Tutoring Week 2: Keith

Last Wednesday Shanshan and I met in the library again and we went over an essay she had given me before and a few suggested structures for LSAT essays I had found online. I was surprised by how quickly the time went, we were supposed to meet for an hour, from five to six, but at 6:15 when I suggested we look at another thing (I was worried about not filling out hour) she pointed out to me the time.

The main thing we worked on was the organization. I was really glad I'd seen that video in class about the different cultures' writing styles. I was able to use the visual illustrations from it to help her understand the straight forward, "First I tells 'em what I'm gonna tell 'em, then I tells 'em, then I done tell 'em what I told 'em," form of the American essay.

I explained the necessity of paraphrasing the information in the prompt instead of directly parroting it. One way to get around this was to refer to the information with the insight that the person already knows the details and her job was to interpret, expand on it them. This helped in another way because she wont have to write as much, wasting her time repeating every detail before making a point.

We also looked over a sample essay someone else wrote and she asked me if it was okay to be as pushy as the writer. I then told her how important confidence was to writing and highlighted some of the rhetorical tricks the writer used ("While this option is not bad..." for example)

We talked about a number of things after that (it was so weird to see someone taking notes of what I was saying!) As I signed my time sheet in Karen's office I felt relieved. I can do this, I thought. There was a spot where it asked how much prep time was put into the lesson and I told Karen, "I think I spent two hours preparing," thinking that was a lot. "That's about how much most people prepare," she said. I'm excited about this week!