McAndrews and Reigstad Chapter 3: "What Tutoring Writing Isn't"

Main Points:

There are many things that writing tutors may appear to be that they are not. Writing tutors are not editors, cheerleaders, nitpickers, therapists or experts. A tutor is not like an editor because contrary to popular belief, the relationship between and editor and writer can often be adversarial, and editors at times take over control of the text from the writer. This is something that tutors should never do, and McAndrews and Reigstad make the argument that the writer/editor relationship should be seen as an “anti-model” for writing tutors.

A tutor is also not supposed to be a cheerleader, offering empty praise to a writer. This is not productive in the slightest, though legitimate praise is a good thing, just talking about good points will not help a writer improve, and praise should never be used to soften the blow, because most people will see right through you. On the other hand, a tutor should not immediately dig in and nitpick every little problem in the essay, as this can offend and demoralize a writer. The goal is to make the writer aware of their issues, help them develop strategies to work on those issues, and have them leave feeling like they’ve accomplished something. Neither cheerleading nor nitpicking will accomplish this.

Tutors also should not act as therapists to writers. Tutors do not have to, and shouldn’t, get involved in the writer’s problems that have nothing to do with writing. This is true even if the piece being worked on contains a lot of personal content. Tutors are not trained therapists and should not act like them.

Just like tutors aren’t experts in psychotherapy, they don’t have to be experts in anything. Tutors sometimes can be the most helpful when they don’t know the answers, because then they can direct the writer towards finding the answers for themselves.

There are also things that a tutor should never do, such as take control of the writer’s work. Just because a tutor feels that they could just fix the essay and make it better, they should resist that temptation. Writing sessions should be about the writer’s ideas and the tutor should just be there in order to help the writer question and expand their own ideas.

Tutoring is also ineffective after the fact, when the piece has been finished. Writers who bring in pieces that they are finished with (we saw that a lot here with the T2K students who brought their high school essays in last semester) are going to miss out on a lot of the helpful aspects of tutoring, having someone there to read a work in progress and act as a proxy audience to give the writer more awareness of what is confusing to others, or what might not be working. This is difficult with a piece that is already finished, because the writer doesn’t particularly need that awareness at that point.

What I got:

Tutors need to focus on the student, not get involved, and not introduce their own ideas into the writer’s work. Ideally, tutors should work as hands-off facilitators of the writer’s own ideas.

Questions:

How exactly does one help someone change the way that they look at writing and think about their own writing while being completely hands off?

I know the answer to the question up there is “talk,” but getting some writers to talk is like pulling teeth, and getting them to find their own mistakes, even with guiding questions, is even worse. How do I help writers like this while still staying hands off?

I occasionally get students that have a lot of the same problems I had at one point during my academic career (Test anxiety, time management problems, problems handling stress), can I address these and give the student tips/resources that I had to find on my own, or would that be too much like a therapist?

What a beginning coach would need:

This chapter gives a good understanding of things to avoid during a session, especially the concept of ownership and how to not usurp that ownership from the writer. The only problem is that this falls in the beginning of the book, before the new coach would even know what their job is.

Best For:

For once, I think that this chapter is fantastic for beginning tutors; my big issue is where it is in the book. I think a beginning coach should probably have an idea of what their job is before going in and telling them what their job isn’t.

Bedford Guide Chapter 2: "The Writing Process"

Main Points:

Writing is not linear; writers go through a process of writing that includes the steps listed in the Longman guide. The big difference between this text and Longman is the description of the revising process, which is split into two stages in the Bedford Guide, global revision and sentence-level revision. When a writer is doing global revisions, they are making major changes to the overall structure of the piece. This is where writers move paragraphs and cut out or expand parts of a draft in order to clarify points or alter the flow of the entire draft. Sentence level revision is when a writer makes changes in word choice and the structure of sentences in order to clarify that individual sentence or paragraph. Like Longman, the Bedford guide stresses that writing coaches must be able and prepared to assist writers no matter what stage of the writing process they are in at that moment. They must also be able to identify the stage that the writer is in so that they can be effective.

