How to Tutor Writing

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If you are a good writer, chances are good that you will be called upon at some point to help someone else with their writing. You may be working at a Writing Center at your school or simply helping a friend with a writing assignment. In any situation, tutoring someone in writing is a tricky business because you can quickly find yourself writing the paper yourself instead of helping your student become a stronger writer. The steps below will help you pass on your writing knowledge without doing all of the work yourself.

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Instructions

Difficulty: Moderate

How to Tutor Writing Effectively

Step1

Know the assignment. Ask your student to bring the assignment sheet, syllabus or any other material that will help you understand what the instructor is looking for in the assignment. If the student does not have any of these materials, ask him to explain the assignment to you. If he does not know, suggest that he get clarification from his instructor before proceeding. Your tutoring will not be helpful if you don't know what the instructor wants.

Step2

Find out where the student is in the process. Have the student bring whatever they have completed so far: brainstorming notes, outline, rough draft, etc. If the student does not have a draft yet, have him talk through what he wants to say in the paper and work on developing a strong thesis and organizing ideas. Make sure the student is doing most of the talking. Use questioning to guide him, but don't come up with a thesis and give it to him.

Step3

Read the rough draft out loud. When the student has a rough draft, you should read it out loud together. It is typically better if you read and have the student follow along, as he will get the chance to hear the words in a voice other than his own. On this first read through, your focus should be on what are known as Higher Order Concerns: thesis, organization and clarity. Look for parts that do not fit or that need to be developed further. Don't tell the student to change something, but once again use directed questioning, i.e. "Why did you include this paragraph?" or "Do you think you could say more about this point?"

Step4

Let the student work on the Higher Order Concerns. After you have finished reading and pointed out areas to improve through your questioning, have the student work by himself to improve these areas. Suggest that he go home and revise and then come back later to have you take another look at it. Don't fall into the trap of doing the revising for him.

Step5

Reread for Lower Order Concerns. After the Higher Order Concerns have been addressed, you can reread the paper for Lower Order Concerns such as grammar, punctuation and spelling. Follow the same questioning process that you did for the Higher Order Concerns. Don't simply say "you need a comma here." Explain grammar or punctuation rules the first time you encounter an error (i.e. "use commas to separate items in a list") and then have the student correct further instances of the same error.

Tips & Warnings

Start Early. As you can see from the steps above, effective writing tutoring can be a time intensive process, so starting the day before the assignment is due will not yield optimum results. Suggest that your student come to you as soon as he gets the assignment and work with him throughout the writing process.
Be Socratic. The most important aspect of tutoring writing is to use the Socratic method of questioning to lead the student to find his own answers rather than having you tell him the answer. Use directed but open-ended questioning to direct your student to the answer. See the Additional Resources for more information on the Socratic Method.
Avoid writing on the student's paper. During a tutoring session, the student should always be holding the pencil, not the tutor. Have the student make any corrections on his own paper. If you need to write (for example, to demonstrate a grammatical rule), use a separate piece of paper.