The Tutoring Book - California State University, Sacramento

Despite the fact that their struggles are similar, there are also two fundamental differences
in graduate level writing. First are the high expectations mentioned earlier and the other is the
knowledge of writing in their specific discipline. The tutee’s discipline will demand expert
knowledge of a particular writing style and its conventions and he or she maybe be unaware how
to identify or use them. As a tutor, you will work with students from disciplines ranging from
business and engineering to nursing and social work, or in Rina’s case, cultural studies and
anthropology. At some point you will be asked to help them with a style you are unfamiliar with,
but don’t worry. There are things you can do to help your tutee find the writing information they
need. For example, if you are unsure how civil engineers format their essays, you can look up
example essays online, ask colleagues in the writing center, or ask the coordinator for help
finding resources.
In addition to looking to colleagues for help, the following tips will help you if you find yourself
stuck.
•First, remember that regardless of how advanced the writer or writing, there is always room for
improvement. Writing that looks perfect can always be better, and experienced writers can work on new
elements of writing.
• If you are having difficulty with the discipline conventions, take some time to familiarize yourself with
the conventions early in the semester. You might also consider studying the citation or formatting styles
you are less familiar with, which will benefit all of your tutoring sessions. Having some knowledge about
conventions will give you confidence as you tutor.
• If the terms that your tutees use are unfamiliar, don’t be afraid to ask for clarification. After all, we
work with tutees from various disciplines, and it is highly unlikely that you will be familiar with every
subject they present in their writing. Keep in mind, that our tutees are writing for particular audiences
who may have an established knowledge base on the subject. Ask the tutee about the audience, and
• Finally, just like you would an undergraduate or less experienced writer, look for higher order
concerns (HOC) first followed by lower order concerns (LOC). HOCs include thesis or focus,
audience, purpose, organization, and development; meanwhile, LOCs are sentence structure, punctuation,
spelling, and word choice (OWL). You always want to start by looking at the big picture first, and work
your way down to smaller sentence and word level issues, regardless of the tutee’s writing level.
Armed with this mental checklist, I have since felt ready to ask questions, give advice and suggestions for
improvements where I can, and finally, I feel confident in my graduate tutoring
sessions and most tutees will appreciate any help or insight you can provide.
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I read Rina’s thesis aloud, paying no attention to the content, as I struggled to think about what I would
help her with. Finally, I stopped reading, sat back, and asked her to talk me through
the topic. As she explained it, the content started making sense and I began thinking that I could
follow along.
Feeling better, I read on; however, this time I paid close attention and recalled my thought
process for tutoring less experienced tutees. I started with HOCs and before long, I noticed a
section where Rina wrote about characteristics, results, and then more characteristics. Even
though I still did not understand exactly what those characteristics were or meant, I could tell
that they seemed out of order. It turned out that while Rina has an excellent writing style, perfect
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