What I Got:

“Please edit my paper” may mean, “help me make global or sentence-level revisions” to a writer who does not have the vocabulary to talk about writing, which many writers coming into a center will not have.

Questions:

What are some ways of figuring out what stage the writer needs help in?

How do you direct a writer away from editing if they are trying to fix grammar and really need global revisions or more work drafting?

What a beginning coach needs:

The information in this is essentially the Cliffnotes version of the information in Chapter 2 of the Longman Guide. The exercises, however, seem to be useful for a beginning coach, especially the exercise that suggests that a beginning coach go to the writing center as a student writer and be on the other side of at least two sessions. This can give the new coach an idea of what it feels like and what may or may not work in certain situations.

Best For:

Like the last chapter of this guide, I don’t know if there’s a lot of information in this that a more experienced tutor would be interested in, because the subject is covered in a much more in-depth way in the Longman guide. The more practical approach of this book does, however, give a beginning tutor a better idea of the kinds of problems that occur with the different stages of the writing process.

Longman Guide Chapter 2: "The Writing Process"

Main Points:

Contrary to what was once believed, writing is not linear. Writing is made up of four stages, planning, drafting, revising and editing or proofreading. Planning is when the writer begins to gather information and generate ideas for their writing project. Drafting is when the writer begins to develop the intention behind their text and writes a draft. Revising is when the writer makes changes to the organization or structure of the text in order to clarify his/her points. Proofreading or editing is where the writer fixes the mechanics of the essay and focuses on grammar and spelling. These stages are recursive, meaning that writers do work in each phase multiple times while writing a piece and do not work in these stages all at once or in order.

Another point that is emphasized in the chapter is that writing tutors must develop an understanding of the writing process and what goes on in each stage. They must then be able to help writers in these different stages while not creating clones of themselves, as what has worked for them may not work for another student. The chapter also talks about the concept of ownership and states that students must develop a sense of their text belonging to them. This is hindered by the fact that they may not care about academic writing.

What I got:

The main thing that I pulled from this chapter is that writing is a way to learn. You don’t just learn to write when you’re writing, you learn to think about ideas and not simply memorize them to report back on a simple test. This makes writing part of the learning process rather than just an end. Another thing that I found interesting was the techniques listed to help people in the different stages of the writing process.

Questions:

How do I know when a technique will work for a specific student? What types of learners work with the different methods?

How do I recognize what stage of the writing process a student is in? Sometimes they come in with drafts but talk like they are still prewriting. Usually they want editing when it’s obvious they need some work revising or drafting, so how do I recognize these things and then bring them to the writer’s attention?

What a beginning tutor might need:

This chapter provides a beginning tutor with an understanding of the writing process and introduces the concept of ownership.

Good For:

This chapter provides a lot of information that is useful for a beginning tutor, but does not provide examples or ways to use different techniques. The history related to teaching composition may not interest those who are just starting to tutor, as we have mostly been taught using process-oriented methods, and probably won’t need to be convinced that it is the best way.

McAndrews & Reigstad “Tutoring Writing” Chapter 2: “Research Supporting Tutoring Writing”

Main Points:

This chapter emphasizes the empirical evidence that supports tutoring. This research comes from research done about Peer Response Groups, where groups of students or peers discuss writings done by others within the group, peer tutoring in general, one-on-one conferences with teachers, and writing tutoring itself. Most of the evidence comes from the other things rather than from writing tutoring, but it translates to tutoring writing.

What I Got:

From this chapter, I developed a basic understanding of the hard facts supporting writing tutors. The chapter also pointed me in the direction of studies in case I wanted too look more closely at the data gathered. I also got an understanding that there isn’t as much research out there that pertains specifically to writing coaching.

Questions:

Both peer response groups and conferences with teachers are very different from one-on-one peer tutoring in writing. How does the data supporting these methods support what we do as coaches?

What a Beginning Coach Would Need:

I’m not really sure if there is anything that a beginning coach would need in this section. Does a beginning coach really need to know about the research supporting tutoring in order to help a student writer learn good writing habits, practices, or methods?

