Psychology students’ experiences of peer tutoring at the

London Metropolitan University Writing Centre

Savita Bakhshi, Kathy Harrington and Peter O’NeillLondon Metropolitan University

BackgroundInitiative of Write Now Centre for Excellence in Teaching and Learning

(CETL).Collaborating institutions: Liverpool Hope University and Aston University.Aims of Write Now:

Enrich students' learning experiences through the development of innovative, evidence-based provision focused on writing for assessment.

Celebrate and promote student writing in the disciplines, enabling students to develop academic and disciplinary identities as empowered, confident writers.

5 years funding from Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE): 2005-2010.

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Opened in October 2006, based in the Department of PsychologyStudent Writing Mentor Scheme Objectives:

1. Avoid institutional duplication (existing Learning Development Unit)2. Offer something innovative in context of UK writing support where peer

tutoring is very rare3. Evaluate a model of student-led writing support that might be

implemented in other Higher Education institutionsThe scheme is collaborative in approach and its purpose is to enable students

to become confident and competent academic writers in their disciplines. The scheme is open to all LMU students across different disciplines, including

psychology. Over 1300 tutorials were conducted with students from various disciplines in

the first year and a half of operation, and around 20% of students who used the Mentor Scheme were in Psychology.

London Met Writing Centre

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Fundamental connection between writing and thinking.Reflective thought is public or social conversation internalised (Vygotsky,

1986):

“If thought is internalised public and social talk, then writing of all kinds is internalised social talk made public and social again. If thought is internalised conversation, then writing is internalised conversation re-externalised.” (Bruffee, 1984: 641)

It follows that engaging students in constructive conversation about their ideas and their writing is likely to lead to better thinking and therefore to better writing.

Undergraduate peer tutors have long been widespread in Writing Centres in North America, but there are only a few Writing Centres or dedicated writing support schemes in the UK, which adopt the North American peer tutoring approach.

Students helping students with writing: a rationale

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The focus is on being: Collaborative, Non-directive, Non-hierarchical Not a content-oriented focus

For collaboration to be real, there must be an attempt to reduce as far as possible the hierarchies inherent in the university (cf. Lunsford, 1991).

As such trained undergraduate peer tutors likely to be ideal facilitators of collaborative learning in fellow students.

Collaborative peer tutorials in writing as an excellent means of getting students engaged in their writing – of cutting through doubts and getting them to actually do something.

“Tutoring in writing is … intervention in the composing process. Writers come to the writing centre sometime during the writing of something looking for help. Often, they don’t know what kind of help is available, practicable, or sensible…. They seem to think that tutoring in writing means either coming to know something new or getting something done to or for them. In fact, though, they need help doing something…” (North, 1982: 434)

Peer collaboration

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“Doing away with study skills”• Real understanding of the complexities of disciplinary writing “can only be

achieved within the subject and through explanations, modelling and feedback by subject tutors” (Wingate, 2006: 463)

OUR HYPOTHESIS:• Students who are themselves engaged with coming to terms with the

complexities of their disciplinary discourse also have a role to play in helping other students

• Moreover, they are close enough to their peers to recognise the confusions that they are going through, confusions which may not be so apparent to a lecturer who has thoroughly internalised the epistemology of her or his discipline

• Collaborating – working together – might be even more effective for real understanding than “explanations, modelling and feedback”

Peer writing collaborators and Academic Literacies

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What happens in a tutorial?“I walked into the tutorial full of half-ideas, and walked out of the tutorial with fully-formed, fully-structured ideas, a good plan in my head of how the assignment would be formed, and two sides of rough notes which included the majority of the things I included in my final draft!…I was able to discuss my ideas, basically verbalise them to the mentor, and by having to put them into words to tell someone, I also had to sort of explain them internally myself in a clear fashion, which I hadn't done up to that point. So I left the tutorial with a crystal clear idea of exactly how I would go about writing up this assignment, things and ideas I would include, and also places to look for more information and areas I needed to research more! I am really happy that I went; students are so lucky to have this service, and I definitely intend on using the writing centre for myself! ”

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Is there a need for peer interaction in Psychology?

Some research conducted on peer interaction in Psychology: Peer e-mentoring (Hixenbaugh, Dewart, Drees and Williams, 2005)Critical thinking skills (Anderson and Soden, 2001)Learning methods (Rae and Baillie, 2005)Statistics (Helman and Horswill, 2002)Peer mentoring (Hill and Reddy, 2007)

Benefits for:StudentsMentorsLecturers

“I’ll be somebody to chat to and to ask questions. Somebody that’s on par with them and not a lecturer, somebody that’s been through it…”

(Hill and Reddy, 2007)9

We argue there is a need for peer mentoring in psychology because: Psychology is a writing-intensive science subject (i.e. essays,

scientific reports, dissertations, case studies, etc). Students may also need help with general writing (i.e. grammar,

punctuation, etc), as identified by Psychology lecturers (see Newman, 2007).

See quote (previous slide)Writing in an academically literate way according to the

expectations of the discipline (including use of APA style) is essential to doing well as a student in Psychology.

The focus is on being: Collaborative, Non-directive, Non-hierarchical

Peer mentoring in Psychology

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The aims of this sessionThis session reports on undergraduate and postgraduate Psychology

student experiences of participating in the Student Writing Mentor Scheme and using the Writing Centre during the first year and a half of operation.

