Tutoring Philosophy

Tutor mentoring establishes empowerment in the learner, and it is in this spirit that mentor/tutoring brings my learner in contact with me through empowerment rather than instruction. What is a mentor, really, other than a nurturing leader with experience? A nutshell explanation would be just that, but the quality leader disseminates their information in such a way as to empower the learner. Not with strict diction and adherence to an authoritative voice, but by offering suggestion and guidance, in the form of queries and collaboration with the learner. We all have it within ourselves to be efficient communicators, and by guiding writers to their own voice, they will discover the confidence they need to become empowered, independent writers.

Tutoring inexperienced writers can be difficult when writers are transitioning to academic studies. Many times, the gap is wide between home dialect and academic speech. The resulting work is less than acceptable in academic writing. My research explores creative free-writing, and how it can be used not only to advance a person’s ability to write in an academic way, but also, the manner in which a person thinks about writing academically.

An assigned self-reflective essay (final draft) focusing on my experience in the writing center as a tutor-in-training.