Best For:

This chapter seems to be good for someone curious about what research is out there, perhaps someone taking a class or thinking about beginning research in the center. This is probably more experienced coaches and people enrolled in the Peer Tutoring course rather than someone getting trained in the center.

Bedford Guide, Chapter One: “The Writing Center as Workplace”

Main Points:

This chapter is all about ethical behavior in a professional setting, which a writing center is. This chapter discusses how a person should behave towards writers, other coaches and teachers. The most important thing they stress is that a coach should respect the others that they encounter while working at the center.

What I Got:

I understood that coaches should behave in a professional manner and never say or do anything that could be taken as disrespectful towards either writers or faculty.

What a Beginning Coach Needs:

This whole chapter is geared towards beginning coaches, as it deals with professionalism and how to act while at work.

Best for:

I doubt that an experienced tutor would get much out of this chapter, since it is basic information about professionalism. The exercises at the back of the chapter also work very well for beginners, although there is a lot that wouldn’t work for our writing center (such as learning the history of our particular center, since we are a new center and are making the history).

Longman Guide Chapter 1: “Why We Tutor”

Main Points:

This chapter serves as an introduction to tutoring and explains how writing coaches must balance between contrasts. For example, coaches must be flexible while still maintaining a handle on the session and knowledgeable without appearing to be a know-it-all.

The chapter also emphasizes how coaches have to trust that the writers that come into the center are able to write their own work and control their own work, with their support. Coaches must also foster a sense of trust in the writer in order for the session to be effective.

The chapter also emphasizes that coaches come from many different backgrounds and that their experiences shape their views of tutoring. It also profiles how different writers go about writing. This shows that there are a lot of differences in how people approach both writing and coaching.

What I got from the chapter:

What I took out of this chapter is that differences are important and necessary to tutor. I also got the idea that every coach brings their experiences into any session that they conduct. This is a good thing because, as illustrated in the chapter, every writer’s process is a little different.

Questions:

They outlined a best-case-scenario, where the writer comes in for multiple sessions at different points in a specific writing project, which as a coach I know doesn’t happen. Is that the only way to be effective as a coach?

What a beginning coach might need to know:

They would need to know the kinds of things that the coaches quoted in the text though that coaching was, because it gives an idea of what is not a great way to go about coaching from what they said they didn’t like about their tutoring experiences. They would also get an idea that it’s okay to put your own spin on things, which is important, because just like another writer’s process would not work for one writer, tutors need to be able to coach in a way that works for them and for the writers they’re working with.

Works best for:

This chapter would probably work very well for beginning tutors, as it gives a lot of encouragement while not glossing over how difficult coaching can be. It also encourages independence and creativity within sessions. It also includes a lot of quotes from coaches and writers, which puts the ideas being discussed into a more personable, accessible format.

McAndrews & Reigstad "Tutoring Writing": Chapter 1: “Theories Underpinning Tutoring Writing”

Main Points:

There are several theories that support how tutoring writing can be an effective way to learn. The first theory is Social Constructionism, which states that writing is a social act and that no writer writes in a vacuum, but is constantly informed by culture and using writing to assimilate or identify with different cultures. This means that tutoring, as a social act, can help someone learn how to write. The second theory is Reader Response, which argues that the meaning of texts are informed or shaped by the way that a reader interprets it. According to this theory, writer, tutor and draft are all active participants. The third theory is called Talk and Writing, which states that talking is an essential to the writing process, and that writers talk in order to write. This supports tutoring because the tutor then becomes a sounding board, and helps the writer generate ideas by asking guiding questions and allowing the writer to talk through their issues. After that, the chapter discusses Collaborative Learning Theory, which states that learning often occurs as a consequence of two people, one more experienced and one less experienced, collaborating on something. In this theory, the learning is an incidental consequence of the collaboration. According to this, tutor and writer both learn by working together. Feminist theory takes a more relationship-oriented view that incorporates collaborative learning theory. Tutoring is a form of Feminist teaching because it emphasizes the relationship between writer and tutor.

