A few days ago, I was able to observe RE in a consultation. The woman she was helping was a non-traditional student (that's the PC term for older people who are coming back to school, right?) who needed help with an application to the social work program. RE was friendly and welcoming to the student. She smiled and spoke to her in a relatively open manner, but was always professional. The consultation covered many topics, but primarily focused on content editing: the student was concerned that the application letter was too long and too broad in scope and she wanted to cut it down. After reading the application questions thoroughly, RE asked whether or not the student thought she had actually answered the question. She asked which parts of the essay the student thought did not fit the question. The student, who did most of the talking, explained which parts of the essay she didn't think fit. RE marked those parts accordingly.
Throughout the consulation, RE leaned forward, often using her hands to help her speak. She kept eye contact with the student and nodded occasionally to show she had understood whatever the student said. Once in awhile, the student, who was quite bubbly and talkative, would go on a tangent. RE would comment on what she said, then use a leading question to return focus to the paper. RE let the student know when there were only about five minutes left in the session, and diligently stuck to her time. She didn't make it obvious, however. I hardly noticed her looking at the clock. At the end of the session, RE suggested the student make another appointment after she had had some time to look over the corrections they had made together. The student thanked RE for her time, and told us that she was on the way to the computer lab right then to work on her paper.
Over all, this was a very successful session in my opinion, and RE handled it with professionalism and awesomeness.
In fact, everyone that I have had the chance to observe over the last few weeks has handled their sessions with professionalism and awesomeness. For some reason, I have this lingering fear that I will not handle mine with such grace. When I get nervous, I tend to fidget and talk a million miles a minute. I also tend to go on tangents. So maybe I will get nervous and lead the student, who only came in for some help in formulating a topic, quickly down the road of constitutionalism and the revolutions of 1848 in Europe. I do this to myself a lot--psych myself out, that is. Insecurity is rearing its ugly head again. I need one of those Whack-a-Mole mallets to smash it down again. I don't want be too scared when the moment comes to just jump in to consulting.
In other news, whoever purchased the fun-sized candy bars for the Writing Center, thank you. I had a very nice mid-afternoon snack of Baby Ruth bar and Moroccan mint tea. Healthy and wholesome.
Friday, September 25, 2009
Friday, September 18, 2009
Journal #3
I was sitting at the computer the other day when I heard a small cough and a timid, "Excuse me," coming from the direction of the door. I looked up and saw an extremely beautiful, slightly nervous-looking woman standing next to the coffee maker.
"Can I help you?" I asked.
"Yes," she said. "I have an appointment with ___."
"Sure, OK," I reply. "What's your name?"
She told me. The name evoked images of smoky, protest-ridden Tehran, or perhaps the near impassable mountains of western Afghanistan. The accent spoke of several years spent in western Europe--France, maybe. As I amused myself by putting together a history for this mysterious woman, I kept asking myself the same question: Why on earth did she decide to come to Boise, Idaho?
I am continually surprised at the number of ESL students attending Boise State. When I moved out here five years ago from the East Coast, I was expecting a state full of white, gun-toting, beer-guzzling, potato-growing hayseeds. And lo, my expectations were fulfilled--except for the beer-guzzling part. What I didn't know, and what I am still amazed by today, was how many refugees have found homes here over the years. With an eclectic mix of Bosnians, Afghanis, Iraqis, Somalis, Chinese, Koreans, and Vietnamese, Boise is a virtual United Nations. This is good for me, as I am fascinated by other countries, languages and cultures. It's a wonder to me that, small and isolated as it is, Boise has become a center for refugee resettlement (as I understand, it has something to do with job availability and a high standard of living). These refugees learn English, find jobs and send their kids to public schools, where they are strongly encouraged to pursue higher education. And, as the work ethic among immigrants tends to be extremely high, they often do pursue higher education right here at Boise State.
One of the main incentives for working in the Writing Center for me was the chance to be able to work with ESL students. I've had a bit of experience in helping ESL students with their writing. From 2007-2008, I lived in Romania and attended classes at the local university. The students who were in the classes with me spoke perfect English, often along with their native Romanian or Hungarian, and had studied German and/or French extensively before taking on English. The Romanian education system is very focused on linguistics. Romania's history includes various violent take-overs by and extended alliances with other nations, so language became a critical element in every Romanian's education. And so there I was: a stranger, a native English speaker knowing only a little French and even less Romanian without any clue as to why the hell I had actually come. It was very interesting being on the other end of the spectrum. People speak slowly, and often loudly, for your benefit, not realizing that deafness and foreignness don't go hand in hand. People make jokes at your expense, speaking quickly so you don't catch it all. You can't read signs, or go to the grocery store alone, or ask for directions. It's very difficult to find your niche when you're so far from all you know.
