Services for Faculty

Faculty Development

The Writing Center will host various workshops and roundtables for faculty on writing issues and the teaching of writing. If there is a particular topic that you would like to discuss, contact Carrie Brecke.

Peer tutoring

The writing center provides one-on-one 50-minute peer tutoring sessions for your students. Each session is geared to the individual’s writing needs, but typically a tutoring session might include:

Making sense of the assignment
Developing ideas
Using evidence
Understanding audience and genre
Considering organization
Discussing grammar and style
Plotting revision strategies

All students can benefit from occasional tutoring, but instructors might find that some students need on-going attention to their writing. For these students we can set up a weekly standing appointment.

On-line peer tutoring is available for Schaumburg students and those students who have limited time on campus.

Introductions
Someone from the Writing Center would be happy to come to your class and talk with your students about our services. This encourages students to come to the Writing Center who may not have thought of it on their own. It also sends the message that you, the instructor, think tutoring is worthwhile.

Group Work

The Writing Center can send a group of tutors to your classroom to facilitate group work.

Feedback on Assignments

Faculty find that having a conversation with a tutor about a writing assignment provides a useful student perspective. Tutors can shed light on how students might interpret an assignment or what language might be confusing.

Workshops

The Writing Center gives class workshops on documentation, thesis development, organizational strategies, and common grammar errors. We also would be happy to work with you to develop a workshop geared to your class.

Writing Community

The Writing Center is a space on campus devoted entirely to writing. A space where writing happens and conversations about writing and the craft of writing are what we do. Stop in and chat.

Why peer tutoring?

Peer tutoring fosters mutual learning. With peer tutoring, learning is a two-way street. Writers get help with their work and tutors learn from the students they help and through the process of tutoring.
Peer tutoring energizes academic conversation. Many theorists argue that reflexive thinking is very like carrying on a conversation with ourselves. In a tutoring session, those internal conversations are brought out into the open where they can be explored.
Peering tutoring helps students realize that writing is a social activity. As a social activity, writing always takes place within a community and generally this will be a community of peers.
Peer tutoring assists students in discovering one another as resources. Peer tutoring provides an alternative to the traditional classroom where students can learn the kinds of questions that they can ask of themselves and of others.
Peer tutoring creates an undergraduate intellectual community. Peer tutoring provides a social context in which students can participate in the kinds of conversations that academics value.