Tutoring Philosophy
Peer-to-peer tutoring falls under a very specific, but important, niche in the realm of higher education. After working for almost three years combined at two different university writing centers, I can confidently say that the impact tutoring has on both the consultant (sometimes referred to as the tutor) and the client can be tremendous, as every client is different and brings something new to a session.
Something I always try to keep in the forefront of my mind is that every client is unique. While every tutor might have in their mind an idea about how a “typical” tutoring session will go, I’ve learned during my time as a tutor that there is no “typical” session. During one semester of my tenure at Auburn’s Miller Writing Center, I had a frequent client who was a Ph.D. student for whom English was a second language. Our appointments would initially start off with us reading through a conference presentation or an article for a journal, which is a common occurrence for graduate students who visit writing centers. However, the last ten to fifteen minutes of our time together would always end in a different manner than “typical” appointments. The client would bring out a list of terms they had encountered over the past week, often slang or phrases embedded with specific American cultural contexts. Using the list, the client would provide me with a hypothetical sentence and ask if they were using the term or phrase in the correct context. This client was one of my favorite clients because they were able to bring their unique experience to the writing center and receive assistance not only on a piece of writing that was important to them but also to the language they would go out and use in everyday life.
Listening has been the most important aspect of working with clients for me. In every peer or administrative observation of my sessions, my most frequent piece of feedback is that I spend a lot of time listening to the client. I consider active listening to be a major part of tutoring, because if you are not listening to the client, then you are not truly assisting them in the way that they need. I usually start off appointments by asking: “What brings you in today?” and let the conversation devolve into me asking more questions about the piece of writing the client brought in. I specifically like clients to focus on what their goals are for the appointment and what their biggest concerns about what they brought in are. Listening allows me to serve the client’s needs as they actually are, not what I perceive them to be. As I said before, every client is different and you never want to assume you know better than a client’s own writing.
The most important part of being an ethical tutor is understanding the importance of the descriptor “peer-to-peer”. As a peer, I never like to assume that I know better than a client about the terminology they are using, especially if they are using that terminology to describe their identity. My job as a tutor is to help my clients achieve their goals, whatever those may be. In turn, I have learned so much from my clients over the years. I have learned vast amounts of information about topics I never would have thought to look into, all because of the knowledge and expertise of my talented clients. As someone who is committed to being a life-long learner, being a tutor will always have a special place in my heart as it has allowed me the opportunity to learn from others as they learn from me.