Helping people, not (necessarily) punctuation.
Being new to the tutoring world, I have yet to see a terrible paper(outside of tutor training class that is. The essay about Abraham Lincoln and Ghandi was really quite terrifying). Everything I am going to discuss in this entry is, therefore, going to be purely hypothetical and based upon the little situational knowledge that i have gained regarding tutoring sessions.
It is important to consider every paper that comes in as a rough draft. If the paper were not a draft, then there would be no reason for students to come into the writing center(unless their professor requires it, which can be quite problematic). Now, if the student and the tutor see the paper as a rough draft, it will be much easier to offer advice, corrections, and critical comments. When giving advice, it is also important to remember that this paper may not be just a collection of words and punctuation; it may actually mean something to the student. Tutors have to avoid anything that could be construed as an attack on the paper or its author. If a paper doesn't fill the assignment requirements, or if its organizational and grammatical problems are bad enough to warrant a re-write, how should a tutor disclose this to the student? The best way I can see, would be to highlight the things that were done right, then help the student create an outline for the next draft that would "embiggen" the good ideas.
I'm not suggesting that the tutor should write the actual essay; that would defeat the purpose of a tutoring session. A tutor should strive to help people increase their knowledge and better their skills; not viscously attack the faulty logic or punctuation. The distinction between helping the paper and helping the tutor is difficult to ascertain. If tutors do their job correctly, however, students will learn to recognize their mistakes all by themselves. That is the beauty of teaching. The sharing of knowledge ennables others to become better than they were.
There seem to be many lines in tutoring that are difficult to discern. For example: when discussing a student's paper, it would make sense to take an objective stance; yet it is also important to be able to empathize with the student. That's kind of hard to do when looking through the objective lens. So where does one draw the line between objectively guiding through the writing process, and emphatically helping the student? Students are people, so we can't really treat them like machines. I don't really have an answer for this dilemma, not yet. I expect it's something i will better understand with more experience.
It is important to consider every paper that comes in as a rough draft. If the paper were not a draft, then there would be no reason for students to come into the writing center(unless their professor requires it, which can be quite problematic). Now, if the student and the tutor see the paper as a rough draft, it will be much easier to offer advice, corrections, and critical comments. When giving advice, it is also important to remember that this paper may not be just a collection of words and punctuation; it may actually mean something to the student. Tutors have to avoid anything that could be construed as an attack on the paper or its author. If a paper doesn't fill the assignment requirements, or if its organizational and grammatical problems are bad enough to warrant a re-write, how should a tutor disclose this to the student? The best way I can see, would be to highlight the things that were done right, then help the student create an outline for the next draft that would "embiggen" the good ideas.
I'm not suggesting that the tutor should write the actual essay; that would defeat the purpose of a tutoring session. A tutor should strive to help people increase their knowledge and better their skills; not viscously attack the faulty logic or punctuation. The distinction between helping the paper and helping the tutor is difficult to ascertain. If tutors do their job correctly, however, students will learn to recognize their mistakes all by themselves. That is the beauty of teaching. The sharing of knowledge ennables others to become better than they were.
There seem to be many lines in tutoring that are difficult to discern. For example: when discussing a student's paper, it would make sense to take an objective stance; yet it is also important to be able to empathize with the student. That's kind of hard to do when looking through the objective lens. So where does one draw the line between objectively guiding through the writing process, and emphatically helping the student? Students are people, so we can't really treat them like machines. I don't really have an answer for this dilemma, not yet. I expect it's something i will better understand with more experience.
posted by Kyle Rollins at 12:27 PM
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