During my tutor sessions, I have noticed some students who tend to skim through readings in order to say they read it. When it comes to them having to talk about the reading, or interpret it, they tend to get super confused and anxious. Yes, the student can claim they had read the readings, but they did not actually take anything from it; almost as if they are expecting someone to interpret the analysis aspect for them.
I have noticed a relationship between reading and drafting within their own work. For example, I often have students read their work out loud to me in order to catch errors. This is often a key moment in the drafting process. Students start to notice grammatical mistakes, and some structural mistakes as well. Sometimes this reveals to a student that their paragraphs do not exactly flow or that there is a bit of confusion on the actual point they are trying to make. This can lead to another look upon the reading in question.
Personally, when I read, I make notes in the margins. I underline things that I feel are important; I make note of any questions I may have well reading; I also tend to summarize difficult paragraphs into the margins in order to ease some of the confusion I may have with the reading. I’ve found that those strategies help me to better understand the reading, and they keep me engaged in the reading. As long as I’m engaged, I tend to do a thorough job of reading.
Lastly, on page 109, Gillespie and Lerner introduce different examples on ways that tutor sessions can almost go wrong. Example 1 is about co-constructing confusion. I have experienced this a couple times, but not too often. Sometimes, I try to guide a reader to a certain area that needs some work. If they don’t necessarily understand the problem I am trying to eliminate, they may not come up with many valid solutions on how to fix the problem. However, it becomes difficult when I do not want to cross the line, which is another example given by Gillespie and Lerner. Tutoring is a process where the tutee is given different tools to help them grow as readers and writers. Guiding a writer to your own ideas hinders their learning process because you are essentially doing it for them. This can sometimes be tricky to avoid.
