Introduction
Hello! My name is Ayame Palmer. I'm an incoming LMC Master's student at Florida State. This portfolio is a culmination of my work in LAE 5946: Teaching English as a Guided Study, containing a literacy narrative, observation reports from my visits to the Reading-Writing Center, and a meditation on what I learned this semester and my approach to peer consulting. I hope that this portfolio will reflect the journey I went on over the course of this semester, and point to how my pedagogical philosophies have developed.
Literacy Narrative
One of the worst writing experiences I’ve ever had was during a business writing course I had to take as part of my minor in professional and technical writing. The second major project was a “genre replication” assignment, where we were tasked with producing a STEM report using a genre example from our field. This class was almost entirely STEM majors, leaving me and a linguistics major the odd ones out— naturally, we teamed up. When we approached the professor about the project, and how we might go about completing an assignment clearly designed without non-STEM majors in mind, she was dismissive. We expected as much, considering that her opening lecture at the beginning of the semester devalued any kind of writing that wasn’t scientific or technical. Since she considered linguistics the more “scientific” field between the two of us, we chose to focus on recreating a linguistics study report. Even though I wasn’t thrilled, I was hoping to at least learn some new writing skills I could apply elsewhere.
The project was grueling and deeply frustrating. My partner was a sophomore, so she didn’t have much formal experience in her field yet, and didn’t exactly know what to look for as our genre example. I was of little help as an English major, and for one of the first times in my life, writing did not come easily to me. We spent several nights in the library trying to scrounge up sources for our own slapped together report on sociolinguistics that at least half-resembled something legitimate. The main concept we were supposed to take away from the assignment— recognizing the genre conventions within our field— didn’t mean much to me, as I wasn’t a linguist. After the project was over, I felt like I hadn't actually learned anything new.
Reflecting on this experience, I started thinking about the concept of transfer theory and the goal of a writing center discussed in the Hill reading:
“to facilitate the acquisition of knowledge and skills that go beyond the present moment, the present course, or the present writing assignment, and help students become better writers in a wider context” (78).
I think the main reason I was so frustrated with this assignment wasn’t because it was outside of my discipline, but because I felt that I hadn’t gained anything that would help me as a writer once the project was complete. With this in mind, I believe that part of my work at the RWC will be to emphasize what students can take away from an assignment, even if they aren’t personally passionate about it. Additionally, being understanding when a student is frustrated with an assignment can go a long way in developing rapport and helping them succeed.
In contrast, one of my favorite writing projects I’ve done was a film analysis paper for a literature class on gothic horror. For context, this was the semester where I was going to be applying for graduate school, so I knew that whatever final paper I wrote for this class had to be great, because it would also be my writing sample for applications in December. As we were discussing Get Out (2017), I was reminded of something I’d read about in a previous class on African literature: the Haitian zonbi. I thought the film was doing something exceptionally interesting with the concept of a zombie, and I wanted to know more. I went up to the professor after class to talk about my idea and get some feedback. I’d taken several classes with him at this point, and we’d developed a strong professional relationship— I was unsure if the idea would work, so getting a second opinion from someone I trusted was important to me. As we talked, I felt empowered to share my ideas, as he never talked down to me or shut down my creative thinking, in this class or otherwise.
Researching and drafting the paper was an incredibly rewarding experience, academically and personally. For the rest of the semester, I would check in with my professor as I made developments with the paper or considered new ideas, and get feedback at different stages in the writing process. In the end, it was a successful paper that got me an ‘A’ and into graduate school.
Thinking back on this experience, I was reminded of the shorter section from the Fitzgerald and Ianetta reading, “A Commitment to Friendly Talk.” Specifically, this quote stood out to me as I thought back on this professor:
“important learning happens when people are comfortable with one another, when there's an environment of trust established [...] high-impact learning involves a back-and-forth among the parties involved” (17).
