happy medium?

I kept on thinking of how we could actually find that dynamic “happy medium” moving around between minimalist and authoritative approach. It seems many factors need to be considered when we are making the judgment. Clients’ professional background, stages in their writing assignment, specific needs or concerns etc. Some are easy to identify, while some are not as obvious. It’s always tricky to ask someone what he or she needs. A difficulty in deciding on what the clients need comes from the false or partial understanding of their own specific needs. As mentioned in David Sheridan’s article on multiliteracy, students might separate technical and rhetorical help and think they know exactly what they want say, and just need to make the tool (computer) work. Before finding clients’ real needs, consultants have to help the clients come to a more sophisticated understanding of the inter-relationship of technical and rhetorical concerns. Is that something really doable? or maybe the right question is how we can actually achieve that, because this sounds so similar to the case with ESL writers. “Don’t worry about the content. I know what I want to say. I just want to make sure the language expresses my real intelligence. Does it make sense to you?” …@#% ... How do we respond to the clients’ specific yet partial or even false needs, and how we actually can help them come to a more sophisticated understanding of what they think they already know…very well? If a first-time ESL client comes to WC with a wrong expectation of writing consultation, how do we make sure he/she finds this consulting session helpful, and comes back again with a right expectation?

I hope I am going to find some answers (probably more questions) in the book, ESL Writers.

Attending the Writing Center as a Client

I've never formally gone to anyone to seek help with my writing before, so this was a very new experience for me. I think I'm one of the people who thinks to themselves, "I don't NEED a writing center, those are for people who can't write theses." However, I think what the consultant I met with today helped me with are things I would normally spend an hour staring at, knowing it didn't sound right, but not quite sure how to fix it.

The first thing my consultant did was have me read my paper (a 2.5-page English paper) aloud, which I was expecting. I noticed one or two missing words, and another area where I made a reference to an event I hadn't yet explained. Otherwise my essay read well, and then the consultant asked where I thought I needed help or improvement. I pointed out a certain paragraph, and my consultant said she wasn't sure of the significance of an event I'd mentioned. This event was actually the climax of the book, but I hadn't mentioned that in my paper. I'm sure that was what that paragraph was missing--some hint of the relevance of the evidence I was trying to use.

My consultant then did something I hadn't expected after all our minimalist approach readings, and drew my attention to my introduction and a quote I had tacked on to my thesis statement. She asked me what the purpose was, and really it had no relevance to the thesis, and it wasn't really referenced in any of my explanatory paragraphs, so I cut it. I then asked about another paragraph that I felt wasn't "flowing" well, and my consultant suggested a "map," or a sentence that gives an overview of the paragraph, and I'm very confident that that will be a good solution.

I'd like to make one final point--that writing these notes down in the first place (first in my notebook and now online) has really solidified the whole experience more. I think that writing about the improvement process will make the suggestions and advice my consultant gave stick in my head more, and I think I will be more conscious of them in my future assignments.

My Experience At the Writing Center

Like some of the other posts that I read, I had no idea what to expect on my first shadowing session. And I will admit that I was nervous. I was nervous that I wouldn't know how to answer a question, that I wouldn't be able spot a problem area in paper, or that I just wouldn't be cut out for consulting. 

I now have shadowed two sessions and the truth is I still have some of those nerves in me, but I have a much better idea of how to tackle questions that a client might have,  how to give advice about a paper, or just how to talk to a client. I think getting a grip in the Writing Center will be a two pronged approach. One is getting a basis on the core ideas of a writing center by completing the reading and talking in class. The second, and what I think the more important of the two, taking those ideas and putting them into practice by shadowing and later conducting our own sessions.

My advice, ( after two whole sessions) would be to get the first session out of the way as quickly as possible. Once the jitters are gone it is a lot easier to focus at the task at hand and learn what it is to work at a writing center. The people that I worked with were super helpful and made the experience both a valuable one and a lot of fun.

I am curious to hear everyone else's first experiences at the Writing Center.

All the Best,

John Lauckner

Intellectual pursuits and practicality

Stock's article addressed a particular grievance in higher education that few link to benefiting society. She mentions the fusion of intellectual pursuit -- studying something for the sake of learning it -- and applying the knowledge practically in society for the greater good. Land grant colleges, particularly MSU, seek to strike a balance between the two to nurture curiosity and obtain fulfillment while benefiting society with an acquired skill set.

I have no true, concrete point on this subject, only that I find it impossible to ever execute this balance to any precise degree. At any college, you have the more "abstract" majors, such as philosophy and history, in which you won't have exact skills, per se, to exercise, but rather theories and concepts to, uh, ponder over. And it's impossible to define practicality in any social sense because people see what's useful and what's not entirely differently, particularly government officials, educators, and scientists. The professional writing program has allowed me to develop a greater number of tangible skills than anything, save for maybe The State News, but both have benefited the other. Operating under the assumption that one may suitably define intellectual pursuit and practical skill, I believe college should be for developing skills -- whether that's critical thinking, problem solving, Photoshopping, molecular splitting, etc. -- and intellectual pursuits should be limited to one's own time. But, like I said, who makes those definitions and, is this person(s) qualified to make them?

Kto znaet.

