The Tutoring Book - California State University, Sacramento

Draw Upon Other Tutors Experiences and Class Readings and Discussions
You will meet once a week as a class and discuss the assigned readings and techniques that have helped
yourself or others and discuss any questions or problems you need help with. So prepare for each class
and participate in the discussions. You will learn from those discussions and begin to develop a network
of fellow tutors that you can ask for advice. It is helpful to know that you are a part of a team and not
alone as a tutor. When you tutor at the writing center, you will be able to experience the excitement of a
tutee understanding the writing process better after you’ve worked with them or their gratitude when they
return the next tutoring session and they tell you that they were successful at applying what they had
learned in the previous tutoring session. Once in a while, you will have the opportunity to hear the
excitement in a tutee’s voice when they say, “My professor said I’ve improved!” Then you know your
work as a tutor has paid off and realize that you have helped someone to become better writer. That will
make your day. Now I am not saying everything goes rosy each tutoring session, but enjoy those
moments when that happens and remind yourself to glean as much information out of your class readings
and discussions. Learn from others what they have found helpful and what they are having problems with.
I guarantee that if one person is having a problem with something there will be someone else in the class
that is too. So don’t be shy about sharing your experiences and ideas with each other.
Relax and Enjoy Your Tutoring Experience
When you are sitting at the table in the writing center for the first time, don’t let it scare you when the
tutees arrive for their appointment. Just remember, they are just as nervous about meeting a stranger who
is going to be looking at their writing. As the semester goes by, you will get to know each of your tutees
and develop a comradely relationship with them and will enjoy working together as a team.
These are just a few of the many things I found to be helpful. Most importantly, the best advice I can give
is to just relax and realize, “Rome wasn’t built in a day,” so don’t expect to become an expert at the blink
of an eye; instead, enjoy the experience of working with fellow students to improve their writing and have
fun being a tutor in the writing center.
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