Questions for 1/3

Writing Centre Reports
There are obvious problems with the first report, but is there anything that bothers you/that you feel is missing from the 'model'?

St. Martin's: "Subjectivity"
I found it really interesting when Freed brought up the issue of students from another culture. As a Bahamian, I can see how some of my own value systems or even the lens through which I view the world could affect my writing and in a consultation cause not necessarily a problem but perhaps spark a conversation. Have you ever had this kind of experience with an international peer?

Bedford Chp. 2
How has reading this chapter affected, if at all, your perception of your own writing process? Do you think you will be more conscious of what you do now/try and incoporate some or all of these instructions?

Shadowing #2

This week I had a pretty interesting shadowing experience. My consultant had an older client, a middle aged woman who is a student in the law school. I was pretty surprised to see her at first, I know that we help older people but I never thought that it happened on a regular/normal basis. When I realised that she was indeed at the Writing Centre for help, I was intrigued about how the session would play out.

For one, I found the content of the lady's paper interesting. She was writing a fictional letter to someone (I suppose the lawyer for the opposition) about a wrongful dismissal lawsuit, and she was on the side of the company that did the firing. Through the course of the conversation I gained some insight into the world of human resources and employment policy. This made me think about the things that we as consultants can learn from the people who come to see us. Beyond just theoretical considerations about writing and what a good paper looks like, we have the opportunity to delve into fields that we might not have otherwise. I know we talked about this a few weeks ago, but that was in terms of whether or not we are qualified to assist these writers, a point which I will evaluate later. I think it's cool that we can glimpse into other disciplines, even if all we get is a snippet of (potentially biased) information. Philosophy, law, religion, biology...the list goes on. This might sound kind of strange but I'm excited to have that kind of opportunity, there are plenty of valuable, or at least thought-provoking, things that we could read.

Regarding whether or not I think the consultant was qualified, I did notice some difficulties at times. However, these were minor if you consider the help she was able to give. The problems were mainly about technicalities, the consultant was confused a few times about the proper layout for the letter and some of the legal phrasing. I don't think these are enough for me to say that we shouldn't work across disciplines though; she was still able to work on clarity, expression and persuasiveness.

As a final note, the consultant showed the same amount of respect and courtesy to this older student than the one I observed her with last week, although perhaps she was a bit more suggestive rather than directive with her comments. I also thought it really interesting that they both had pens and wrote on the paper.

Questions for 22/2

This is a Redneck Argument
How do you think the writer would have felt had the tutor not been Turkish? (I looked him up) Moreover, if the consultant had been a white American, do you think that they would have felt more comfortable addressing the writer's position in a more open/agressive way?

Reflections on Teacher Comments
Were you surprised by the graduate students' (in scene 3) reaction to their professors comments? Has this scenario changed your perspective of teacher commentary and how long it takes to be able to 'decipher' it?

Bedford
These tips all come from a situation where the writer has time and motivation to revise. How would you modify them if one or neither of these were the case?

Hjortshoj
Do you own a writing handbook? If so, how often do you use it and has it been noticeably helpful? If not, after reading Hjortshoj and Bedford would you consider buying one?

College Mentoring Project - Meeting 1

On my way to the Commons this afternoon, I tried to analyse my feelings about our mentoring task...just so I could have a clear understanding of myself I guess. I didn't come up with anything concrete, but my overwhelming sense was one of nervousness. I was thinking - how in the world am I going to be able to help this student? I've only had one shadowing experience thus far, and despite all of the discussing, theorising and reading we've done in and for class, I knew actually using all of the skills we talked about would be a different story.

I'm happy to report that everything went so well! I had such a good time talking with my mentee and I am excited to see how her paper develops after our discussion. To break the ice, I did the introductory thing - what's your name? are you originally from VA? do you have siblings? - and answered the same questions about myself. Then I asked her to tell me about the reading she chose and why she picked the person that she wrote her letter to. After listening I read her paper aloud and we got to work.

We discussed a lot of different ways she could improve her paper and I tried hard to focus on larger issues and ideas rather than grammar and sentence structure. My student was open and communicative, which really helped me to see how she was digesting what we were talking about and how I could further guide her. We were a little slow going initially, but when Dr. Gale called for us to stop, I was surprised because we had gotten into such a good groove.

Overall, I'm really pleased with how today went. I do have a comment to make though - Ms. Dolson came over and noted that I was writing the guidance points down myself, rather than having the student do it. I don't really know how I feel about this because I have seen writing centre consultants doing it in the past, but at the same time I can see how you might want the student to write themselves. It is an interesting thing for me to think about. I wonder how other people feel about this?

Post Script to Consultant Shadowing #1

I forgot to add that Jim actually missed his first consultation, and that Helen was luckily able to take over for him because her student cancelled their appointment. This made me very upset, firstly because I remember how vehement Dr. Essid was about not standing up our students, secondly because this put Helen in a difficult position and thirdly because he did not even apologise to Helen or show any kind of understanding of the consequences of his actions. This unprofessionalism probably added to the reason why I was less impressed with Jim than I was with Helen.

Consultant Shadowing #1

I'm so happy! I've finally had my first shadowing experience. I'm supposed to be working with a consultant in Freeman but nothing has come of that yet, so I thought it would be a good idea to go to the Writing Centre.

I was supposed to be shadowing a girl, let's call her Helen, at 8pm. When I got there, there were two consultations going on. Helen was just finishing up one and another guy, let's call him Jim, was just starting one. Helen told me that I could observe the tail-end of her consult and then watch Jim, since she did not have an 8 o'clock appointment.

I really thought Helen did a good job with her consult. She helped to guide the student rather than telling him what to do. Basically, she did what we've talked about, you know, getting the student to talk about their ideas. She encouraged him to be clear and make sure that his ideas flowed through the paragraphs of his paper. At the end of the session, she gave him a few tip sheets and I thought that was helpful.

The next consultation I observed did not go nearly as well, in my opinion. Not because Jim did not help his peer, but because he helped him a little too much. In some instances, he created sentences and made specific comments about word choice. I was actually a little uncomfortable about the kind of help he was giving, because it did not at all look like what I thought a consultation should be. Moreover, he kept fiddling with his cell phone, which although I can understand might be necessary in certain situations, I think he did it way too often. There was one thing that I thought Jim did really well though. He gave sincere compliments - about the student's use of quotations and some analyses - and I thought these were well deserved, after all, I was listening to him read the paper and new which parts he was referring to.

Overall, I think this was a good introduction to the world of consultations, because I got to see two very different sessions and since they were carried out within minutes of one another every observation was fresh in my mind. Lastly, I think its useful to note that although I have my own opinions about the success of each meeting and the work of each consultant, both the students left the writing centre happy with the help the received.