Induction Tasks and Personal tutor information
Welcome Week 2023: Meeting your Personal Tutor & Level 1 Induction Task
Welcome to the School of English!
We know that Welcome Week will be a very hectic time for you, with so much to do to settle into University life and to find out about all that Sheffield has to offer. We also know that it will be on your mind that you want to get to know about how the School generally and your degree programme specifically will run.
That is why we have organised a meeting with your Personal Tutor (PT) during Welcome Week. Your PT is an academic member of staff in the School whose job it is generally to look out for you and make sure that all is well as you progress through the degree. It’ll be a relaxed 50-minute group discussion -- so as well as being introduced to your PT and the role you’ll also get to meet up with some other School of English students who share your PT.
The main point of the meeting is to welcome you into the School, get you more acquainted with the way teaching and learning works here, and make sure that you’re feeling prepared for the academic year to come. Obviously, one big aspect of this is to help you to negotiate the transition into university learning.
To get started with this we would like you to do some productive preparation for the meeting by working on the task below. It is important that you work on this in advance of Welcome week, because during the meeting you will be asked to share your thoughts with the Personal Tutor and other students, as well as getting to hear their ideas.
Most personal tutor meetings will take place on Thursday or Friday of your first week with us.
The exact time and location of your meeting will be confirmed in Intro week.
Induction Task
There are three separate areas we’d like you to work on. Please complete these tasks before your Personal Tutor meeting.
Task 1
To break the ice, we’d like you to say a few words about your favourite work of literature or an area of linguistics that interests you. Your chosen textual example can be from any time-period, style or genre or your chosen area of linguistics can be from any field (i.e. historical linguistics, syntax, theory etc) – the only condition is that you’re excited by it. If you would like to bring a small excerpt with you to help illustrate the language, style, form or questions/topics raised by your choice then please do (no more than 3 sentences if it is prose and 5 lines if it’s poetry). Be prepared to share your example and say a little about why you like it. (You needn’t speak for more than 1-2 minutes.)
Task 2
Next, we would like you to have a think about what you expect from yourself in the work you will do here, and hear about what you think we expect from you. To prepare for this, please look through the marking scheme and the criteria we use when reading students’ work.
How does this mark scheme compare to the kind of grading you are used to?
You will find a wide range of qualities that academic work can have like “analysis of relevant sources”, “consistent focus”, “critical thought”, “independent thought” and many more used to describe first, second and third class work etc. Some might seem very new to you or different from what has been important in your work up to now.
In preparation for the meeting, we would like you to make a list of five of the qualities listed in the marking scheme (you should choose the ones which seem most important) and rank them ranging from the most complex or hard to achieve to the most straightforward. Once you have this list, make another one ranking which of these you feel you are personally strongest at, down to those which need most work. Then make notes in response to the following questions:
Which do you think is the most important of the qualities you have listed?
Do you have any ideas about how you might work on improving your skills to achieve these qualities?
What help do you expect to receive from your tutors with this?
Task 3
As a final bit of preparation for the meeting, please watch the three videos/ presentations on the HUB, which contains key information on studying with us.
Then write down two bits of important information that you think it would be helpful for another new student to know. Bring these notes along to your meeting.
Personal Tutor Meetings
Your Personal Tutor is a member of academic staff in the School of English who is there to support you with any difficulties you may be experiencing and also point in you in the right direction for specialist help or additional skills development you may be interested in. Your Personal Tutor is likely to be the same person throughout your degree, although this may change if your Personal Tutor goes on Research leave. If this occurs, you will be allocated a replacement Personal Tutor. If you are a Dual Honours student, your Personal Tutor will be from your Home department (normally whichever of your subjects is first alphabetically) but your second department may also have a member of academic staff with responsibilities for dual degree students whom you can contact as well.
Your Personal Tutor will organise to meet you periodically during your time at University to discuss how you are getting on and if you have any concerns. However, if you are experiencing difficulties, don’t wait for your scheduled meeting but do contact your Personal Tutor as they will want to help you identify ways to help resolve the problem. You can email or phone your Personal Tutor to ask for an appointment or visit your Personal Tutor during their office hours. It is important to meet your personal tutor early in on in your programme so you know who to go to if you have a problem. Remember, your Personal Tutor is not just there to help resolve issues but to support you in reaching your full potential and making the most out of your experience here so be proactive and make the most of your meetings.
Your first meeting with your Personal Tutor will be a relaxed group discussion; at which you will meet other students who have the same Personal Tutor. It will be an opportunity to ask your Tutor any questions. To prepare for your Personal Tutor meeting please complete the induction task above.