Tutoring Prof. Alexander's students was very different than my previous tutoring for the ENG 101 students. To start, this time all the students had their papers with them, mostly because the professor handed them out to them but still, it was helpful having students who came equipped with their assignments and feedback ready. I began with just one student, a young lady who's main issues with her assignment was the repetitiveness of her ideas, and the placement. After reading through her professor's comments, and then reading her assignment myself, I realized that she had not come up with three separate ideas like her assignment asked of her. I began to ask her questions regarding the article she was discussing, and saw that she was having trouble still coming up with ideas. So I asked her to look over her article and look over her paper briefly, and see what sounded similar and what sounded different, and see where she could maybe separate or come up with new ideas. The majority of my session with her was a little difficult, I don't think she was quite as receptive as I needed her to be so her ideas could flow. Around the time I got her to jot down 5-6 ideas like her assignment suggested, I got a second student, so I left her to think about these ideas, which she would like to expand on, how she would like to place them, and maybe up with a few "main idea" sentences to help her focus.
My second student's energy was much better than the first. He was much more receptive and had already come up with some ideas, his issue just seemed to be expanding on them and expressing them because English was not his first language. He actually didn't have much on his original assignment, however he had already jotted down a few ideas, so what I did was ask him questions to try to expand what he was trying to express. He had some really great ideas, and I kept reassuring him that he was on a great start by coming up with these, and I got him to jot down a few sentences for each of his ideas, and because we were short on time because he had come in late, I had him write down some keywords and key ideas so he wouldn't forget what he was trying to say.
By the time I had gotten both my students to finish up these tasks and answer their questions, time was up. I left each with a plan. My female student was to further expand and find the proper placing on her three ideas and make sure it didn't sound repetitive, and my second was to use his keywords and key ideas to turn his few sentences into a full paragraph of about 3-4 sentences. I thanked both of them, and they thanked me, which made me feel good and like I helped. I came out of there feeling good about my session, like I did somehow help and they would be able to use the concepts I suggested to pass their CATW. I hoped that my probing and open ended questions would be something they would think about when it came time for them to take their tests. I didn't name any strategies to them, but I hoped they would remember the ones I used and put them to good use when it came time for them to take the test.
