Writing From Different Backgrounds: Some things to think about!

Hello there, Reader,

If you're a tutor, you have probably had difficult sessions where you might have wished the writer would be more engaged. You may have asked yourself why is it so exhausting and sometimes hopeless in making a good name for writing-- after all, writing is very powerful. However, the real question is: have you thought about how one's background affects how motivated the writer is/will be?

Knowing how diversified the demographic in colleges tend to be it is not easy to predict the level of writing or the type of experiences the writer has had in the past. So, when you feel frustrated and do not believe that your sessions are going too well, think about what kind of experiences that the student may have faced in high school and where certain issues stem from.  

Let us explore some of the common struggles that may arise in a session:

- The writer is disengaged/shy and you tend to be talking more than they are
- When you speak, the writer writes down what you say and stops when you stop speaking
- The writer is adamant about their lack of writing ability
- When asking questions or for elaboration on their ideas, the writer may become reluctant
-  Caution when the writing piece is more personal
- The most painful: the writer only comes in because they want proof that they came to a session for credit

Does this sound accurate to some degree?

Now, try think about what may be going on here. Sometimes, just by reading a writer's paper, you can tell what kind of style the writer sways toward. You can even be able to identify their style by their willingness to participate in the session. For the purposes of this blog, we will focus on writers who might not be a fan of writing.


Not a 'Fan'...yet!

Take a step back, and think about all the times a writer has told you that they either dislike writing or that they are terrible at writing. Why do you think anyone might say that? I, myself, come to find that many students who make such claims are missing something important: confidence. But, why is this the case?

The priorities of typical English curricula that are outlined by schools about writing vary. Not every school has English programs that pour their attention into areas of writing that are much more empowering than, say, grammar and spelling. Most of the work that youth are assigned is meant to "prepare" them for the infamous, and often dreaded, standardized tests. The room for creativity and self-expression then becomes highly restricted resulting in a student, who may have had potential, very bored by the concept of writing. Sometimes, the students' imaginative faculties open up when they pursue individual writing projects of their own creation such as: online sites where they may publish poetry and stories; journals about their life experiences or fiction; short stories and poems for 'Poetry Slams' or 'Spoken Word' events with their friends.

 

Very much related to the first issue is when the instructor then highlights grammar and spelling as vital to their grade. Imagine getting a paper back with all sorts of markings and red ink. How would you feel? What would you think? I, for one, always thought that I have done a very poor job, and I have hated writing all through high school. When someone tells you that your writing is terrible and that you are unable to write, that can be problematic. The student is harmed and disempowered. It is made to seem like writing is an ability rather than an art that you develop over time.

When you really think about what writing means, ironically, these practices are counter-intuitive to the "goals" many schools set for themselves. I think about writing as the embodiment of your thoughts, ideas, feelings, beliefs, and everything that makes you who you are. So, evidently, telling someone that they are unskilled in writing really means, by my logic, that you are fragmenting the identity of a person. Less ironically, these types of attittudes towards writing come from youth who live in predominantly low-income and minority neighborhoods.

That is not to say that teachers love to tell students that grammar makes the grade rather, it is the educational policies that manipulate the curriculum that teachers have to abide by. It becomes a challenge to work around and be nurturing at the same time. Still, this does not make it right. Educators should not have to face the kind of choices that they are limited to.  

But, what I have come to believe is that this is all for a reason (not a very positive one, at that). When you have the power to disenfranchise whole groups of people from being able to express themselves confidently and articulately, you are erasing identities and limiting their active participation in creating counter-discourses in the issues that concern them most.

Then, what should be done? There must be a complete revision to English curriculum in schools that are located in low-income and minority neighborhoods. Youth must be encouraged to express themselves and be proud about what they have to say! So, aim to be as thoughtful and positive as you can be and don't feel hopeless about sessions if they're not how you'd like them to be!

Dustin F. Geranen, Former Writing Center Tutor, talks ESL and the Post-Graduate Life

My work at the Writing Center was my first step toward a career in ESL teaching and tutoring. I’d read all of the articles Carrie makes new tutors read about ESL tutoring but I still had questions. I sat down with her for nearly an hour during which she talked to me about her own experiences and gave me more reading material. I then spoke with former tutor, Madeline Christensen, who advised me that the tricky part of ESL tutoring was understanding and respecting cultural differences. A student from Asia might be embarrassed to show their grade on an assignment while a student from Russia might feel like your not qualified to tutor them if you aren’t quite blunt.

