In the past few days I have had a couple of history students. So far, I think I've only had 3, including my most recent. I really felt at home working w/ them and I really feel I was able to help at least one of my two recent students while I hope I gave the other some ideas on how to expand and strengthen her work. I really liked being able to use what I've learned and apply it to my sessions. I had to rein myself in a few times to make sure I didn't overwhelm or direct the student too much, but it felt pretty good overall. I felt especially familiar w/ the first history student's work because I had taken a course w/ that professor and I could apply the strategies that I used in that class to help him. The second one's coursework less so, but I was still familiar w/ the type of assignment and helped her look at it a bit differently that seemed to help.
This all goes to my topic of tutoring in disciplines. I definitely felt more comfortable working w/ students studying history, but at the same time, I couldn't imagine only seeing history students. The fact is, I know I've benefited at least a few students who informed me of the good grades they received. So, I guess what I'm saying is that fell like I'm working harder outside of history and the few other subjects I've taken an avid interest in. Well, I've talked enough here...later
Hokay, so I've been wondering about the necessity of having such a detailed language selection at attending for a while now, but an incident last week reminded me of it. A student came in to make an appointment and the attendant, not me but I did witness it, asked for the student's native language and because it wasn't on the list, it became a bit awkward w/ the student asking why it was necessary and so on. The attendant did a good job of explaining the reasons as best he knew them, but the student wound up saying he didn't want to make an appointment because of the language issue. Well, luckily, the attendant was able to persuade the student to make an appointment and everything was hunky-dory. My point is, why should it be so difficult and how can we fix that. While the majority of students have little or no problem w/ this, and a few will eventually have issues w/ it.
What we need is a clear explanation that defines why we need this information that the student’s will accept and not take it as some kind of judgment or different treatment because of their language status. I think this should be consistent and clear to all attendants so that we can avoid these problems. Granted, while we can’t please everyone, we can at least show a bit more consistency and have a clear-cut policy to present to the students.
The other part of this issue that I keep trying to get my head around is the need to be some damn specific in the first place. Can’t we just list students as NNS students so that our consultants can be aware of each student’s possible needs? This would immediately eliminate the before mentioned episode because all the attendant would have needed to do was to list him as a NNS student and finish the appointment.
I just thought that this could be improved in some way, but I know my suggestions might be impractical or untenable because of certain factors that I am not aware of. End of rant…Later