My head is cold.
I got my hair cut this week. When I went to the hair salon, I had certain expectations of how I wanted my hair to look. I was nervous and excited at the same time; I closed my eyes when the hair stylist began, cutting 10 inches of my hair. I could hear the "clip! clip!" of the scissors. When I opened my eyes, I looked at my shorter length for the first time: I looked different. I felt different. I couldn't tell if I liked it or not at first glance; and even now, two days later, I'm not sure what to think of my new look.
Erik Mathews on Boy Meets World cut his hair; he said that his new hair style represented the "new and smarter" Erik. (And then he asked if anyone else's head was cold because his head was cold.)
When students come into the Writing Center, what are their expectations? I guess it depends on what he or she is looking for when the individual comes in. But do you think that we might have students who want to hand you their paper, close their eyes--- and then when they open their eyes again they want to be presented with the "new and smarter" paper? They want us to do the thinking, revision and changes. Can we still help them achieve their "new and smarter" paper without them closing their eyes?--- or in other words, not want to make the changes themselves? So what if you do? ---What if you amazingly enough get the student involved in the revision process and they don't like your ideas. For me, if I decide that I don't like my short hair, I can tell myself that it will grow back. My hair stylist suggested that I layered my hair to give me more volume. I didn't have to, but I felt brave. I guess in the same way, you don't have to force changes onto the student.
I had a session a couple weeks ago where I helped a student make changes in her paper. She came back yesterday and showed me her score. The paper was graded in four sections. She did well in three of the four sections. A closer inspection revealed that the section she didn’t do as well in was the section we didn’t get to talk about as much. We spent the session yesterday revising and coming up with ways to open ideas up for discussion. We talked about what good things she did in the other sections, what her teacher liked, etc. And then we molded these ideas together so we could revise her last section of the paper. It was fun talking with her, but I wonder if she really liked the changes I was suggesting. She might have been skeptical about my ideas. But she said that she would try a couple of them and see what she could do to fix her paper so she could resubmit it to her teacher.
I guess that is all we can do when it comes to helping students make drastic changes in their papers: suggest the changes and hope the suggestions are good. I don't know if I like my hair layered and this short. I've never had it this way before. But I guess I can work with the change and hopefully I will like it.
So... is anyone's head cold? 'cause my head's cold!
Erik Mathews on Boy Meets World cut his hair; he said that his new hair style represented the "new and smarter" Erik. (And then he asked if anyone else's head was cold because his head was cold.)
When students come into the Writing Center, what are their expectations? I guess it depends on what he or she is looking for when the individual comes in. But do you think that we might have students who want to hand you their paper, close their eyes--- and then when they open their eyes again they want to be presented with the "new and smarter" paper? They want us to do the thinking, revision and changes. Can we still help them achieve their "new and smarter" paper without them closing their eyes?--- or in other words, not want to make the changes themselves? So what if you do? ---What if you amazingly enough get the student involved in the revision process and they don't like your ideas. For me, if I decide that I don't like my short hair, I can tell myself that it will grow back. My hair stylist suggested that I layered my hair to give me more volume. I didn't have to, but I felt brave. I guess in the same way, you don't have to force changes onto the student.
I had a session a couple weeks ago where I helped a student make changes in her paper. She came back yesterday and showed me her score. The paper was graded in four sections. She did well in three of the four sections. A closer inspection revealed that the section she didn’t do as well in was the section we didn’t get to talk about as much. We spent the session yesterday revising and coming up with ways to open ideas up for discussion. We talked about what good things she did in the other sections, what her teacher liked, etc. And then we molded these ideas together so we could revise her last section of the paper. It was fun talking with her, but I wonder if she really liked the changes I was suggesting. She might have been skeptical about my ideas. But she said that she would try a couple of them and see what she could do to fix her paper so she could resubmit it to her teacher.
I guess that is all we can do when it comes to helping students make drastic changes in their papers: suggest the changes and hope the suggestions are good. I don't know if I like my hair layered and this short. I've never had it this way before. But I guess I can work with the change and hopefully I will like it.
So... is anyone's head cold? 'cause my head's cold!
posted by Kassie at 12:06 PM
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