Re: Tutor training research

[becky.rickly@umich.edu (Becky Rickly)]

David, let me first give you a few URLs.  The syllabi for the two-course
sequence that tutors at U of M have to take are at

http://www.lsa.umich.edu/ecb/ECB300.html

and

http://www.lsa.umich.edu/ecb/ECB301.html

You'll find most of the resources we use listed there, though students
actually generate much of the class resources through their daily
InterChange discussions over the reading material and practical experience,
and through their WAC presentations (most of our tutors are NOT English
majors, so we ask them to research how writing is done/valued in their
disciplines then present this information to the class).

You can find out more about our peer tutoring program at the following URL:

http://www.lsa.umich.edu/ecb/ECB/peertutor.html

I'll answer some of your questions below, too:

>        3.  What failures have you experienced with training materials or
>strategies?

Interestingly, the "failures" have often led to breakthroughs.  A few follow:

--using too much of the class discussing readings/issues in a NON f2f
manner on the computer.  I've found that we need a balance, esp. in the
inital class.

--there's virtually NOTHING written on tutoring online; we're often making
it up as we go.  Initially, we modeled the OWL training after f2f training;
then we decided tutoring online was nothing like f2f, and we modified the
training to reflect this.  Finally, we've come back to thinking that OWLing
is a lot like f2f with some very important differences/things to keep in
mind.

--we need to spend more time as a class and as a profession w/ ESL and WAC
issues.  Tutoring non-native speakers and folks writing in disciplines such
as biology dictates that the tutors' strategies be somewhat different than
for the generic freshman comp. paper.

>        4.  What, if any, new ideas or methods have you experimented with?

--the student-driven WAC presentations.  They do a presentation, complete
w/ examples and handouts, for the class.  We then compile this information
into a course reference that other tutors can use as well.

--OWL training.  Now we have several "experienced" OWLers ("head hooties"
if you will) helping with the training.  The new tutors "lurk" on the list
for a while, we go over netiquette/OWL techniques, then they try their
hands at responding just to each other.  We rate the responses and revise
them.  Finally, when tutors are ready to send responses to actual
customers, for the first few times they have to send their responses to a
head hootie before it goes to an actual student.

>        5.  Finally, would you be willing to send samples of your tutor
>training handouts/manual/bibliography/syllabus?  If so, please e-mail
>your physical address and I would be glad to send a SASE and
>reimbursement for any copying expenses.

Check out the URLs above.  Let me know if you need more information!

--Becky