Of the four observations I’ve had so far, the assignments for three of the observations were due the same day. In fact, one observation was due thirty minutes after the client had arrived to the Writers’ Room. This, I am certain, is a common theme seen by most consultants. I immediately ask myself how students can do this. And, of course, I immediately know the answer. How? Well, I AM that student. I always write essays either the same day or the night before. This is the case for many students. But this is not the case for all students.
In high school I never knew how to get started or how to finish essays. I would hit a brick wall. I would have a brain fart. I would have writer’s block. You name it. I had it. And we must remember that this is the case for many students. This is when tutors should be at their best. As Christina Murphy states, tutors should be like psychotherapists, “awaken[ing] individuals to their potentials and to channel their creative energies toward self-enhancing ends” (Murphy 98). The tutoring, the psychoanalyzing, must provide the client self-awareness and self-actualization.
Whether it is writer’s block, self-doubt, anxiety, negative cognition, or procrastination, students entering a writing center all have one thing in common: they make themselves “vulnerable in opening themselves up to understanding or misunderstanding, judgment or acceptance, approval or disapproval” (97). This is one important thing I hadn’t considered before. Students may feel hurt or even unwilling to get help, and this is when tutors must make certain the clients feel “safe, secure, free from threat, and supporting but not supportive” (Peterson 498). This is when tutors must be psychoTHERAPISTS.
Murphy, Christina and Steve Sherwood. The St. Martin's Sourcebook for Writing Tutors. 3rd ed. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's, 2008. Murphy, Christina. “Freud in the Writing Center: The Psychoanalytics of Tutoring Well.” 95-99.
Peterson, C.H. Theories of Counseling and Psychotherapy. 3rd ed. New York: Harper and Row, 1980.
You made me think about Murphy in a way I usually don't. I react so strongly against her presentation of clients as "hurt" that I'm tempted to overlook the real kernels of wisdom in what she is saying. But considering, from the perspective of a self-confessed "bad writer" - the one who waits to the last moment to do assignments, I mean - that maybe students really DO need tutors to be particularly empathetic and approachable...Well, it just makes me reconsider my tendency to dismiss Murphy. Hmm. Be sure to bring up these complicating issues in class, too. My reading of our readings (that sounds weird, but you know what I mean) isn't always necessarily "right."
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