- Do not hold the pencil
- Look for the most common grammatical error--focus on it instead of any or all errors you notice.
- Try to focus on the most important errors. The ones that happen the most. The ones that most interfere with meaning.
- Make sure you let the student know, "we don't do that here."
- Read aloud
- Ask the student about their paper before you read it.
- Ask the student to summarize the ideas of the paper for you.
- Find something good to say. Praise with Dweck in mind--focus on effort and time.
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
Avoiding the line-by-line tutoring trap...
Here are some of the ideas generated by tutors during our Wednesday meeting:
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Is the corollary to "Do not hold the pencil" "Do not make corrections on the computer"?
ReplyDeleteI rarely if ever read silently, I find that more often than not if I read aloud slowly to the student they hear their own mistakes. I read exactly as it's written/spelled/run-on so they have the chance to pick up on anything that may be off. I always ask them to identify their thesis so we can double check it for relevance throughout the body of the paper.
ReplyDeleteAsking questions such as "what are you trying to say here and how is that relevant to your thesis?" or "Does this make sense?" I'll ask them to explain the prompt/story in a summary and a brief summary of what they are trying to convey to their reader?
My ultimate goal is to make them think about the assignmment and what they want to say about it, with the end goal being something they can feel proud of as their own thoughts and ideas.
I think reading silently "sounds" so judgmental--one person doing something and the other person waiting for a verdict. I almost expect to see a thumbs-up or thumbs-down, like the crowd in the arena appealing to Cesaer for clemency, or maybe a quick death.
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ReplyDeleteI agree with Wedorecover -- reading aloud allows the student to hear his errors, and he will often self-correct. I do point out certain things: the use of "there" when he means "their" or "they're," or "site" when he means "cite." He won't hear those errors; they must be seen and understood.
ReplyDeleteI don't ask the student to show me her thesis. Rather, I comment when I believe I have located it (I begin the session by asking her to describe the assignment and her goals). That way we can both tell if the thesis is clearly stated and if the paper as a whole explains and supports it.
I sometimes believe I can identify a thesis. But I have also had the experience of guessing it was right here, obviously A, and then discovering many more minutes in that the student did not consider this her thesis at all, and what I saw as failing to support a claim was actually the student trying to support an entirely different claim. So now I make the guess inside my head, but I also ask. This also indicates how much the student understands of her own process in structuring her argument (and sometimes reveals that she is writing by instinct rather than design). And we work with that.
ReplyDeleteI think it’s important to resist the temptation to “dive” for the paper right away. Before I even look at the paper, I like to have the student talk me through her/his understanding of the assignment, and then we look at the assignment sheet together. This helps to make sure that the student understands (me too!) what the teacher is asking—often I find that the student needs some guidance understanding what is expected.
ReplyDeleteIf the student has a somewhat complete draft written, I ask the student to tell me about it by verbally recounting the “moves” that they make in their text. This helps me get a context before we look at the paper, and it also helps the student to think about what he/she is trying to communicate and how. I do this by asking questions while I “map” their paper by writing down their main moves. I’ll ask “What do you do in your first paragraph?” “What is your thesis?” & “how do you go about supporting your thesis?” “What do you do in the third paragraph?” and so on, all the way through the paper. In this way, I have a good context for the paper before we begin reading aloud.
I like your idea of "mapping" the paper, Shawn. I always begin sessions by talking with the student about the assignment, trying to make sure we both understand the teacher's requirements. "Mapping" sounds like a good step to add before I actually begin looking at the paper with the student. I'll try it!
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