The established rapport I had with this professor created a foundational “environment of trust” that made me comfortable sharing ideas with him, and our “back-and-forth” conversations helped articulate and develop my thoughts for the paper. In turn, this led to a writing process that I thoroughly enjoyed and benefited from as a scholar. I hope to capture some of this energy with the students I meet in the writing center— creating an environment where they can share ideas, develop their critical thinking skills, and offer guidance that will help them become the writer they want to be.
Works Cited
Fitzgerald, Lauren and Melissa Ianetta. The Oxford Guide for Writing Tutors. Oxford UP, 2016.
Hill, Heather N. “Tutoring for Transfer: The Benefits of Teaching Writing Center Tutors Transfer Theory.” The Writing Center Journal, vol. 35, no. 3, 2016, pp. 77-101.
RWC Observation Reports
Week 1
The main valued practice I saw in my first RWC shadowing shift with Emilio was learning the rhetorical situation of an assignment, creating opportunities for learning through asking good questions, and demonstrating the writing process’s recursive nature.
The student we worked with had a completed draft of a paper on Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe for a communications class. The student stated that his main priority was to have someone look over his paper and make sure his writing was clear overall, with some focus on specific sections that he felt weren’t coming across well.
Emilio proceeded by asking what kind of project the student was working on. Then, they had the student pull up the assignment rubric on Canvas and repeated the requirements back to the student, making sure they were both on the same page. Through this, Emilio familiarized themselves with the assignment and made sure the student knew what was being asked of him. Once the rubric was covered, Emilio did a brief read-through of the student paper and focused on the student’s global (argumentative clarity) and local concerns (sentence-level clarity).
The main thing that they ended up discussing was the fact that there was a crucial piece of analysis missing in the student’s paper. Emilio took a lot of time explaining to the student how his current analysis would fall short of what the professor was expecting, then led into asking several questions about how the student might fill that gap. This placed the onus of critical thinking back onto the student, which helped him develop his analysis more explicitly. Emilio helped him think of scenes in the novel that he might analyze further, as well as how to incorporate that with what he had already written.
Emilio then spent some time working with the student on how specific points in his argument could be better articulated. Emilio phrased the student’s point in their own words, then had the student evaluate if that was what they were actually trying to say (“So, it seems to me like the argument you’re making here is [X], is that correct?” and so on). This culminated in the student actively drafting during the session, making revisions to parts of his paper in real time as Emilio was offering feedback and suggestions. For me, this exemplified the idea of “writing as a process” and not a product (Fitzgerald and Ianetta, 30). By getting the student back into the writing process, Emilio helped him reconsider the state of his paper— it wasn’t in the “final product” stage like he initially thought, but instead still in the drafting stage.
In the session, I was reminded of the in-class consulting demonstration we did in class where Sophia acted as our student writer. I felt that we got the best results when we asked questions, rather than giving prescriptive feedback. The session was more student-guided, which I felt was beneficial for this student in particular. He came in wanting what was essentially a final read-through, but left the session redrafting and adding to his paper. By asking good questions, Emilio was able to help guide the student towards a more in-depth analysis, closer to what the professor was expecting. This process helped promote deeper thinking within the student, opening up opportunities for thinking about the text in more nuanced ways, as well as helping the student develop stronger arguments with the use of evidence and explanation, rather than summary.
Week 2
The main valued practice I saw when co-consulting with Emilio was helping a student feel confident drafting and revising their writing, and encouraging their thought process through asking open-ended questions.
The student Emilio and I met this week brought in a literary analysis essay on “The Man Who Was Almost a Man” by Richard Wright. She wanted help with making sure her argument was clear and that her citations were correct. We had her explain the assignment requirements to us, in her own words, and then what her central argument was.
She started by asking about APA citation style, so we spent about ten minutes going through her paper and checking her in-text citations and formatting. I noticed a few errors during my first read through, namely improperly quoted dialogue and the wrong author name in an in-text citation. I was hesitant to say anything, but Emilio opened the conversation between me and the student by asking if I had noticed anything. I used some linguistic hedging to make sure I didn’t sound too critical or harsh, and generally kept my tone light and conversational. She responded well to my feedback, and I recommended she consult OWL Purdue when doing her final read-through, in case we missed anything in the session.
