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.

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.

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.