Eventually, however, when my language skills improved, I found my niche. The students in my class were always eager to learn the newest slang or curse words that America had to offer. They paraded me around in front of their friends as a kind of trophy. And perhaps most importantly (and the entire reason why I even went off on this Romania tangent in the first place), they were constantly after to me to help them with their English papers. "What's a better way to say this?" "How's my punctuation?" "Does this sound awkward to you?" "What's a good idiom to use here so I sound more American?" "Citation? What the heck does that mean? I just copied it all from Wikipedia. Is that OK?" I really enjoyed helping them become better English speakers and better English writers. It was great to find a purpose in the craziness that was that entire experience.
All that to say, I am very excited to begin consulting if it means I get to work with ESL students.
Knock on wood. Now that I've said that, something will happen to make me hate all ESL students. But I hope that won't happen.
"Can I help you?" I asked.
"Yes," she said. "I have an appointment with ___."
"Sure, OK," I reply. "What's your name?"
She told me. The name evoked images of smoky, protest-ridden Tehran, or perhaps the near impassable mountains of western Afghanistan. The accent spoke of several years spent in western Europe--France, maybe. As I amused myself by putting together a history for this mysterious woman, I kept asking myself the same question: Why on earth did she decide to come to Boise, Idaho?
I am continually surprised at the number of ESL students attending Boise State. When I moved out here five years ago from the East Coast, I was expecting a state full of white, gun-toting, beer-guzzling, potato-growing hayseeds. And lo, my expectations were fulfilled--except for the beer-guzzling part. What I didn't know, and what I am still amazed by today, was how many refugees have found homes here over the years. With an eclectic mix of Bosnians, Afghanis, Iraqis, Somalis, Chinese, Koreans, and Vietnamese, Boise is a virtual United Nations. This is good for me, as I am fascinated by other countries, languages and cultures. It's a wonder to me that, small and isolated as it is, Boise has become a center for refugee resettlement (as I understand, it has something to do with job availability and a high standard of living). These refugees learn English, find jobs and send their kids to public schools, where they are strongly encouraged to pursue higher education. And, as the work ethic among immigrants tends to be extremely high, they often do pursue higher education right here at Boise State.
One of the main incentives for working in the Writing Center for me was the chance to be able to work with ESL students. I've had a bit of experience in helping ESL students with their writing. From 2007-2008, I lived in Romania and attended classes at the local university. The students who were in the classes with me spoke perfect English, often along with their native Romanian or Hungarian, and had studied German and/or French extensively before taking on English. The Romanian education system is very focused on linguistics. Romania's history includes various violent take-overs by and extended alliances with other nations, so language became a critical element in every Romanian's education. And so there I was: a stranger, a native English speaker knowing only a little French and even less Romanian without any clue as to why the hell I had actually come. It was very interesting being on the other end of the spectrum. People speak slowly, and often loudly, for your benefit, not realizing that deafness and foreignness don't go hand in hand. People make jokes at your expense, speaking quickly so you don't catch it all. You can't read signs, or go to the grocery store alone, or ask for directions. It's very difficult to find your niche when you're so far from all you know.
Eventually, however, when my language skills improved, I found my niche. The students in my class were always eager to learn the newest slang or curse words that America had to offer. They paraded me around in front of their friends as a kind of trophy. And perhaps most importantly (and the entire reason why I even went off on this Romania tangent in the first place), they were constantly after to me to help them with their English papers. "What's a better way to say this?" "How's my punctuation?" "Does this sound awkward to you?" "What's a good idiom to use here so I sound more American?" "Citation? What the heck does that mean? I just copied it all from Wikipedia. Is that OK?" I really enjoyed helping them become better English speakers and better English writers. It was great to find a purpose in the craziness that was that entire experience.
All that to say, I am very excited to begin consulting if it means I get to work with ESL students.
Knock on wood. Now that I've said that, something will happen to make me hate all ESL students. But I hope that won't happen.
Thursday, September 10, 2009
Journal #2
Seriously, this post is in dire need of a more clever title.
Does collaboration eliminate individual thought? This is something that keeps coming up as I mull over this and last week's readings. Collaboration, that omnipresent, idealized concept, is loosely defined as social writing: peer response assignments, participation in writers' groups, anything in which people exchange ideas and information in order to positively influence each other's writing (or at least that's what I wrote down in my notebook during our last meeting). Regardless of the subject of the group's writing, the overarching goal of collaboration is self discovery. By engaging in conversations and receiving feedback from other writers, the individual further develops their own point of view.
