Doubled Up

So this week I doubled my solo consultations number, and that was in one day! I really do love doing this tutoring thing. There are parts of it that I think I do great at. Greeting each student and trying to get them to quickly relax and feel comfortable comes naturally to me. And even though I might be nervous about what they might need help with and how/if I am going to be able to help them with it, I don't think it comes across to the student.
The concerns that have come up for me this week is the reading of the paper. For all of my sessions I have read the paper, except for one time this week. I had decided not to let the student have a choice, and just asked her to read the paper out loud. I tried to look at his as best as I could (not a good seating arrangement, my bad) so I found it hard to get a total feel for the paper and the issues that were occurring. The student was concerned with transitions, having been told by her E101 teacher that she had problems with that in an earlier draft. We found one to work on, and then several grammar spots. The biggest help for her she said at the end of the session, was letting her talk about which piece of writing she should include in her paper as a writing sample of the person she was interviewing. And although the session went well, I feel that I could have helped her more if I would have read it out loud.
Another problem I have with reading papers, is knowing how much of the paper to read. So far they have all been fairly short papers, the longest being around 8 pages, so I have been able to get through them. Although one session went 10 minutes over because I did not have another one after her. But I am worried about the time when there will be a longer paper that cannot be read through in 30 minutes. The problem with me is that I am extremely linear, start to finish kind of girl. So I know I am going to have a hard time with this. But I know I will get a feel for it, even though there could be some rough spots along the way.
My favorite session this week was with a non-traditional student working on her E101 interview paper. She was so nervous about the paper and that everything was correct. She had been in the day before and had seen Lizzy. They had worked on her thesis and focus of her paper. She had totally revised it and was wanting to check grammar and punctuation. I read through it and realized that she had interviewed her husband, the wrestling coach. She laughed and said she knew it was probably not right that she used her husband for her subject. I told her that I had just finished a paper where I interviewed my sister. She said that made her feel a lot better. It is a small thing, but it still helped her feel more confident, and that is a HUGE thing when writing!
I want to be better at this, and I know I will continue to the more I tutor. The problem is that I want to do it the right way right now! My confidence keeps waning. But my desire is there, and so I will keep pushing, learning, and doing the best that I can.

Balancing

While reading chapter one of ESL Writers by Bruce and Rafoth, I have to admit I was surprised to learn in chapter one that they believe that high school teachers have a large role to play in the struggles of the Ls college student. The fact that anyone would follow a trend that stressed content over errors must have also be some of those who weren't taught grammar in school and haven't yet realized that wasn't a good thing.

Why does it have to be one of the other? Is there a secret scale that is used, and if grammar gets too much attention that content gets thrown off into space? Where is the balance that is needed for the rest of the adult life? Isn't it their jobs as teachers to be thinking about the future of all the students, and preparing them for the 'real' world? Of course they want the ESL students to have success and feel good about what they are doing. But do they have any idea how bad they feel when they get to college and realize that they high school teacher was not telling them the whole truth? Maybe no one has told them, the high school teachers, that this is happening. The ESL students could write them a note, bring it into the WC, and then we can make sure the grammar is correct so that the teachers don't have to struggle to find the content of the writing.

When working with ESL students, or really, any student who is struggling with writing and all that it involves, there has to be an effort to find something to point out that they have done correctly and along with correcting what they haven't done correctly. Understand? It is balancing, and it is very much needed in most learning in life. You have to know what you are falling short on so that you can get the help you need to learn how to correct that. If you sail along thinking that everything you are doing is fine, how do you know to fix it? And then when you realize that it needs fixed, you have already acquired bad habits, you are now past puberty, and relearning is not going to be very easy.

During my consultations this week (that is so great to be able to write!) with the ESL students and the native student alike, I made a conscience effort to find an example of where they were doing correctly the thing that they were struggling with. One of the girls was struggling with commas, and I pointed out the places that she succeeded in placing them correctly. Or even if there is no success in one area, there is always somewhere that can be found that they are doing correctly.

We all need this as humans, rather native or foreign. Being told that you are doing something good and right helps us be able to tackle the things that we are not doing correctly. It is common sense. That is how we learn and succeed. Somebody please let the high school teachers know as soon as possible. I thought it was innate, but I guess not.

Okay-let me say first off that I might have misunderstood the entire message in Singley & Boucher's essay Dialogue in Tutor Training: Creating the Essential space for Learning. Maybe after tonight's discussion I will have a different outlook and opinion on it. I guess if I do, I will have to write another blog about what I learned!

Bur for now, I have to say that, even though there are basic philosophies and practices that I agree with, there is a fundamental premise that I have an issue with.

On page 14 the author's make this statement, "We can only conclude that teaching must consist of dialogue, not monologue, since dialogue opens up the space that would foster true learning." Although I totally agree with the last part of the statement, I take issue with saying that only dialogue and not monologue should be included in teaching. There are times where monologue is required for learning. You can not discuss what you don't know. If you try to have a discussion about something that you have not learned yet, then it is going to be a fruitless conversation. So my revision of this statement would be that teaching should include both monologue AND dialogue. I know that dialogue is useful in learning, and that there are times that it is essential, but it seems that it gets overused and also used as an excuse for teachers not to teach as much as they should. There is also the fact that when having discussions while in a class, there is usually that one person that monopolizes the time, asks unrelated questions, or doesn't under-

stand the real subject and concept that is being talked about. Then it is a waste of time for everyone in the class.

In learning to be a tutor I believe this is the same situation. Although we are reading material about the 'the theory and practice' of tutoring, we still need monologue/teaching from those with the expertise and knowledge of not only HOW to tutor but also how to teach how to tutor. Those are two separate things.

What I agree with a 100% is the statement on page 19 that reads, "We believe that tutors must first understand themselves both as learners and teachers- or at least be engaged in this endeavor-before they can offer useful assistance to others." Basically, the two are so intertwined that you cannot be one without the other. But you also need to know when it is the right time to be which one. That is the tough part. It is almost as simple as knowing when to speak up, and knowing when to shut-up. How is that for oversimplification.