Systems Approaches to Composition

Composition and Technology
As I think about Anson's article (and its connection to Lanham's "Audit of Virtuality"), Kearcher's article, and TOPIC (as an example of a systems approach to teaching composition), I see a key tension and dynamic at play. What does "systems" mean? How does the "system" work? I think one way we can answer these questions is to frame the "system" along these continuums:

Strategic---><---Tactic Closed---><---Open Anson closes his article warning of "those uses of technology that will lead to bad teaching, poor learning, unfair curricular practices, and unjust employment" (816). These warnings are the dark side of what systems approaches to composition could become. Let me start with the first pair: strategic-tactic. I'm taking the terms from Kearcher who uses them from Certeau, so I can't claim I fully understand them. I interpret Kearcher's use of the terms to revolve around issues of freedom and access. "Strategic" would describe the school's or teacher's predetermine elements of learning content and writing assignments--what she calls "institutionally-based writing instruction." We might question at what level the "institution" controls this instruction, and see a continuum from my department where we have a sketch of a common syllabus (with common learning outcomes and general course requirements) and teachers have complete freedom to teach what and how they like within that sketch to the scripted curriculum a friend of mine must follow in her Sophmore high school class at Smithson Valley High School (all teachers must be doing and saying the same things on the same day). What we see in a program like TOPIC is that the programmatic homogenenization of curriculum is facilitated via technology that runs through a central database. Depending upon the context, this systemization of a program might be for the good, but of central concern would be the level of agency that teachers have within that system. "Tactic" as Kearcher uses instead seems to focus on the student and seems to refer to access--the freedom to get to needed resources to meet individual needs at kairotic moments. I am totally excited about the possibilities for technology to serve as a "mediator" for action and learning in the way Kearcher describes, especially the way she describes access to a learning community (or rhetorical forum) to share writing. We might ask of systems approaches to composition if they could provide "tactical" help to teachers too. Rather than making the curriculum a monolith that restricts teachers (to say one syllabus and assignments and textbook), can it facilitate the "tactical" choices and actions teachers make as they teach as well? The second continuum we can frame systems approaches to composition upon is a similar one to the last and it is closed to open. I'm thinking particularly of how Clay Spinuzzi uses the terms at the end of his book on Genre Tracing. Computer "systems" have a tendency to "formalize" behavior--to push it through specific actions and behaviors. They are closed systems in that the users are not able to change the system in any way. In the teaching of writing, you don't have to have computers to get this level of formalization (as witnessed by my friend teaching from a scripted curriculum). The ideal, somehow, is to have a composition system that is open and adaptable for the teacher (user). The tensions in this dynamic of closed-open are enormous, but potentially powerful since it might combine the best of teachers interacting to find common ground (the need for some level of formalization and conformity amongst the curriculum) and teachers seeking ways to teach how they want and how they believe is best (from their own practical wisdom). IF the computer interface could facilitate this kind of open system, then I think we might have arrived.