Well, that's lovely. But, returning to the question, does this social writing take away individuality? Perhaps I've been blinded by society's blatant mistrust of collaborative work, but the thought of group writing bothers me. It makes me think of groupthink, and groupthink makes me think of communism, which makes me think of the Cultural Revolution in China, and that makes me think of that rather disturbing scene from "The Last Emperor" when the students were taking great pleasure in humiliating their former professors in the streets of Beijing, and that makes me think of the collaborative work the Emperor and his servants did while writing their life stories when they were serving a lengthy sentence in a re-education camp because the the Emperor had had some rather shady dealings with the Japanese, who had created a nation in the Manchurian region of northern China and named in Manchukuo, which was an action that was ironically condemned by all imperialist Western nations, and...oh, you don't care. I often forget that not all people are history majors. Anyway.
What I keep wondering is, if everything I have ever written and will ever write has been influenced by things I have read or people I have talked to, does that mean that I have never had and never will have an original thought? Does that mean that anyone who has ever written anything, anyone who has ever developed a ground breaking idea in any field, is guilty of plagiarism?
And if a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it...?
I don't know, I have the feeling I'm not making a lot of sense. But the concept of collaboration is reaffirming my fear that no one is saying anything that hasn't been said before. All of the odd thoughts that float through our brains as we daydream have already been thought. Humanity is set on the spin cycle and history as we know it has come to an end--at least it has if you take Fukyama's viewpoint. My, that's depressing. So somewhere, at some point in history, someone else has had the same thoughts I'm writing out right now (Well, at some point in recent history, as the Cultural Revolution only happened in the last forty years or so, and "The Last Emperor" was made about twenty years ago). I am not an original. Fortunately, I am convinced that there is something more than this copycat life. Perhaps I can have an original thought when I reach the other side. At least I have that to look forward to.
Then again, as billions, perhaps trillions of people have died since the beginning of time...No, I won't even go there.
To cheer you up after this rather melancholy post, here's an awesome song by the amazingly talented Alexi Murdoch, who is my future husband. He just doesn't know it yet.
Does collaboration eliminate individual thought? This is something that keeps coming up as I mull over this and last week's readings. Collaboration, that omnipresent, idealized concept, is loosely defined as social writing: peer response assignments, participation in writers' groups, anything in which people exchange ideas and information in order to positively influence each other's writing (or at least that's what I wrote down in my notebook during our last meeting). Regardless of the subject of the group's writing, the overarching goal of collaboration is self discovery. By engaging in conversations and receiving feedback from other writers, the individual further develops their own point of view.
Well, that's lovely. But, returning to the question, does this social writing take away individuality? Perhaps I've been blinded by society's blatant mistrust of collaborative work, but the thought of group writing bothers me. It makes me think of groupthink, and groupthink makes me think of communism, which makes me think of the Cultural Revolution in China, and that makes me think of that rather disturbing scene from "The Last Emperor" when the students were taking great pleasure in humiliating their former professors in the streets of Beijing, and that makes me think of the collaborative work the Emperor and his servants did while writing their life stories when they were serving a lengthy sentence in a re-education camp because the the Emperor had had some rather shady dealings with the Japanese, who had created a nation in the Manchurian region of northern China and named in Manchukuo, which was an action that was ironically condemned by all imperialist Western nations, and...oh, you don't care. I often forget that not all people are history majors. Anyway.
What I keep wondering is, if everything I have ever written and will ever write has been influenced by things I have read or people I have talked to, does that mean that I have never had and never will have an original thought? Does that mean that anyone who has ever written anything, anyone who has ever developed a ground breaking idea in any field, is guilty of plagiarism?
And if a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it...?
I don't know, I have the feeling I'm not making a lot of sense. But the concept of collaboration is reaffirming my fear that no one is saying anything that hasn't been said before. All of the odd thoughts that float through our brains as we daydream have already been thought. Humanity is set on the spin cycle and history as we know it has come to an end--at least it has if you take Fukyama's viewpoint. My, that's depressing. So somewhere, at some point in history, someone else has had the same thoughts I'm writing out right now (Well, at some point in recent history, as the Cultural Revolution only happened in the last forty years or so, and "The Last Emperor" was made about twenty years ago). I am not an original. Fortunately, I am convinced that there is something more than this copycat life. Perhaps I can have an original thought when I reach the other side. At least I have that to look forward to.
Then again, as billions, perhaps trillions of people have died since the beginning of time...No, I won't even go there.
To cheer you up after this rather melancholy post, here's an awesome song by the amazingly talented Alexi Murdoch, who is my future husband. He just doesn't know it yet.
