SneezING
Wow. I don’t think I’ve ever submitted a blog this early in the week, but I’m leaving town on Friday. Yahoo! Let’s see if I can get my brain in gear…
I’ve tutored quite a few sessions with unfamiliar terminology, but I don’t know if I’ve had one with a completely unfamiliar subject. For a couple weeks there were oodles of nutrition papers, followed by a wave of health science research papers. I learned a lot that week. (I even had a student promise to bring in some Indian food. Still waiting.) Like Michelle, I’ve really enjoyed reading the variety of topics students choose to write about.
For me, the hardest topics are those that are VERY familiar. Who can forget the Obama vs. McCain deluge? I found myself making the same recommendations, asking the same questions, finding the same gaps. Not my best tutoring moments. Same goes for those universal, hot-button topics such as gun control, abortion, illegal immigration, etc. It’s hard not to become catatonic when they come in one after another.
I’m rarely left speechless (no secret), but there have been a few sessions wherein I’ve struggled. The first was with an English 955 student out at the Davis campus. I can’t say she didn’t warn me; her first words to me were, “I’m so sorry. My professor says I have an ING problem.” She didn’t lie. Her essay about love consisted of paragraph-shaped groupings of “ing” words: kissing, hugging, loving, holding, wishing, wanting, wailing. You get the picture. She did have an occasional full sentence, and I grabbed on to these like lifelines. I really didn’t know what to say or how to begin. But an essay is “a try,” right? My first strategy was to drown ourselves in words and conversation until I figured out the real strategy. I was trying desperately to get her to give me some idea of her thoughts on her topic while inside I was screaming, Gerunds! Millions of them! Present participles by the dozen! This is not an ING problem, it’s a talent!
The session lasted an hour and a half. Nobody was waiting in line to be tutored, and the student was in no hurry to go anywhere. We grouped the INGs into three clusters that fit loosely into her main ideas on love. Next we wrote complete sentences. Then we faced the INGs where they stood. I didn’t feel capable of addressing her imbedded writing practices, so I tacked another method on top. One process progressed thusly: produce gerund, construct sentence, cover the ING with a finger, place the word “to” in front. For example, “Kissing is such a good thing” became “To kiss is such a good thing.” She was thrilled; I felt completely inadequate.
Another session, also involving a 955 student, left me speechless for a completely different reason. This boy was terrified of me. I was working like crazy to get him to relax, or even look at me. As he read his paper his hands shook on the desktop; he actually had beads of sweat on his forehead. It wasn’t his palpable terror that silenced me, though. It was his essay on beauty. The writing was far from perfect, but he had such startling, poetic views that I actually thought I was going to bawl like a baby. It was one of the most heartfelt essays that I’ve read in my time as a tutor. My strategy consisted of a fake sneeze to cover the obvious tears in my eyes. Professional, eh? It also gave me just a moment to gather myself and find my words again.
I’ve tutored quite a few sessions with unfamiliar terminology, but I don’t know if I’ve had one with a completely unfamiliar subject. For a couple weeks there were oodles of nutrition papers, followed by a wave of health science research papers. I learned a lot that week. (I even had a student promise to bring in some Indian food. Still waiting.) Like Michelle, I’ve really enjoyed reading the variety of topics students choose to write about.
For me, the hardest topics are those that are VERY familiar. Who can forget the Obama vs. McCain deluge? I found myself making the same recommendations, asking the same questions, finding the same gaps. Not my best tutoring moments. Same goes for those universal, hot-button topics such as gun control, abortion, illegal immigration, etc. It’s hard not to become catatonic when they come in one after another.
I’m rarely left speechless (no secret), but there have been a few sessions wherein I’ve struggled. The first was with an English 955 student out at the Davis campus. I can’t say she didn’t warn me; her first words to me were, “I’m so sorry. My professor says I have an ING problem.” She didn’t lie. Her essay about love consisted of paragraph-shaped groupings of “ing” words: kissing, hugging, loving, holding, wishing, wanting, wailing. You get the picture. She did have an occasional full sentence, and I grabbed on to these like lifelines. I really didn’t know what to say or how to begin. But an essay is “a try,” right? My first strategy was to drown ourselves in words and conversation until I figured out the real strategy. I was trying desperately to get her to give me some idea of her thoughts on her topic while inside I was screaming, Gerunds! Millions of them! Present participles by the dozen! This is not an ING problem, it’s a talent!
The session lasted an hour and a half. Nobody was waiting in line to be tutored, and the student was in no hurry to go anywhere. We grouped the INGs into three clusters that fit loosely into her main ideas on love. Next we wrote complete sentences. Then we faced the INGs where they stood. I didn’t feel capable of addressing her imbedded writing practices, so I tacked another method on top. One process progressed thusly: produce gerund, construct sentence, cover the ING with a finger, place the word “to” in front. For example, “Kissing is such a good thing” became “To kiss is such a good thing.” She was thrilled; I felt completely inadequate.
Another session, also involving a 955 student, left me speechless for a completely different reason. This boy was terrified of me. I was working like crazy to get him to relax, or even look at me. As he read his paper his hands shook on the desktop; he actually had beads of sweat on his forehead. It wasn’t his palpable terror that silenced me, though. It was his essay on beauty. The writing was far from perfect, but he had such startling, poetic views that I actually thought I was going to bawl like a baby. It was one of the most heartfelt essays that I’ve read in my time as a tutor. My strategy consisted of a fake sneeze to cover the obvious tears in my eyes. Professional, eh? It also gave me just a moment to gather myself and find my words again.
posted by cheyney at 11:03 PM
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