Tutoring thoughts of the day

I am surprised by how many students come to the writing center wanting grammar help, when their papers are fairly grammatically correct. I guess grammar's just that scary to most people. Even those of us who get it right most of the time stress out over the though that someone will assess our accuracy.

Many of the students I've seen have said they wanted grammar help, and then we quickly move to structure and content, instead, usually because those are the kinds of questions they have.

I wonder if it would help to change up the blue sheets to some manner of multiple choice (with the always-helpful, open-ended "other" as a final option, of course), to remind students that we can work on structure, thesis statements, cohesion, etc. Would categories like "narrative," "informational," "comparative," "analytical," "persuasive," etc., help them get more specific when describing their essays?

College Level Writing Collaborative

Two weeks ago, I went to a meeting of the College Level Writing Collaborative that was hosted at JWU's Harborside Campus. The goal of these meetings is for both upper-level high school instructors, and college writing instructors to meet and discuss how they (cumulatively and separately) help students become college writers.

We split into groups to hold round-table conversations, and the group I was in quickly began discussing templates and formulas for writing. While most of the high school instructors were required to use some manner of formula for their teaching, (i.e. write a topic sentence; then write three sentences that raise three examples; then write a closing sentence for the paragraph), many of them were unsatisfied with such rigidity in their instruction.

When we work with college writers, we sometimes see this kind of formulaic writing that lacks an overall sense of presence: a purpose or cohesion to a piece as a whole. I will admit that I've often taken the easy out and blamed it on high school instruction... but this became tougher to do once I heard high school teachers voice the same concerns that I've had.

Templates help beginning writers get a foothold on a concept, but they (eventually) need to see a "bigger picture." I guess that where I'm going with this is that, in the writing center, we have a unique opportunity to converse with writers. We are there as peers, as fellow writers, and so students are more comfortable telling us when they've written a certain way because they think it's an immutable rule, or because they were aiming for an effect. I suppose the whole experience of the meeting is making me re-think college and high-school instruction, and the ways that students are taught. I wish I had more of a handle on where my thoughts are going so that I could make an overt "point" with all of this, but all I can do at this time is mull it over.

Would any of you like to be added to the list-serv for the College Level Writing Collaborative? I think it would be interesting to have more writing center voices in the mix; (there was one college writing center head at the last meeting). The collaborative is really a fascinating concept, and the conversations are productive.

Diggin' It

This semester I have seen a tutee by the surveilled name of ‘Maggie’. It was really awesome to see a tutee like this be engaged like she was. As a freshman, she has been completely engaged with me in fixing and working on her papers! She has come into the WC with her rough drafts that are in process up to a week before the due date! I mean seriously, how often does that happen!? At least for me, I consistently have students come in who have a paper due the next day--or even worse—the day of their appointment. ☹ That adds a lot of pressure to the tutor in the meeting, but also there is a lot of pressure being put back on the student in a 11th hour situation like that.

So far in the semester, there have been a lot of motivated tutees and I have not been getting any students who come in just for extra credit. Also, there seems to be a good flow that I have been feeling even if I have 4 or 5 tutees in a row. Needless to say, things are going well! Just thought I would check in and spread the good vibes!

Harrington school bash: write-a-thon?

It looks like we're moving closer toward an end-of-semester event for Harrington School's first year students. I'm now in contact with a Residential Life staffer in Weldin Hall, where the Harrington living-learning community is located. Apparently, she has some resources to put on an event. So perhaps this could be some fun? I hope so.

Here's one idea I have been kicking around: a "write-a-thon." Everyone has trouble sitting down to draft papers and other assignments. So perhaps we could sponsor an event (with food) to get these students writing? After some opening remarks and some eating, we could set them to work, freewriting style. (Don't stop writing! If you have to stop, you must talk with a tutor!) Perhaps there could be prizes: for most words written, for most assignments fully drafted. It could be something like an athletic event for writers.

Comments? Guffaws? All feedback appreciated--

Oh, the poster wall. . .

I really liked the idea of papering over the south wall of room 408 with posters, but I'm not sure how well its developing. In any case, I'm definitely tired of looking at that Korn poster. What should we do about the poster wall? Just tear them all down? Or do you all have more posters to contribute?