PeerCentered

Kenrod James
September 7, 2010
English 1810
Role of the Tutor???
Tutors play a vital role in the development and the progression of any student. Students go to a learning center to learn how to develop their writing skills and to receive guidance from someone who has expertise and more knowledge. This is where the difference between a tutor and a teacher comes in to play. Teachers are there to watch you and to set regulations on the material you learn and how you learn that material, whereas a tutor is there to guide you and allow you to create your own views and ideas. Tutors actually in my opinion, are more influential, because they allow for the student to find their own voice and develop their inner most thoughts and feelings. I know that tutors have the responsibility to judge whether a student actually wants help or if they are just looking for someone to write the paper for them. The relationship of the student tutor has to be one of respect. I think that the student has to wa…

In class, we were talking about tutors and the roles they do play and the roles they should play. It got me thinking, I thought to myself, 'What do I think a tutor should do?' Thus, this is what I came up with:

Tutors: Our Role
Our role as tutors is to be the “backboard” to their “goal”; the writer’s goal being getting a good grade on their writing or maybe, just bettering their work. As the “backboard”, we let them bounce, or help them to bounce, their ideas off of us and in return, give them helpful, constructive feedback. As tutors, we are there to help them to learn how to properly edit their own papers and to give them inspiration and guidance when the writer’s may need it. Tutors are there to assist the writers learn more about writing and to help them manifest their visions and ideas, in a clear and cohesive manor, on to paper. As a tutor, one should never write the work for the writer, and the same could be said for any tutor in any area of study. The writers cannot lear…

Collin BakkerReflective journal- What role does the tutor play…?I haven’t spent much time in the writing center… any time for that matter.I think I had to borrow a stapler from there once, so I guess that means I’ve spent a little time.It’s not really somewhere I’ve ever felt drawn to.To explain, I’m not a natural at writing.I’ve spent many hours late into the night with the word processor.Fighting, mostly… though as abusive as the relationship is, I’ve never felt so rewarded as when we finally put something together that works.Because of that, I feel that I have an intimate understanding of what students are going through when the words just won’t cooperate.Being in this position has its advantages, and disadvantages.I know how frustrating it can be when even after all your work someone has the gall to tell you it’s not good enough.But I’m probably going to try and fix the paper for the student because of it.I don’t want to have to see any student struggle like I did, even if struggl…

Shane Dykes
English 1810
Reflective Journal #2
For this reflective journal we are required to answer the question, what role does the tutor play in helping the student? To be completely honest I cannot completely answer this question from a writing center point of view because I have never been to a writing center and do not know exactly how all the teaching there works, but I am pretty familiar with the classroom setting writing tutor.
We all know that writing centers are a bit different from class rooms and some may actually say that they are the complete opposite, however I feel like the role of the tutor is in the end the same whether they are in a class room or in a writing center. I feel like the ultimate goal is to make the writer better. The role of the tutor is to make sure that you help in a way that doesn’t slam the writer and doesn’t put them down. When I was in high school it was always your papers are graded in two ways bad, or good. Your paper was either good and received a…

A tutor can do many things to help a student learn how to become a better writer. However, after years if tutoring, a tutor can get into ruts that hinder performance, such as taking on the role of expert. I have been tutoring for several years now and feel that I have things to change with my approach, and I have decided that some good concepts to remember to prevent being a prescriptive expert rather than a descriptive helper are control and flexibility. Control and flexibility are important for both tutors and writers.

Tutors need to work on using the concepts of control and flexibility in their tutoring. Taking more time to ask questions and explain would be more helpful to writers rather than giving advice right away. Control comes into play when the tutor asks questions directed toward higher order conders first. Flexibility comes into play when the tutor works with the answers writers provide, allowing writers to direct the course of the discussion.

Expertise can be helpful in tut…

This post is a revision of a reflection on "What role does the tutor play to help the student learn?" a question asked in my Writing Center Studies class. As part in the revision assignment, we were asked to have a mock-session with one of our classmates, taking turns acting as the tutor and then as a student, reading our reflections aloud. The next step was to revise our reflection based on the advice given in the tutorial session, and then reflect on how the tutorial session went. I confused myself, however, when doing the 2nd reflection and went on to talk about the corrections I made in the revision and why I made them. Hopefully this can still work to show how one goes about reflecting on their corrections.

Revised Reflection

To me, the role of a tutor is more descriptive than prescriptive. I previously thought tutors acted as editors but, as I’m quickly finding, this is not the case. The important aspects of tutoring seem to be guidance and “tutoring” as it’s defined, no…

Here at Salt Lake Community College Student Writing Center, we created a series of new video commercials for display both online and on our campus information screens.  Creating the videos was a fun process and involved many different people in the Student Writing Center.   The commercials are based on a common theme ("Don't hate.  Collaborate!") and end up telling a story.

In any case, rather than sharing those, I'd rather share some rather creative and succinct commercials I just found from our friends at Brigham Young University.  Take a gander:









Ok,ok, if you really want to see the SLCC SWC videos, go here.