Next, she wanted to spend time looking over her body paragraphs, since she was worried she might be repeating herself. I asked her to point to which places she felt this was happening, and we read through them together. I concluded that the two paragraphs in question were quite distinct in the evidence they were analyzing. However, the second paragraph had a closing sentence that mentioned something she’d already discussed in the first, distracting from the argument in the second. I asked her to consider what might change if she took out that specific phrase. Watching her edit in real time, she came to the same conclusion I did and thought that her paper felt much stronger.
This student was an extremely capable writer with a nuanced understanding of the text she was analyzing, and I think she benefitted from having a conversation about her paper more than anything. Fitzgerald and Ianetta highlighted the importance of tutoring as a “friendly conversation” and I kept that in mind during our session (17). I was nervous to jump in with feedback or recommendations, since I didn’t want to come off as rude or overly critical. But, framing my feedback as more conversational, rather than stated with conviction, helped with that. This helped me understand what makes the RWC different as well: “it is the opportunity to work together to understand ideas and try out options that separates much individualized tutoring in writing from the mass-format instruction” (Fitzgerald and Ianetta, 17). By working together to improve her paper and experimenting with her writing, she got more from the session than she would have in a more prescriptive environment.
One of the things that surprised me was when the student would ask me what I thought about a specific paragraph, then quickly write down whatever I said in response. I suppose I shouldn’t have been surprised, considering that I was there to give her feedback. But, I think this was the moment when I finally felt the “role” I would be playing in the RWC. Students will look to me for advice, and take my opinions on their work seriously— that’s a lot of pressure. But, I was able to alleviate some of that pressure by having friendly conversation, and treating the session like a moment between peers, rather than hammering down on someone’s paper.
Works Cited
Fitzgerald, Lauren and Melissa Ianetta. “Tutoring Writing.” The Oxford Guide for Writing Tutors. Oxford UP, 2016.
My Approach to Peer Consulting: The Temple of Praxis
I imagine the work I’ve done this semester as an ancient temple. Learning the history of writing centers, as well as the theories and practices that shaped them, created a strong foundation of knowledge for my temple of praxis. Through the readings and in-class discussions, I learned about various pedagogical approaches and valued practices used in the Reading-Writing Center, building up the pillars. I saw this theoretical knowledge reflected in my observations of Emilio’s consulting sessions, carving into the marble of those pillars. I hope this reflection will act as the pediment atop my temple.
The three central pillars in my temple of praxis are transfer theory, the collaborative nature of knowledge creation, and a balance between directive and nondirective approaches. These pillars were constructed through a combination of reading theory and observing them in practice— they have helped me develop a formidable temple of knowledge that will prepare me to enter the RWC in the fall.
Transfer Theory
My first formal introduction to transfer theory came in the Hill reading, but I was familiar with the concept. As an English major with a minor in Professional and Technical Writing, I developed a suite of writing skills that could serve me across multiple contexts— something I learned while writing a literary analysis paper could help me with writing a proposal in a business writing class, and vice versa. With this in mind, Hill’s article on transfer theory and a conversation with Emilio helped shape how I might implement transfer theory in my own practice.
Initially, I thought that the objective of an RWC consulting session was to help a student writer with the one assignment they brought to the session. They’re only there for forty-five minutes after all— there couldn’t possibly be time to expand beyond the writing task in front of us. However, as Hill states, “[i]f tutors can help students understand some of these broader concepts about writing, students might be able to take that abstract knowledge with them into other writing situations” (81). I think this is especially true when a student is dispassionate about a particular assignment. A tutor can play a vital role in getting the student to take something meaningful away from the assignment through transfer— even if they don’t particularly care about writing this literary analysis paper, they can still use the skill of building an argument with evidence to help them draft a grant proposal months from now.
