Reflection for Roosevelt Tutoring Project

My role in this project changed decisively from the debut to the present. During my first sessions, I had tried to
focus on the administrative side of teaching. I would take notes on things like when homework was assigned during
the allotted time period, how to silence a noisy classroom, or how long to give students to work on an in-class
assignment. I remember thinking that balancing the immediate teaching with the preparation would be difficult for
anyone just starting out, and I saw how my supervisor did it instinctively. She was always glancing at the clock,
keeping track of how students were doing with their individual assignments as well as where the collective class was
in her plan for the day. I had forgotten how personal life in high school was; At UW, it is easy to be overlooked
among the four hundred other students in your CSE lecture. Here, Mme. Hilliard had to answer to a million of
student queries, and she did so graciously and with the utmost patience. There were students who had had field trips
and needed to be excused from class, and students with missing assignments who wanted extra credit. Being at
university for over a year had made me forget how responsible teachers are for their students at this level. I have yet
to have a UW class that meets five days a week, so this was also jarring for me. The teacher could spread out her
lesson over the course of two or three days if needed. I realized that this afforded an enormous amount of flexibility
to the instructor, and an elite teacher would use that to their advantage.

Another thing I struggled with was how I was perceived as a tutor. It was a facet of teaching that I had never
encountered, and in the beginning it was more stressful than I had anticipated. I felt constantly watched, in the spot
light and unable to let my guard down. I remember sitting down in an empty desk facing Mme. Hilliard on the first
day, and then thinking that I seemed more like a student than an assistant. I immediately changed places and sat at
the front, facing them in order to give myself a psychological identity. I wanted to be knowledgeable like an
instructor, but remain approachable in the way that teachers sometimes are not to teenagers. However, developing a
rapport with the students proved more demanding than I thought! The shyness of the sixteen year old girl could be
challenging to overcome. This difficulty allowed me to see some of the social problems of this profession, and I can
only imagine that they are compounded ten-fold when teaching a foreign language or teaching those who speak a
foreign language as their first.

Finding my niche was perhaps the hardest part of the service project. I did not immediately know where I fit in, and
discovering where I could be the most useful to instructor and student alike did not become clear until sessions later
on. I originally thought that I would be more of a teacher's assistant, and possibly help with such things as schedule
planning or leading discussions. However, I soon found that at this level of pedagogy (or perhaps it was this specific
situation) the curriculum was too tightly structured for someone with as little experience as me to have much impact.
Combined with the fact that Mme. Hilliard has as many years of teaching experience as I have years in my life, I
realize that my original intentions might have been a little ambitious! Halfway through the quarter I started to
circulate more around the classroom. This allowed me to overhear the difficulties of the students in learning French,
and figure out who needed more attention in what area. One day I helped Brayden understand the different
pronunciations of "boule" and "bule", and he was able to correctly apply the knowledge when called on later. It was
a small moment, but gave me a window into what this profession is all about; the students.

This was a definite turning point for me. I decreased my energy towards being a direct help to the teacher, and
strived to help her by devoting more of my time and thought to the students themselves. One day I gave a table
group a lesson on the past imperfect tense (l'imparfait) because I had overheard one boy complain that he still didn't
understand. Another day was more pronunciation, gently reminding some students to not pronounce the last 's'
unless it is followed by a vowel. These were very small alterations, but the more individual time I spent with the
kids the more I was able to establish a working connection to them. I started to find out how to connect with them
outside the classroom; Simon plays Frisbee like me, and it turns out that we had a few mutual friends. Blair, the
quietest boy in French 3, had spent the previous year in Paris because his dad traveled a lot for work. Adam also
sang as a hobby. By helping them with French, I was helping them form their high school identity.

Or not. Another thing I did not anticipate was that French was a requirement for them, not a privilege. French has
been my passion for close to four years, and some have yet to achieve that level of commitment for the language.
One of my goals for this service learning project was to help the students understand how important French
language and culture was from a global perspective. I also wanted to be able to answer any and all concerns the next
step in the French education, namely studying at a University level. However, the question never came up, even
when college applications were being turned it. It seems that certain students had other primary interests, or were
rarely actively engaged in the lessons and assignments. Because I saw them so infrequently, it was difficult to tell
whether this particular subject was the cause of their latency, or if other factors influenced them more poignantly.
Nevertheless, I feel that in my first quarter of service I did not transmit enough information about why French could
be so important.

Despite this obstacle, I was most useful in giving pronunciation help and grammar questions. I enjoyed using my
linguistic knowledge to precisely describe how to make the sounds like in "ruer" that can stump even the most fluent
of speakers. The 'u' sound is not native to English so it causes a lot of trouble for Americans. I could see the
difference between the habitual past and the indefinite past tenses, and was able to give them other examples besides
the ones that the teacher was providing. The difference between "I used to eat" and "I ate" is very slight, but very
necessary. The subjunctive tense is one we use sparingly in English, and in every French class I have ever taken
there is a collective groan of dismay whenever the instructor announces the start of the subjunctive unit. This was no
exception; the finer intricacies must be made clear in order to grasp French, and I was able to provide another source
of verification.
Overall, I think that my service helped (and will continue to make a difference) because of the numbers of kids in
the class. Mme. Hilliard's second period has over thirty-five students, and dealing with all the 'extracurricular' issues
of the classroom took up a fair amount of time. I was there to provide a focused resource for the work they were
doing right at that moment, without the strings of leading an entire class to hold me back or slow me down. There
was a significant difference between what I could do to help the French three students and how I was able to impact
the A.P. students who were mostly all in their final year taking French at the high school level. Contrary to what I
originally thought, I made a larger difference in the lower level's learning experience. There were a lot more
opportunities for me to circulate around the classroom while they worked individually on worksheets to achieve the
desired foundation for the language. In the A.P. class, the curriculum was more geared towards their oral
conversation requirements than actually developing their grammar or vocab; from my own experience, I know that
the only thing that improves French conversation is practicing French conversation itself. Obviously this is harder to
do in a high school setting so I was of lesser importance to the A.P. students. Talking with Mme. Hilliard about this
phenomenon, she agreed that teaching the lower end of the foreign language spectrum is significantly easier across
the board because you can impact what they absorb a lot more.

Moving forward, I am forward to continuing this project beyond the minimum "quarter-length" time frame. Perhaps
taking a real French class concurrently with tutoring will help me narrow down where I need to improve. I will
continue to go to Roosevelt and help the students, because one of the side effects of teaching is creating a bond with
your students. Although a small part of me feels guilty that I am invested in another high school other than my own,
a larger part feels welcomed by this community and the people within it; go Riders go!

Submitted by Martin Horst on

Jan 12, 2014