1. The tutors usually open
the workshop by trying to sell the students on the advantages of conversation
and collaborative learning.
2. They have a favorite group exercise
that serves as an ice breaker. It also illustrates the advantages of collaboration:
individuals, small groups, and then the large group usually reach different,
and more accurate, conclusions the more they collaborate.
3. What Bruffee terms "constructive
reading" forms the first component of a three-part review process. By reading
a text to understand what its parts do and say, students
learn to describe before they prescribe. The workshop leaders illustrate
what words do and what they say.
4. In their writing course, tutors
in training write outlines describing what paragraphs do and say in one
another's papers. Tutors usually don't, however, write outlines during
a tutorial. Workshop leaders use the outline to help the group describe
a sample paper.
5. Workshop leaders use a piece of
writing from the class to illustrate the does/says process of constructive
reading.
6. The second part of the review
process involves a discussion of a hierarchy of evaluative concerns ranging
from unity, coherence, and development to style, grammar, and mechanics.
Tutors sometimes advise students to discuss these matters of form last
in their review process.
7. The final component of the review
process is for many tutors the second part. This stage of substantive review
is where the reader questions the writer's point, argument, and assumptions.
8. After the class has practiced
reviewing a sample paper, the tutors get the students working in pairs
or small groups on their own writing.
9. After some time is spent with
students working in pairs or small groups, the class reassembles in one
group for final observations and assessment.
