Power!
I just made an amazing tutoring connection so I’m feeling particularly brilliant at the moment! It’s not even Friday, but I thought I better get this down before it disappears like so many of my great epiphanies.
Right after my brother Searls died (I know you are sick of hearing about this, but bear with me) I watched as my brother, Ernest, had a complete temper-tantrum because his pen wouldn’t work. It was a silly, insignificant thing, but he made it huge. He threw the thing across the room and used "colorful metaphors" (thank you Star Trek). He then stomped out of the room and snapped at his kid. A few minutes later I could hear him fighting with his wife in the hallway. All over a pen? Obviously, the problem wasn’t really the pen, but it was easier to be upset about a pen than to face the reality of a death in the family. After all, he could do something about the pen. He could cuss and stomp around, then go find/buy another pen that would work. Cussing and stomping around wouldn’t change the reality of death and he certainly couldn’t fix the situation, so it was fruitless to react.
Similarly, we have students who come into the writing center overly concerned with grammar issues. All they want to know is if they have a comma splice, run on sentences or the like. They say over and over "is my grammar okay?" ("Does it flow?") Perhaps (I may be making a big leap here, but it made sense to me) they are reacting the same way my brother did. They subconsciously know that there are big problems with their paper (missing thesis, disorganization, lack of evidence or support, etc.) but they don’t feel that they have any control over that. They are feeling helpless. They don’t think they can change the major flaws, so they focus on something they can change easily: grammar.
So, the question is how to make students feel like they have control over their papers. We’ve been discussing various strategies throughout the semester that relate directly to this, but not quite in these terms. Having a student write on their paper makes THEM in control of the paper. Asking questions instead of giving answers gives them a feeling of power/control. All along we’ve been talking about how to make students feel equal with the tutor and not condescended to, but maybe it’s all about power. We all know American’s are huge on power. ;) This is where Layne’s "you’re the god of this paper" comes in.
Right now my boy is sitting on my lap fussing over his Lego engineered dog. It won’t stay together and he’s really mad about it. Now, we all know that the real problem is that he is so tired he can’t see straight, but his mom is typing rather than putting him to bed. I’m feeling frustrated because he won’t let me write. Catch-22? Who has the power in this relationship? (Very stupid question.)
Yes, Dr. Rogers, I just made that two point connection, too.
Right after my brother Searls died (I know you are sick of hearing about this, but bear with me) I watched as my brother, Ernest, had a complete temper-tantrum because his pen wouldn’t work. It was a silly, insignificant thing, but he made it huge. He threw the thing across the room and used "colorful metaphors" (thank you Star Trek). He then stomped out of the room and snapped at his kid. A few minutes later I could hear him fighting with his wife in the hallway. All over a pen? Obviously, the problem wasn’t really the pen, but it was easier to be upset about a pen than to face the reality of a death in the family. After all, he could do something about the pen. He could cuss and stomp around, then go find/buy another pen that would work. Cussing and stomping around wouldn’t change the reality of death and he certainly couldn’t fix the situation, so it was fruitless to react.
Similarly, we have students who come into the writing center overly concerned with grammar issues. All they want to know is if they have a comma splice, run on sentences or the like. They say over and over "is my grammar okay?" ("Does it flow?") Perhaps (I may be making a big leap here, but it made sense to me) they are reacting the same way my brother did. They subconsciously know that there are big problems with their paper (missing thesis, disorganization, lack of evidence or support, etc.) but they don’t feel that they have any control over that. They are feeling helpless. They don’t think they can change the major flaws, so they focus on something they can change easily: grammar.
So, the question is how to make students feel like they have control over their papers. We’ve been discussing various strategies throughout the semester that relate directly to this, but not quite in these terms. Having a student write on their paper makes THEM in control of the paper. Asking questions instead of giving answers gives them a feeling of power/control. All along we’ve been talking about how to make students feel equal with the tutor and not condescended to, but maybe it’s all about power. We all know American’s are huge on power. ;) This is where Layne’s "you’re the god of this paper" comes in.
Right now my boy is sitting on my lap fussing over his Lego engineered dog. It won’t stay together and he’s really mad about it. Now, we all know that the real problem is that he is so tired he can’t see straight, but his mom is typing rather than putting him to bed. I’m feeling frustrated because he won’t let me write. Catch-22? Who has the power in this relationship? (Very stupid question.)
Yes, Dr. Rogers, I just made that two point connection, too.
posted by Anonymous at 11:46 PM
1 Comments:
You are seriously on a roll this week. I'll be stealing your question about commenting on papers you know nothing about as the prompt for this week once I get finished grading the pile of essays I've been working on all day.
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