During a break between sessions, I asked Emilio about how they get through to students who are frustrated with the assignment they’ve brought in. Emilio talked about the importance of rapport, but also mentioned that you can help them work through that frustration if they feel like they’ve gotten something out of the session. If they leave feeling like they’ve accomplished something, or developed a new skill, they’re more likely to have a positive impression of not only the RWC, but writing more generally.
The Collaborative Nature of Knowledge Creation
One of the more revolutionary concepts introduced to me in this course was the idea that knowledge could be (and often is) created between people, instead of being held by one person and then passed down to someone else. The Lunsford reading opened my eyes to this, but this quote in particular stuck with me:
“What’s important is knowing that knowing doesn’t just happen all by itself, like the cartoons show with a little light bulb going off in a bubble over a character’s head. Knowing happens with other people, figuring things out, trying to explain, talking through things. What I know is that we are all making and remaking our knowing and ourselves with each other every day” (9-10).
After my second RWC observation, I was struck by how the student and I were able to create knowledge between us. I think subconsciously, I was still waiting for that lightbulb moment to occur, for her to stand up and say, “I’ve learned all I can from you, goodbye.” But, of course, that’s not what happened. We built knowledge up together over the course of the session, compounding on her ideas and introducing new ones from me. I didn’t feel like I was prescribing knowledge to her, and I didn’t feel like she wanted that from me, either. Our most meaningful discussion happened when we were having a back and forth conversation about her ideas. I felt as if that line of communication, that space of knowledge creation, was still open to her, even after she left to finish her paper before the deadline that night.
The Balance of Directive and Nondirective Approaches
When we started learning more about how writing center theory was put into practice, I was interested to learn about the difference between directive and nondirective approaches. I was expecting our discussion of Corbett’s article to lead to a definitive answer as to which approach was better. My guess was that directive approaches were for the classroom, where the teacher divulges knowledge and provides direct instruction; writing centers, in my initial conception, were meant to operate in contrast to this dynamic, taking a more nondirective approach. However, I was surprised to learn that there was a balance to be struck between the two that was not only possible, but encouraged. Corbett concludes that “sometimes it’s all right to give a pointed suggestion” and that it is possible to “practice along a continuum of instructional choices both socially collaborative and individually empowering” (154).
I had this “continuum of instructional choices” in mind when I was giving feedback to the student from my second visit to the RWC. I was able to give more direct feedback when we were talking about citations, since there were concrete rules in place that I could use as the hard scaffolding behind my corrections. I could tell she appreciated having someone tell her explicitly that she’d made a minor proofreading mistake that might’ve lost her points.
As we transitioned into talking about her argument, I practiced “authentic listening” and was able to experiment with more nondirective feedback, asking open ended questions that prompted deeper thinking (152). This was where I saw the most development in her ideas, as she was allowed to take the lead in the session.
Conclusion
When students visit me in the RWC, I hope to not only broaden their writing skills, but to show them how they can use what they’ve learned in their future as writers. I want to create an environment where students feel comfortable sharing their work and their knowledge with me, so that we can work together to help them build their writing skills. I realize the value in the balance between directive and nondirective approaches— students can benefit from both, even in the same session.
I have a strong start for my temple of praxis, but it is still under construction. I hope to learn more, adding more pillars over the course of my time at the RWC.
Works Cited
Corbett, Stephen. “Tutoring Style, Tutoring Ethics: The Continuing Relevance of the Directive/Nondirective Instructional Debate.” St. Martin's Sourcebook for Writing Tutors, edited by Christina Murphy and Steve Sherwood, Bedford/St Martin's, 2011, pp. 148-55.
Hill, Heather N. “Tutoring for Transfer: The Benefits of Teaching Writing Center Tutors Transfer Theory.” The Writing Center Journal, vol. 35, no. 3, 2016, pp. 77-101.
Lunsford, Andrea. “Collaboration, Control, and the Idea of a Writing Center.” The Writing Center Journal, vol.12, no. 1, 1991, pp. 3-10.
Credits:
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