I wasn’t alone in my trepidation but I decided that the only way to get good at it was to take on as many sessions as possible. I told everyone they could give me their ESL sessions if they were nervous about them and Carrie spread the word to all of the comp teachers that I’d be more than happy to work with ESL students on a regular basis. Soon, teachers began contacting me directly about working with their ESL students.

During my second year at the Writing Center, the ELP department contacted Carrie and asked about setting up a standing appointment for a student from China. She’d worked with an unscrupulous agent who impersonated her on the phone and her English was at quite a low level. She is the main reason I’ve pursued ESL as a career. I worked with her three times a week for a year. I saw her go from a struggling learner relying on nouns and pointing to pictures to a confident student capable of writing meaningful paragraphs and developing a linear essay. The sessions were frustrating and often tiring for both of us but we persevered and her English improved as did my instructional ability.

For a year after graduating from Roosevelt, I worked teaching comp at a couple schools in Chicago—including Roosevelt. My work with my ESL students was always most fulfilling. It’s not just the intricacies of learning how to teach people from radically different cultures, but working with a student who fears she may have made the wrong choice to leave her homeland. With each week of work an ESL student becomes more confident in their ability to be a student and succeed in America.

I answered a craigslist ad for online ESL work thinking I’d pick up some extra cash to supplement my teaching. The ad turned out to be for a position as a language coach at Rosetta Stone. Now I only work for them. I lead 50 minute Totale sessions in which 1-4 learners interact with me via webcam. I show them pictures and play vocabulary-based games with them. I also help teach them about cultural differences relating to language. Additionally, I teach Reflex sessions, which last 5-9 minutes and focus on fast-paced conversations that students will likely encounter such as asking for directions in a city and interacting with a flight attendant when your headset is malfunctioning.

The sessions are quite productive. We don’t focus on written words as much as aural/linguistic association. It’s not enough for them to give me the noun; they must form a sentence that sounds American. This helps shape their thought process when interacting in English because they start to understand how we form our sentences based on our thoughts.

It’s not all business, though. My learners crack me up on a daily basis. I’ve found making jokes about everything helps relax them and gets them to use English more freely. I’ve posted some of my more humorous interactions at a blog:http://charhybdis.blogspot.com 

-Dustin F. Geranen

The Indestructible Man by Jake Wrenn

The Indestructible Man

By Jake Wrenn

                A crowd had gathered around the stage, and painted clowns began setting up tables. There were items on the tables. The items were weapons. The clowns were bringing out weapons and placing them on the tables. The crowd was drawn in by the enigma of it, the strange.

                “Step right up! Come one come all!” A clown had taken the stage, swinging his arms and keeping his knees bent. The clown had a white face with red eyes. “Come see the eighth wonder of the world! The scariest of the scaries! The freakiest of the freaks! The ghoulish, the grotesque, the bloodcurdling! Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you, the Indestructible Man!”

                The crowd shifted in revolt as the man took the stage. He was impossibly large, hands that could crush a skull, his body a hellish façade. He walked the way mountains walk, slow, uncalculated.

                The clown continued, pressing the morbid. “I challenge each and every one of you to take but one swing at death, and to try and kill the man that cannot be killed!”

                Spectators began a line near the corner of the stage. They stood with wide-eyed fear, staring at the man, the thing, this entity. Each took a device from the tables; some tried stabbing him and some tried shooting him, one man tried to choke him and the thing laughed, having those hands around his neck. The man swallowed potions and acids that would burn the body from the inside out, yet there he stood, unscathed.

                I wished to participate.

                I stood in front of the tables, the array of the ghastly pieces; there were knives and guns, chainsaws and swords, strange things I had never seen. Devices all that would end the life of a normal man. The knives were rusted, suggesting a lifetime of use. I stared at the stage, the Indestructible Man.

                Some may criticize my modest choice of weapons, but the kitchen knife was the only thing I felt familiar with. I took the stage. The crowd groaned, seeing many knives come and go. I stood in front of him, this man, this enigma. He was two heads taller than me to be sure and stared down, his hollow, dead eyes, saying nothing, thinking the decrepit. I could feel the grandfather clock tick tick of my heart.

                “Go ahead, kid,” a clown whispered behind me, “stab him.”

                I felt the knife in my hand, its rigidity, its decisions, and I felt the man staring down at me. I flipped the blade in my hand, revealing the handle to the man and the blade pointed toward myself. He reached out, confused, taking the handle of the knife. Silence swept over the crowd as the Indestructible Man fell to the stage.

               

Jake Wrenn is the winner of this year's Flash Fiction contest! Congratulations, Jake! And congrats to all the other winners!