Rewriting and Models

I want to focus on the Shamoon and Burns article that explores more hands-on tutoring methods. They cite a variety of examples where a student felt their writing was drastically improved after they submitted it to a professor, who then tore it apart and essentially rewrote it. I believe a professor's "rewriting" a paper is effective because the professor is considered an authority on the subject, so the student assumes they know what they're doing & what they're talking about. But, in a way, students often view their instructors as unapproachable. To tie into our collaborative learning readings, they are not really engaged in a "conversation" with the professor since many times the student wouldn't be contributing anything after initially submitting the paper, they will just go and make the changes. I think this "unapproachability" causes a fear of showing dependence or inability, which is why students feel that they can't run to their instructors to have their papers rewritten every time.

So while this process may be a way for students to receive (possibly) constructive feedback on their writing once or twice, it doesn't really help in a writing center setting. If a student were given this kind of "help" at a writing center, they may think that a tutor can rewrite their paper every time, no matter what class, so they won't learn as much from feedback when they assume they can just keep coming back for the same experience. A writing center is where you're "supposed" to go for help with your writing, so the fears of dependence or inability are no longer relevant. This enables the writing center to become a tool or crutch that allows students to get comfortable and used to using such a radical hands-on approach.

I think an alternative strategy for a writing center is to have a student write a general model of one of their problem areas, (a thesis, a well-referenced quote, etc.) and then receive direct intervention and feedback from a tutor. When this practice is applied to the specific assignment that the student has brought, it simply becomes a quick solution to the student's problem, and I think it will be difficult for the student to see any benefit to using the methods involved on their own. But making the student think about their problems in a different context helps them to learn more broad strategies that they can see applied to two pieces at once--the model, and their assignment.

First Hand

I have a difficult schedule this semester. I did not think that being required to observe consulting sessions in the Writing Center would offer me much besides inconvenience. I was surprised, though, to find that it was actually quite an interesting experience.

I do not deny that reading the articles is important. After all, this course is called "Writing Center Theory." Still, I think, there is no substitute for first hand experience. The articles force the reader to consider the nature of writing centers. Having a conceptual understanding of what a Writing Center is and does is important. It seems to me, though, that the only way to be a good consultant is first to observe how it is done and then do it yourself. I thumbed through the required text recently, the one devoted to writing tutors. This book offers a great deal of information that will be useful. It presents profiles of different types of tutors and different types of writers. Again, all of this is important and worth reading. I do not think, though, that it will provide much else but a foundation. The book cannot teach you how to deal with other writers in the same way that physically doing it can.

I felt slightly nervous just shadowing a session. If I felt that way simply observing I can only guess that it will be much worse the first time I help someone myself.

Multiliteracies and related thoughts

It seems to me that I am constantly being surprised and informed every time this class talks about something. I had never thought much about the WC here (though I'm sure I heard about it at one time or another), but my vague impression was that it was a place for people whose writing needed improvement, as in it was not up to college-level standards. I have been discovering that this is not the case. Secondly, the notion of multiliteracies in a writing center is a completely new idea to me, but one that I will admit I find not only exciting but plausible.

Sheridan's article discussed MSU's DWC's and their work. Obviously, to an extent, the MSU WC is already a multiliteracy center. Perhaps to be more effective, more DWC's and advertisement of their services would be needed. In my mind, the WC can carry out the work of being a multiliteracy center as it is. Should there be more space? Maybe. But things seem to be working ok as they are now (though I admit that I am hardly familiar with the Center and therefore am not a great judge of this). I imagine that even if more people realized that DWC service was available here, the large majority of clients would still come for more traditional writing-related help. However, I would certainly have come to a DWC for help last year when I was taking 210. There were many times when I was working on a project and knew what I wanted, but I didn't really know how to get it there. Sometimes I almost had what I wanted but wanted to tweak something to make it a little better and in the end couldn't do it because I wasn't in class and couldn't ask for help. And even if I emailed my professor, he couldn't see my screen and could therefore only offer tentative suggestions as to what might need to be done. I also would have been and would be delighted if the section of foreign language tutors were expanded. I have always had a very hard time writing well in French and would have spent much time with a consultant already had I had that option. I could spend quite a while arguing for the usefulness and relevance of DWC's and other multiliteracy consultants, but I had intended to talk about other things.

I spent two hours shadowing consultants on Wednesday, which I found interesting and informative. I am not nervous about helping people with their work, though I understand why some people would be. I am comfortable with writing in in almost every aspect: creative, grammatical, structural, flow, inspiration, and so on. The only things I don't particularly like are creating titles and poetry. However, I look forward to the time when I can (hopefully) help other students with understanding and appreciation for their own work. The first consultant I shadowed was working with an international grad student who had been told by her professors to come to the writing center. She brought one the papers she had written last year (I didn't see how long it was exactly, but it was long) and wanted help mostly with her transitions, which she had been told were often choppy. She read three or so pages aloud at a time, and the consultant made notes in the margin or interspersed with the sentences as she read. When she finished, the consultant went through his notes and made suggestions, which mostly concerned sentence order in order to improve the flow and ease the transitions. I found it difficult to judge whether or not she was learning anything or simply seeing how her paper would have looked with a few more revisions. However, the consultant did explain his ideas and he thought they might help, so as long as she was taking his advice to heart, then I do believe that she left with the seeds of improvement her writing. The second consultant was also helping an international student, this one an undergraduate who wanted help mostly to fix mechanical errors since English is her second language. This consultant underlined words or phrases as the session progressed. I also believe that this student left with improved writing abilities. While the help being given may have appeared to be merely mechanical, I can say as a student who has studied a foreign language that purely grammatical learning often becomes stlylistic learning as you discover new and innovative ways to express the same ideas.