The Tutoring Book - California State University, Sacramento

agreement errors also works for students with dyslexia. And another technique that works for some
students is the use of color: color highlighters, color pens and pencils.
Many students benefit from the collaborative model of tutoring; as a matter of fact, LD students
benefit greatly from this model. However, there comes a point in which LD students and other students
that seek help from Writing Centers need a more explicit and direct method of tutoring. Collaboration
benefits the writer and the tutor in the Writing Center, yet since the tutor is usually the more experienced
writer, the tutor will be wise to use a more directive approach to help the student. Knowing when to step
in with visual aids, open-ended questions, specific formulas for writing will only improve the chances for
success of an LD student and of other students who enter into a tutoring relationship.
As I read more on learning disabilities, I became aware that they are “persistent condition[s] of
presumed neurological dysfunction, which may exist with other disabling conditions” and these
dysfunctions remain “despite instruction in standard conditions” (LD 5). Since students with LDs’ brains
are structured differently and work differently, the classroom becomes a contact zone for them or a social
space in which “cultures meet, clash, and grapple with each other” (Pratt 4). A contact zone for a student
with an LD would “otherize” them because in traditional classroom settings their needs for processing
information are not included. What we as tutors need to be aware of is that we do not create contact
zones or environments in the Writing Center that are mirror images of the classroom. If we do, then we
inhibit the student instead of helping the student become resourceful.
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