Dear Kate, Sandra and group,
Thanks for all this work – very useful!
I have another related use for reports like these. In training our postgraduate research student Writing@Liverpool
tutors, I invite new tutors to consider reports from more experienced tutors. Our confidentiality agreement with student ‘clients’ explicitly allows us to use anonymised versions of session reports for the purposes of training.
Using the reports gives new tutors a real sense of the interactions, including affective elements,
and helps them to make their own academic skills explicit to themselves so they can share techniques with others. The reports also model (or express a dilemma about) a collaborative and somewhat ‘minimalist’ approach that moves away from overly-directive working
and towards fostering independent learning.
In case you’re interested, I copy a selection below (in choosing reports to include, I aimed at a range
of thought-provoking sessions, ones with good approaches but potential for different ways to interact with the student, e.g. instead of summarising a session at the end, asking the student to do so in order to assess their understanding and increase their
sense of ownership of the work/agency). Should you wish to do so, you are welcome to use these examples for training purposes, but not in other contexts – thank you.
As you will note, I have not implemented a fixed structure for session reports – something to think
further about!
Best wishes,
Joanna
Joanna Cheetham
Educational Developer
Centre for Innovation in Education
University of Liverpool
Room 3.21
126 Mount Pleasant
Liverpool
L69 3GW
Writing@Liverpool Session Reports
Questions
1.
What would you pick out as especially good tutoring practice in each of these reports?
2.
Are there other approaches to the issues you might have tried?
3.
What else did you find interesting in the descriptions?
a)
We discussed what B would like to focus on for the session and we decided to work on her clarity of expression. B brought a historical source commentary graded 66 (2:1). I began by sharing
general tips that B could use to identify areas of her work that needed their clarity of expression improving. I then supplemented these broad strategies (primarily proof-reading techniques) with more specific paragraph and sentence level strategies. We then
used her marked piece of work as a tool for improvement. I identified an area of her work that could use development and discussed the processes she might use to clarify her expression. I then identified a second area of her work that could be enhanced and
encouraged B to apply the previously discussed processes to improve her own clarity of expression (which she successfully achieved through editing and rearranging her work in a similar fashion to what I would have suggested). We then repeated this process,
but on this third occasion I encouraged B to identify the area of her work that could use an improvement in clarity. I then ended the session with a summary of what we had covered and the suggestion that she go through this marked piece of work and apply the
strategies we had discussed.
b)
A challenging session. J brought a piece of work marked 74 (that was fairly well-written and typical of his average mark), but expressed dissatisfaction with his writing process and how
his work never seemed to ‘flow’ and always felt disjointed. These feelings have considerably hindered J in the past (despite his good marks) to the point where he has been on occasion unable to submit various pieces of written work. However, he could not highlight
a specific section from the marked piece of work that prompted this reaction, and stated that his work always felt and read better after it had been marked. Therefore, I thought it best to focus on planning, writing, and proof reading strategies that would
improve J’s confidence in himself, his work, and his processes. I stressed that a robust plan and a more structured approach to his writing would help alleviate nervousness and lack of confidence. I also emphasised how these tools can alleviate the stress
of writing by transferring mental burdens (ideas, structures, etc.) to more tangible formats.
c)
S struggles with grammar and her markers have consistently suggested she try to improve this aspect of her writing. We spent the session working through her marked piece of work and I
explained how to resolve her most common grammatical errors. The primary grammatical errors were plural usage, sentence fragments, comma usage (or rather the lack of them), and past, present, and future tense usage. After working through some examples together
I set S the task of identifying grammatical errors and resolving them herself, which she quite capably managed. S’s grammar issue stemmed in part from her writing style, which makes good use of short sentences, but is hesitant to fully develop those that would
benefit from longer form expression (perhaps a result of her tentative comma usage). Therefore, I demonstrated how to edit two or more short sentences into a more effective single sentence, which we then also practiced together. English is S’s second language
and I made sure to emphasize that her overall grasp of English was very good, but that it could be improved by correcting the (comparatively small) grammatical issues discussed in our session.
