Culture and Writing

Last week, we got to view a very short and brief documentary about ESl students in America. It was fascinating to hear these individuals talk about the shock of being in a different culture, that was different than their own. This week in our blog, we had to answer two different questions dealing with culture and writing.

I think the environment that surrounds a person does indeed affect the way they write and their viewpoint that is represented in their writing. Their knowledge is obtained through what they have learned in the coutnry they live in. I can write creatively, about a number of topics that deal with anything that I am familiar with. Unfortunatly, during this semester, whenever I have read an ESL student's paper on certain topics, I often struggle to understand the point of their paper.

For example, a student from Kuwait, came in and presented to me a paper that dealt with his experience's with concerts in Kuwait. Before I go any further, I would like to make it very clear, than I have attended many concerts in America, and only in America. So when this student told me the paper was going to be about concerts, I was immediatly excited. Who in their entire life has never been to a concert?

I love going to concerts, and writing about a concert is usually pretty easy to understand, but his paper wasn't. I know nothing of how concerts are conducted over in Kuwait. Normally, to consider the type of audience that is going to be at a concert in America, you look at the music that is going to be played at the concert. For example: A rock concert is probablly going to draw mainly teenagers and younger adults, but I can't imagine many seniors being there. The type of concerts that he was writing about, didn't really make any sense to me at all. It seems that there were different crowds for the different bands that played, which was odd to me. There were also two different stages with bands playing on them at the same time. This was very easy for him to write about, because this was all that he knew. Helping him with his punctuation and grammar was easy, but understanding the topic of his paper and what point he was trying to make was really hard for me to understand. I wish I had asked him questions about what he knew and what was familiar with him from his other country, before we began our session.

I write what I know, and only know. I don't speak a second language, but I wish that I did, so that way I could be more useful with the ESL students. I hope that the next time that I meet with an ESL student, I can hopefully develop a conversation with them that deals with what they have learned about the differences between America and the other country they used to inhabit, and how I can learn from them also.

Make a Plan

I have been working in the writing center, for about three weeks, and I have had alot of interesting encounters with students. Although it has been fun and eye-opening for me, any time that I get an ESL student in the writing center, it is always a struggle for me to help. In Breaking Ice and Setting Goals, Shanti Bruce takes you through the way an ESL student approaches tutoring in the writing center, and what plan you can make yourself as a tutor to help the student effectively.

On my first day of tutoring, I had an ESL student. She was from Japan, who moved to America a few years ago. I started the session off very slowly and asked her what she thought about America. She responded in a very angry tone, "I don't like America"! I thought to myself, Wow, this is a terrible way to start off a tutoring session". After that, whenever she spoke, I couldn't understand a word that she said. I tried asking her questions about her paper, but she just wouldn't talk. I read the paper at least three times, to get a grasp of what it was about. Every sentence had like a million problems with it. Because I am in the writing lab only one hour a day, I barely got through the three pages of her assignment. I felt really bad about that day, but I did the best I could. What I needed that day, was a simple plan.

What I truly love about this chapter, is that the author lays out for us a simple plan to follow and practice, whenever we tutor ESL students. His plan consists of five main points: Find out what the student knows about the writing center, Ask about the student's piece of writing, if necessary ask more direct questions, set goals together, and make the plan visible. Out of all of theses steps, I would say the most important step is to always ask more direct questions, because you can never ask a student too many questions when they are writing a paper.

I hope that the next time that I encounter an ESL student, I can be more direct and hopefully follow a plan similar to the one found in this chapter, that will help me to assist the students needs in writing. I hope that also, at the same time, the more ESL students that I encounter, I can help them to feel more comfortable with their issues in whatever is it that they are writing.

The Observation Analysis

I have to say, that observing the writing center has been alot of fun, but really weird at the same time. Some of what I have discovered in the writing center has been good, but alot of it has been really bad. I am curious to know how exactly the tutors will feel about the way I help students. More importantly, at the end of this semester, will I be the same or be a different person?

When I work with somebody, I want to come off as very warm and laid back. I want my clients to feel comfortable and open when we go over their papers. I can't say that I see any of this at all in the writing lab. The tutors there, are very loud and act as if they are in a rush. Whenever I walk in, the first thing that I usually see, is two or three of the tutors eating and drinking or reading their facebook on the computer. As soon as a student walks in, they walk over and ask them if they need help. They grab the students paper and began to make corrections on it.

Whenever the tutors in there have a conversation with the students, they talk really, really loud. Loud in a way that I do not understand or could ever comprehend. I could walk outside the classroom and into the hall and still be able to hear them. I think it's annoying to talk that loud, but this is just my opinion. I try to be very soft and quiet. When somebody meets with me and I talk to them, it is just between me and them, not the entire class! I understand that it is a very small class, and it's not as if the two of us are supposed to be meeting in private(we're not), but I just don't see a need to speak that loud. I would feel embarrased if the tutor I was with started talking like that.

Often times, some of the individuals who come in here, are in a real big hurry, and act upset, if they don't get their papers looked at. They will even come in abut thirty minutes before the paper is due! Not all of the students are like this. Sadly enough, I see the tutors acting like they are in a hurry, as if they don't care about their clients. This I cannot understand. They do not ask questions like I have been taught, but I guess they don't see a need to build any kind of relationship like I do. At the end of the meeting, I wonder what was learned between the two of them.

I hope that I will come off as a patient and kind tutor, who is interested in learning about the students ability to write, but one who takes the time to listen to what the client says, if they say anything at all.

Response 5

For this week, instead of just responding to the chapters in the book, we get to write about the superheroes that we created last Wendsday.

Usually, when I go into an English class, the last thing I would think that we would ever do was create superheroes! This was kind of bizarre and wierd, but really cool at the same time. I have never done anything like this before, so it really was alot of fun. Superheroes have always been a big part of my life. When I say this, I mean that ever since I was around 7, I have constantly read numerous amounts of comic books with superheroes that I always thought were amazing to me. However, I have never thought of a superheroe being an English tutor.

The classroom was broken up into three or four different groups consisting of about four students. Each group was given a different colored poster board and different pictures of superheroes that they could choose from to put on the posterboard. We chose orange, and somehow or another decided on a villian. But this wasn't just any villian, this was "Doctor Octopus"! In my eyes, Doctor Octopus, was the craziest villian from the Spiderman series. I can't beleive that we chose him, but we did.

So perhaps the person who is reading this is asking themselves, "why would you ever choose Doctor Octopus"? Doctor Octopus the villian, consists of eight tentacles that he uses to fight his enemies or either get what he wants. Now as tutors, in so many ways, we are unfortunatly seen by many students as the "bad guy". I can see why they think that way, I used to think that way as well. Now that I am on the othe side of the fence, I know that I am not the bad guy, but really the "good guy" trying to do some good.

We basically named our hero Mr.Ironic. I think this is a great name! I wish I could name his strengths, but unfortunatly I forgot them. I think that some of the strenghts that we gave him were, that he was flexibile, straight-forward, honest, and understanding. These are all traits that every tutor should bring with them once they enter the writing center.

I am actually glad that we did something like this in class. This project showed that we can have fun, but we can actually learn alot from each other on how we should conduct ourselves as tutuors. As tutors, we should always do our best to be the "hero" of the situation and to be limitless with our powers!