Blog Post Week 14 - Sallie
Getting to work with students who are studying vastly different disciplines than you is both a challenging and rewarding aspect of working in the Writing Center. I have been fortunate to have one student who is expressly interested in my poetry and creative writing, and I have found working with her to be a truly enjoyable and mutually beneficial experience. However, the majority of the students I work with have interests and academic focuses that span way out of my personal scope. Last week, I helped a student on a paper about sexual dimorphism in apes and then moved on to help another student write a personal statement about her experience and interest in Public Health. While approaching a paper on which the terms themselves are uncertain is a difficult task, I have found it a helpful tool in reminding myself of the basics of writing and how to give instruction on writing itself without feeling the push to interfere with my own personal styles, interest, sentiments, etc. We can focus on clarity and organization, diving deep into what makes a sentence or paragraph successful, without getting bogged down in the details of a subject. This, after all, feels more in line with what we are supposed to be doing as tutors in the WC.
I have not worked with any PhD students, and I suspect this would pose additional challenges tutoring, as I imagine the subject matter would be further disguised by academic convention. However, I believe that this would provide an opportunity for students to gain further dominion over their work by having to explain carefully their choices and topic to a layperson. These kinds of discussions are incredibly fruitful, and I often try to have them with students that seem ultimately unsure of what it is they are trying to say. First explain it orally, figure out its dimensions and how to wield it, and then write it.
I found the article A University's Writing Practices from the Inside Perspective of the Writing Center to be very useful in providing footing in student work by offering clearly outlined taxonomies of assignments. Having this reference gives me a sense of confidence as a tutor in my ability to tackle a range of assignments effectively and efficiently with students.
I have not worked with any PhD students, and I suspect this would pose additional challenges tutoring, as I imagine the subject matter would be further disguised by academic convention. However, I believe that this would provide an opportunity for students to gain further dominion over their work by having to explain carefully their choices and topic to a layperson. These kinds of discussions are incredibly fruitful, and I often try to have them with students that seem ultimately unsure of what it is they are trying to say. First explain it orally, figure out its dimensions and how to wield it, and then write it.
I found the article A University's Writing Practices from the Inside Perspective of the Writing Center to be very useful in providing footing in student work by offering clearly outlined taxonomies of assignments. Having this reference gives me a sense of confidence as a tutor in my ability to tackle a range of assignments effectively and efficiently with students.
I like your strategy of reminding yourself to focus on the writing itself and not your own opinions about the student's topic, which you may not know very much about, or your opinions about the style of writing required by the field. When we encounter an unfamiliar topic in an unfamiliar field, some of us are inclined to display to the student a defensive attitude (e.g. "What I know about apes I learned at the zoo and by watching Planet of the Apes"), which changes the subject of the tutorial from the student's writing to the tutor's (lack of) knowledge and probably doesn't do the student much good.
ReplyDeleteHi Sallie, I also found it helpful to focus on the writing and helping students with organization, instead of focusing most of the time with vocab or terms that are unknown to me. I think it is also important to not be afraid/ashamed in asking the student to give more context about their work. I find that it also helped me to help them.
ReplyDeleteHi Sallie, Yes agreed. I have a PhD student, in science, no less. It's been useful to focus on the writing, as well as, in this case, the organization of how information should flow. What should come in an intro paragraph, how to set up the central question concisely, and how to make rhetorical moves that allow for clear transitions.
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