Not for our exercise (unless you have time) - a few more reports / extracts from reports…
L arrived 25 minutes late to the session. This meant that our interaction was relatively brief and limited. L brought along a source commentary that was graded 2:2 (57). I read over the marker’s comments
and asked L what area he would like to improve. L thought that it was his structure and arrangement of material that needed the most improvement and after quickly reviewing the source commentary I agreed. I enquired about the planning strategy he used when
writing his source commentary and it quickly became apparent that this piece of work was rather hastily written (only 3 days from beginning the assignment to submitting the assignment). I emphasised that it was this restrictive time table that most likely
lowered the quality of his work. To resolve this issue we briefly discussed how a good plan alongside appropriate time management could improve his work. I also provided some brief suggestions to improve his proof-reading, critical thought, and assignment
structure. I have arranged another session with L next week so that he can benefit from a full 45-minute tutorial (I stressed the importance of punctuality and how I would be unable to offer another such concession to lateness).
|
Issues Identified
|
The feedback the student had received indicated that whilst he was clearly well read and had some interesting ideas, these were being lost in poorly structured essays. This was true for both problems questions
and essays.
|
|
Strategies Explored
|
Having looked at several pieces of the student’s work, we devised a strategy to help him structure his arguments in the future.
Planning: T is good at identifying a clear thesis but we agreed that he needs to make this even clearer by also identifying the arguments which underpin this over-arching thesis. He will do this during the
planning stage.
Also during this planning stage T will identify how each paragraph/argument links back to the question and his over-arching thesis statement.
Writing: during the writing stage T will ensure that he continually checks how his argument is answering the question.
Proof-reading: T will try colour coding his draft essay in accordance with a colour system corresponding to his thesis and sub-thesis arguments. It is hoped that this will not only make T look objectively
at his arguments and structure in the proof-reading stage, but will also provide a visualisation of whether he is jumping between arguments in a way which undermines the flow and persuasiveness of his argument.
|
From: learning
development in higher education network [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
On Behalf Of Sandra Sinfield
Sent: 04 July 2018 10:17
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Recording Information - A Summary
Thank you Kate for sharing the responses.
Really interesting - and useful to see what is happening.
It seems to be that there is scope for harnessing these records, asking people for individual short case study exemplars - which could
form a series of practice tales, showcasing different interactions in and across one-to-one sessions?
If we, ALDinHE, captured them - it would help us develop individually and collectively as reflective practitioners - it would help
people apply for their Cep/CeLP - and it would provide a great record of our work.
On 3 July 2018 at 12:53, Kate Coulson <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
Good Afternoon to you all,
Thank you to everyone (Gillian, Pat, Barry, Sue, Lee, Sian, Kim, Paul and Maria!) who replied to me regarding my question
(see below). Here is my summary of the responses for the list:
·
Some teams use a form and get the student to agree to the actions included on the form
·
Others record their interactions on their student record system (allows access for other colleagues where appropriate but some responses highlighted concerns about confidentiality)
·
Whilst some colleagues use student records systems, other use bespoke systems which have been designed specifically for the needs of that team (like here at Northampton), other use Access
databases or Excel and some use online tool such as Google scheduler
·
It seems that some kind of analysis is undertaken at the end of the academic of the notes in some institutions
·
The general consensus that some kind of record is essential but then varying views about level of detail within the record
·
Everyone agreed that it was beneficial to record what happened and the advice/next steps for the student to allow some continuity (most responses included comments about the ad hoc nature
of their support which meant different members of staff picking up students returning for more support)
All in all, this was an interesting and beneficial exercise for me. In my team meeting this morning we discussed this
and decided to record the following on our bespoke system:
Date of Tutorial/121; What the student asked for; What support they received; Next Steps and Signposting; Tutor Initials.
We are going to do this for every tutorial/121 and review it in the autumn term to see if it works and whether it is
beneficial etc.
I’ll report back then if anyone is still interested!
Thanks again,
Kate
Kate Coulson
BSocSc (Hons) MSc PGCTHE SFHEA
Head of Learning Development
Library and Learning Services
DDI
+44 (0)1604 893167
M
+44 (0)7484 802051
<image001.jpg>
northampton.ac.uk
University of Northampton
Park Campus, Boughton Green Road, NN2 7AL, United Kingdom
Follow the story on social media
http://www.northampton.ac.uk/social-media-hub/
Good Morning,
It’s a beautiful day here in Northamptonshire – I hope it is lovely wherever you are!
Quick Question: Do you make a record of your tutorials and if so, what do you record? Here at Northampton we have a
notes section on our booking system which allows us to record what happened in the tutorial. I think this is very helpful as it allows tutors to ‘pick up’ where a different tutor may have left off with a particular student. Do you all do this? If so, what
do you record and if not, why not?
Happy to receive replies direct to me and I can collate for the list.
Thanks as always,
Kate
Kate Coulson
BSocSc (Hons) MSc PGCTHE SFHEA
Head of Learning Development
Library and Learning Services
DDI
+44 (0)1604 893167
<image002.jpg>
northampton.ac.uk
University of Northampton
Park Campus, Boughton Green Road, NN2 7AL, United Kingdom
Follow the story on social media
http://www.northampton.ac.uk/social-media-hub/
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