Sunday, September 6, 2009
Journal #1
I wish I could come up with a cleverer title. And figure out how to copy and paste. It seems easy, and yet...Technology, my cursed enemy, we meet again. Anywho:
Ah, another school year begins. The sun is shining, the birds are singing, the football team is footbal-ling, and the administration is sucking every last cent out of the student body for various nefarious purposes. It's a beautiful thing. This fall semester is a particularly special one for me, as it marks the beginning of my internship at the Writing Center. Though my knowledge and experience of writing centers is limited, I hope to make some small contribution to the Center, and more importantly, to glean knowledge which will help me with my own writing and that which will help me aid others in the future.
I have been to the Writing Center only once before, and under duress, if I recall correctly. My biology professor, for some mischievous reason of her own, decided to make it a requirement for all of her students to visit the Writing Center at least once while penning the dreaded lab report. It should be noted that I am not a fan of criticism, especially when it comes to my writing. I have a hard time taking criticism, I have a hard time giving it out--but these are things I am working on. Oh, the divers glories that stem from low self-esteem. Having someone read through and (God forbid!) correct my writing was unthinkable, unconscionable, completely out of the question.
It was with trepidation that I scaled the stairs to the Writing Center, and with hesitation that I handed my paper over for scrutiny. I twisted and squirmed in my seat in anxiety, trying to arrange my features into something I hoped appeared menacing, but probably only looked as if I had bad gas. After the initial awkwardness of hearing my work read aloud, however, I began to relax. Hearing someone else's opinion on my writing helped rather than hindered me in the writing process. Surprise, surprise. Though I did not visit the Writing Center again, but I remembered the experience. So when it was suggested to me that I apply for an internship at the Writing Center, I jumped at the chance. To be on the other side of that table, to help someone else have that gestalt moment in the same way my consultant helped me seemed a wonderful idea. So here I am, an intern, about to take my first bumbling steps into the larger writing world.
My first week in the Center was largely uneventful. I did some dishes, participated in a class tour, and helped type up a few handouts. There were no belligerent students or bomb threats, nor any rabid dogs or random Ebola outbreaks. There was, however, some talk of a John Waters Halloween costume, which is rather scary, I must admit. I didn't get any hands-on Writing Center experience, really, but I think I did something more important: I began to make connections with the people who work there. They are far from the grammar Nazis and harsh critics I had imagined. They're laid back and fun to talk to, and just want to help people become better writers.
Plus, they let me do the dishes, so they can't be all bad.
Ah, another school year begins. The sun is shining, the birds are singing, the football team is footbal-ling, and the administration is sucking every last cent out of the student body for various nefarious purposes. It's a beautiful thing. This fall semester is a particularly special one for me, as it marks the beginning of my internship at the Writing Center. Though my knowledge and experience of writing centers is limited, I hope to make some small contribution to the Center, and more importantly, to glean knowledge which will help me with my own writing and that which will help me aid others in the future.
I have been to the Writing Center only once before, and under duress, if I recall correctly. My biology professor, for some mischievous reason of her own, decided to make it a requirement for all of her students to visit the Writing Center at least once while penning the dreaded lab report. It should be noted that I am not a fan of criticism, especially when it comes to my writing. I have a hard time taking criticism, I have a hard time giving it out--but these are things I am working on. Oh, the divers glories that stem from low self-esteem. Having someone read through and (God forbid!) correct my writing was unthinkable, unconscionable, completely out of the question.
It was with trepidation that I scaled the stairs to the Writing Center, and with hesitation that I handed my paper over for scrutiny. I twisted and squirmed in my seat in anxiety, trying to arrange my features into something I hoped appeared menacing, but probably only looked as if I had bad gas. After the initial awkwardness of hearing my work read aloud, however, I began to relax. Hearing someone else's opinion on my writing helped rather than hindered me in the writing process. Surprise, surprise. Though I did not visit the Writing Center again, but I remembered the experience. So when it was suggested to me that I apply for an internship at the Writing Center, I jumped at the chance. To be on the other side of that table, to help someone else have that gestalt moment in the same way my consultant helped me seemed a wonderful idea. So here I am, an intern, about to take my first bumbling steps into the larger writing world.
My first week in the Center was largely uneventful. I did some dishes, participated in a class tour, and helped type up a few handouts. There were no belligerent students or bomb threats, nor any rabid dogs or random Ebola outbreaks. There was, however, some talk of a John Waters Halloween costume, which is rather scary, I must admit. I didn't get any hands-on Writing Center experience, really, but I think I did something more important: I began to make connections with the people who work there. They are far from the grammar Nazis and harsh critics I had imagined. They're laid back and fun to talk to, and just want to help people become better writers.
Plus, they let me do the dishes, so they can't be all bad.
Saturday, September 5, 2009
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