A good teaching philosophy is a statement of your beliefs, assumptions, and knowledge about teaching and learning.  Similarly, a philosophy of tutoring is a statement of your beliefs, assumptions, and knowledge about tutoring.  The beliefs, assumptions, and knowledge you have might depend on the formal studying you’ve done throughout your years in the English Education program.  They might depend on the experiences you’ve had in your years as a student and on the teaching experiences you’ve had in or out of the tutoring environment.  All of these elements are worthy of discussion in the tutoring philosophy, which basically says, “This is what I believe as a tutor.” 

The tutoring philosophy also might discuss the practices and methods you employ to help writers learn and could certainly benefit from specific examples you could provide from your life experiences.  It could include a series of position statements that address specific issues that come with the territory of tutoring writing, including students’ rights to their own language, the boundaries set up (and perhaps crossed) during tutoring, and many others that we may not have time to address in this class.  The tutoring philosophy might show where you stand on the issues.

The benefits of writing a tutoring philosophy are several-fold.  Articulating a tutoring philosophy might help you understand why you do what you do during a tutoring session.  Articulating a philosophy can also help determine if a particular tutoring environment is right for you.  That is, if your philosophy is radically different from that of the environment you’re considering tutoring in, you’ll know that if you accept a job there you’ll have to radically change either yourself (which is easier but causes a lot of mental anguish) or the tutoring environment's philosophy (which is harder but more satisfying in the long run).  Finally, having a pre-articulated philosophy will help you fill out job applications and do well in the interview, because many people will ask what your educational/teaching philosophy is, and a tutoring philosophy can be incorporated there.

Just as all tutors are developing tutors, all tutoring philosophies are developing tutoring philosophies.  I just laugh when I look at the simplistic educational philosophy I began with over 20 years ago compared to the document I’ve most recently written.  And the more I read, the more I add to it.  It will never be finished, and I don’t expect yours to be, either.  But (yes, I just started a sentence with “but.”  Get over it.), I do expect that you’ll have a draft of a philosophy that is presentable in its current form to a potential reader, be it an administrator, parent, student, or another teacher.

There are so many forms a tutoring philosophy might take that I’m not going to put limits on it for you, but you’ll be working on this throughout the semester by doing thinking exercises, reading, drafting and exchanging drafts with each other and with me.  I’ll see your philosophy and give you suggestions throughout the semester and will help you determine how effective it is.

Questions?  Please raise them in class so that everyone may benefit from the clarification.