[owl hoot sound effect]
Hi, I'm Joe, content coordinator for the
Purdue OWL. If you're a new graduate
teacher in the English department and
you're anything like me back when I
started you may be feeling a little
overwhelmed by all the duties that now
lay before you. Well have no fear, you
don't have to shoulder those duties
alone. The free services offered at the
Purdue Writing Lab can help you be the
best teacher you can be. Our tutors are
always available to work with your
students on their writing, and our data
shows that undergrads who use the
Writing Lab get higher grades, and by the
way, grad students do too. We also offer
group workshops, writers rooms, and even
special events for ESL students. All of
these things help ensure that you aren't
the only person your students can turn
to when they need writing help. What a
relief, huh? Now we're going to hear from
two experienced ICAP teachers, Elizabeth
and Isaac, who also work in the Writing
Lab. It's our hope that by sharing their
experiences, they'll help illustrate all
of the cool ways that the Writing Lab
can help graduate TAs. My tutoring
experience impacted the way I responded
to student work, and also how I ask
questions and coach students to
problem-solve. You know, when I created
assignment sheets, I kept my students my
student audience in mind, so how they
might understand or receive the
information I'm requesting of them. Also
my lesson plans unintentionally mirrored
some of the pedagogies I adopted as a
tutor. I would also talk to tutors and
staff about my lesson plans from time to
time, which really helped me talk about
argument and research topics that are
somewhat difficult to teach but also to
understand and learn at the same time. So
typically when I'm teaching 106, I try to
get students into the Writing Lab as
soon as possible, so that means maybe
taking them on a tour of the Writing Lab,
having the Writing Lab staff walk them
through what we do, and I also will tell
them about the Writing Lab and pitch the
Writing Lab to them as a place where
they can work on their writing and
develop their skills, and I—I try to do
that pretty early on in the semester.
I think writing is a really
collaborative task, like there's this
idea that, oh, if you're a really good
writer what that means is you just go
off and write in like your garage or
attic and then come down with a fully
polished manuscript and that's just not
how it works.
Writing is a conversation so from the
very beginning, like, it's always focused
towards an audience, it's always focused
towards a community, and so it only makes
sense that, if writing is this
conversation, that you involve other
people in the conversation and make sure,
like, okay am I actually saying what I
think I'm saying, am I actually like
meeting the assignment requirements, are
there things I'm not seeing in my own
writing. So I'm a PhD student who writes
quite often and without feedback all of
my documents would look a lot different.
They would have important details
missing. You know, I think sharing your
work with others means that you're
inviting added development to your work,
a development that just can't always be
seen internally. So when I'm teaching 106
I typically try to make sure my students
are coming to the Writing Lab as soon as
possible and what that usually means is
I have them come visit the Lab and have
one of the tutors walk them through, okay
like, this is what the Lab is, this is
what they do here, but then also like
I'll give them the Writing Lab spiel in
class, like I've been in writing centers for
for pretty much ever and so like I have
that that kind of like talk down, and
so I'll just like tell them about the
Writing Center class and um push them to
go as they're working on their different
projects. You know I even talked about
how I use the Writing Lab for my own
writing, and I do this quite often so, you
know before I even started working at
the Writing Lab I would share with my
ICAP students about how I'm writing this
article or I'm writing, you know, this
paper for my own classes and I go to the
Writing Lab pretty consistently to work
on that, and that—and that tends to be
received pretty well by students.
So I quite often encourage writers to
engage in conversation with their
instructors, professors, and advisers.
Sometimes my job as a tutor isn't
about—isn't about explaining how to
write something, but rather explaining
that I simply just don't have the
answers, you know what works in my field
might not work in theirs,
so there's differences in assignments
and also across disciplines. I will push
them to seek help from advisers or from
their, like, professors if they have
specific disciplinary questions or if
they have questions about, like, the
assignment or how it's structured. I think
that's—that's pretty much the only time
I'll have them go look for help
somewhere else, like, pretty much always
it's like, okay here's the Writing Lab, go
to the Writing Lab. I don't force them
obviously because I think that leads to
kind of sessions where students are less
invested in the work they're doing, but I
definitely push pretty hard for everyone
to show up at the Writing Lab at some
point in the semester. I have right now
about four reoccurring writers, which
almost all of them have explicitly told
me that the work we're doing together
collaboratively has really helped them.
They'll sometimes—they'll write it in
the actual appointment form and say
thank you so much for your feedback, or
thank you so much for the conversations
that we had recently, it's really helped
me a lot as a writer and also just, you
know, thinking about the subject matter
that I'm talking about. I was working with a
student who was applying for a pretty
big job in Indianapolis directing a
series of hospitals and a couple months
later I heard back and she sent me a
thank-you note because she got the job.
I've worked with people who are prepping
for academic job interviews and had them
get jobs, I've, like had people get
scholarships and those are all really
tangible ways you can see, okay, what I'm
actually doing, how I'm working with
people is making an impact in their
lives, and I think that's one of the best
feelings. So in short ICAP teaching and
the Purdue Writing Lab go
together like mustard and mayo. I've put
some links in the description that can
direct you to some of our most relevant
services and I've linked a video here
that explains how to sign up for
tutoring. Hope to see your students or
you soon!