My two very different observations!

When I went to observe a tutoring session, I originally scheduled my observation with Princess, and I ended up observing Princess and Marissa at the exact time. Of course, it was very difficult and hard to keep up with them both, but the fact that they were two different types of tutors made it easier to take notes on both going back and forth between documents. I started observing Marissa first because her appointment started 5 minutes before Princess’s. Marissa was a more down to business tutor, she was very professional and courteous to the student she was tutoring. She always asked the student if it was okay if she read the paper out loud or if the student rather read it aloud. She was always making sure her tutee was always comfortable. I noticed that her focus was to point out the grammar errors, the lack of a thesis statement, and formatting. I personally thought grammar isn’t what you should address first once reading the tutee’s paper, but she was very good at making grammar into something positive to work on and even saying to the tutee “don’t worry everyone struggles with grammar it’s not something everyone excels at”. Marissa saying this made the tutee more comfortable and open to feedback from Marissa which ended up being a very good tutoring session. I noticed how the tutee was a perfectionist and was very nervous about being judged for her opinion on her paper or anything that could be wrong with it. Marissa did a good job bringing the tutee’s confidence up by telling her she was a good writer and only had minor grammatical errors with some formatting issues that every student goes through. Marissa was a very thorough tutor and very open and friendly with her tutee; by the end of their session they had gone through the entire paper and Marissa offered to email the tutee’s professor which the tutee responded with a yes. I will admit I didn’t tell Marissa I was observing her because I wasn’t planning on observing her it just happened in the moment. I’m also glad I didn’t because I felt if she didn’t know maybe she would be more of herself in a regular tutoring session. I was very impressed with Marissa’s tutoring style and if there’s one thing I’d recommend for her is to make a more emotional or personal connection with a student, so the tutee is comfortable by the very beginning of the session.

Once Princess’s tutee finally arrived, I could instantly tell that she had tutored this student before with how they interacted with each other. Princess was a very friendly tutor who asked more friendly and as a regular student just peer reviewing a friend’s paper. She asked her tutee a lot of questions when it came to what their paper was about and what were they worried about the most. The tutee had been going to Princess consistently for the same paper, I could tell because the tutee even said, “isn’t it way better than last time!”. Observing Princess made me feel like a secret spy eavesdropping on a conversation because there were moments where they weren’t talking about the writing so they would start whispering or talking lower. It was a very chill session that ended quickly since the tutee had been there at least once already for the same paper. This tutoring session was very different compared to Marissa’s tutoring session because Marissa’s was more professional and focused on the task at hand while Princess’s tutee wasn’t very focused on getting help with her paper and rather talk to Princess about TV shows. I could tell that Princess isn’t the dominant type and is easier going while Marissa was more of a professor, she kept the tutoring session very professional and goal oriented. Princess was very nice and came to talk to me once she finished her tutoring session, she offered to answer any questions I had and showed me the form tutors must fill out after tutoring sessions. Overall, both tutors worked well with their tutee’s and were very comfortable doing their job. I do regret not telling Marissa I tutored because I would have loved to see what knowledge she had to offer me.