What I Got from this Chapter:

Tutoring is not like teaching, where an expert delivers information to a less knowledgeable party. The writing coach and writer must be able to work together in order for the session to be effective. Talk is an important part of the session, rather than a distraction, as talking is part of the writing process. Written language is social.

Questions I had about this Chapter:

How is feminist theory different from collaborative learning?

What does Reader Response theory have to do with coaching writers? It’s mostly a literary criticism theory, so I don’t see how this works into tutoring.

How do I put these theories into practice in my sessions? What theories work best in practice?

What a Beginning Coach Might Get Out of this Chapter:

This chapter provides a bit of background knowledge about the logic behind tutoring, and why and how it works. This chapter also explains why tutoring is not like traditional teaching, which may be important at a school like Kean, where there are a lot of education majors who might be looking to become writing coaches. They would need to understand why this is not like what they study in their education courses.

Best For:

While there are points in this chapter that are helpful for beginning tutors, this book doesn’t explain some of these theories in terms of how they differ from each other (Collaborative Learning and Feminist Theory) or how they fit into the subject at hand, tutoring (Reader Response Theory). This could be confusing for tutors just starting training. This chapter would probably be very helpful for slightly more experienced tutors who are looking into theory as a way to develop strategies for use in their own sessions, though this chapter gives no strategies itself and the tutor would have to find their own way to put these theories to practical use.

Prefaces and Introductions to the Guides

McAndrews & Reigstad (Pink Book)

It seems that one of the main points of this introduction is that writing tutoring doesn’t just occur in collegiate settings, and that it can be useful in other areas. The authors talk about how they have led workshops in business and worked with parents in secondary schools to help their students tutor at home as well as worked in a college setting. As a tutor, that is not the most interesting thing that I got out of this introduction.

The thing that fascinated me the most was that they referred to tutoring as a process. I’m familiar with writing being referred to as a process, but I had never thought of tutoring to be a process. I can only hope that this is expanded on further in the book, as it wasn’t explained in the introduction. They also briefly say the kinds of things that will be covered in the book, such as what tutors do, and what they don’t, which would be helpful for beginning tutors, but there also seems to be a lot of emphasis on theory rather than practice, which may not be helpful to a tutor just starting out.

From the introduction, I would think that this book might not be the best for beginning tutors, as it seems to have quite a bit of theory in it. Not all beginning tutors are going to need theory in order to help students, even if it is useful. Also, according to the introduction, there is a chapter on how to conduct a course on tutoring, which is obviously geared more towards instructors than student coaches.

After reading the introduction, if I was reading this book independently in order to improve my effectiveness as a tutor, I’d probably only read chapters 4 through 6. These chapters are listed as being the ones that have the most direct importance to actual tutoring sessions.


Longman

This introduction seems to want to bring the focus to the coaches more than the authors, and talks about the structure of the book mirroring the training process for a writing tutor. This focus on the tutor seems to be more in keeping with a guide or a handbook for tutors than the previous book, which read more like the introduction of a textbook, with an overview of theories used. The authors also stress that writing centers are a growing field and that means that needs more experienced, able tutors.

The most interesting thing that I got from this introduction was that there’s a chapter in this book on conducting writing center research. This makes me think that this book might be a good choice for experienced tutors looking to expand their involvement with their center, rather than a beginning tutor. This is supported in that the book seems to cover a lot more in-depth subjects, at least from glancing at the chapter overviews, than the other two guides.

Bedford

The introduction for tutors is simply two anecdotes told about tutors the authors have worked with. These anecdotes stress the kinds of issues that new tutors have, namely the desire to help writers write a “perfect” paper and the idea that they have to follow all the guidelines all the time. These anecdotes work well because they provide concrete examples of what a coach may face when they start working with writers, and right from the beginning too.

To me, this guide seems like the most simplistic, since they seem to take a more “how-to” approach rather than a theoretical one. This might be the most helpful for beginning tutors, but there drawbacks because as a tutor gains experience, they may want to explore the research and logic behind tutoring methods, and those might not be explored in this book.