Observation of Writing Center Consultation

I observed a writing center consultation earlier in the semester. The student came to the writing center looking for advice on how to better his assignment. The writing assignment was for his freshman-level history class. How I would have consulted with the student was far from how the trained consultant handled the situation.

The female consultant was very warm and accommodating towards the student. She initially asked what the student’s concerns were and proceeded to go through his draft of the assignment. They read through it alone at first, and then went through it again together. The consultant asked what seemed like innocent questions throughout, which lead the student to take on the responsibility of identifying ways in which the paper could be improved in his own way. Her questioned prompted the student to begin thinking analytically about his own work. The consultant never truly gave her own opinion or suggestions for fixing specific problems with the writing. Instead, she opened a dialogue in which the student did most of the talking. In his elaboration, he was forced to reconcile his his own concerns with the assignment.

Not immediately realizing the strategy of the consultant, I asked both parties to entertain my own questions, concerns, and suggestions for the student-writer. Without any sort of training, I came upon the conclusion that the problems manifested in this particular assignment, by this particular student-writer, were the result of poor instruction by the teacher who assigned the work. As a history major, I felt entitled and responsible for making the student aware that his assignment was, in fact, to write a review of a particular chapter. The prompt described, in what I felt was insufficient detail, many of the components necessary in writing a historical review. In addition to this wisdom, I indicated that the draft lacked a thesis, a conclusion, and a couple other required details as prescribed in the prompt.

My observation of the writing center allowed me to view the writing center for what it is, rather than what I assumed it to be: the writing center is a tool at the disposal of students to help better themselves as a writer, rather than to better their writing assignment as a grade. Though the writing center has its benefits, there is a catch: what you get out of it is dependent on what you go into each consultation with and your openness to change how you think about writing.