise serve to complement this basic strategy.

I don't know I feel about emulating a fashion guru (my general feelings on the matter of fashion are in an earlier entry), but I guess we take our role models where we find them.