The evaluation will Assess the degree to which students felt that the Writing Mentors

and the Writing Centre provided an environment supportive of their own writing development,

Identify the key factors that shaped the students’ experiences of this new form of writing support provided by the University.

The evaluation will be based on data collected through an online questionnaire.

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The aims of this session (cont…)

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We will report our findings in relation to the following categories:

a. Motivations for using the Scheme b. Specific writing concerns, actual experiences, and post-tutorials

views of Schemec. Nature of relationship between student and Mentord. Students’ attitudes towards their own writing before and after

participating in the Scheme.

Our sampleGender distribution: Females (81%), Males (19%)Native languages other than English= 71% Studying a variety of different subjects, including

Psychology (26%) Art and Design (14%) IT, Media and Communications (10%) IR and Politics (7%)

Undergraduate (75%), postgraduate (21%)This sample is largely representative of the students who visited the

Writing Centre in 2006-07. This presentation will focus on Psychology students responses and

will compare their responses to the overall sample where appropriate.

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a. Motivations for using the Scheme

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Figure 1: Importance of factors influencing Psychology students' decisions to book their first tutorial (n= 15)

0 20 40 60 80 100

Wantingencouragement to

help me staymotivated

Being able to talkabout my writing

with someone else

Wanting assurancethat I'm on the right

track

A lecturer'srecommendation

Very or fairly importantNeither important nor unimportantOnly a little important or not important at all

Being able to talk about their writing with someone else and wanting encouragement to stay motivated were the most important reasons for Psychology students for booking their first tutorial.

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b. Specific writing concerns, actual experiences, and post-tutorials views of Scheme

Figure 2: Students' reasons for booking their first tutorial (n= 25

0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45

Structure

Writing in an academic style

Content

Developing an argument

Spelling, punctuation and grammar

Addressing the question

Critical evaluation/analysis

Writing paragraphs

Using evidence

Subject- specific writing

Motivation to write

Referencing

Other

%

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b. Specific writing concerns, actual experiences, and post-tutorials views of Scheme (cont…)

90%

10%

Figure 3: Degree to which Psychology students felt the reasons for booking their first tutorial were

addressed in that tutorial

Very or fairly well

Not sure

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b. Specific writing concerns, actual experiences, and post-tutorials views of Scheme (cont…)

91%

7% 2%

Figure 4: Students' degree of overall satisfaction with the tutorials they have had (n= 67)

Satisfied or very satisfied

Neither satisfied not dissatisfied

Dissatisfied or very dissatisfied

35% (7)

5% (1)

60% (12)

Figure 5: Psychology Students' degree of overall satisfaction with the tutorials they have

had (n= 20)Satisfied or very satisfied

Neither satisfied not dissatisfiedDissatisfied or very dissatisfied

There were some major differences in the degree of overall satisfaction experienced by the whole sample and psychology students with the tutorials.

Whereas 91% of the total sample was satisfied or very satisfied with their tutorials, only 35% of psychology students were happy with their sessions.

Any ideas why these differences may exist?

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c. Nature of relationship between student and Mentor

Figure 6: Degree to which Psychology students found it helpful to have a Writing Mentor from A DIFFERENT/THE SAME subject area

(total sample n=20/19)

10.5

21.126.3

42.1

90

05 5

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

100

Very or fairly helpful Neither helpful norunhelpful

Only a little helpful ornot helpful at all

N/A

different subject- psychology students same subject- psychology students

Overall, Psychology students found it very or fairly helpful to have a Writing Mentor from the same subject area (90%), compared to the total sample (68.8%).

Further, 26.3% found it little or not at all helpful having a Writing Mentor from a subject area other than Psychology (26.3%), similar to the total sample (23.8%).

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d. Students’ attitudes towards their own writing before and after participating in the Scheme

95%

5%

Figure 7: Degree to which students felt the Writing Centre helped them to develop their writing

generally

Very or fairly helpful

Neither helpful nor unhelpful

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d. Students’ attitudes towards their own writing before and after participating in the Scheme

Figure 8: Students' self-ratings of confidence about their own writing before/after coming to the Writing Centre (n=

68/69)

0

5

10

15

20

Extr

em

ely

con

fid

en

t

Extr

em

ely

un

con

fid

en

t

AFTER BEFORE

Figure 8 shows that students’ confidence levels rose after visiting the Writing Centre.

Conclusions

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We found evidence of: Students visiting the Writing Centre because they wanted to talk

about their writing with someone and wanted assurance that they were on the right track with their assignments.

Psychology students wanted Writing Mentors in their own subject – understandable in UK context of disciplinary degrees.

Student perception that the Writing Centre helped them develop their writing.

Considerable student satisfaction. Psychology students were less satisfied with the tutorials they had, compared

to the overall sample- any thoughts on why perceptions differ?Increased student confidence about their own writing.

Where do we go from here?Research into…

The relationship between participation in the Writing Mentor Scheme and student achievement – for both Mentors and students.

Longitudinal intervention study to assess the impact of the Writing Centre on student performance.

Using quantitative and qualitative methods Collaboration with staff to develop assessment tools for different

disciplines Observation and recording of tutorials Content analysis of student writing, using discipline-specific

assessment criteria Correlation with essay and examination grades

Any ideas?

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References

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Anderson, T., and Soden, R. (2001). Peer interaction and the learning f critical thinking skills. Psychology Learning and Teaching, 1 (1), 37-40.

Bruffee, K. A. (1984). Collaborative learning and ‘the conversation of mankind’. College English, 46, 635-52. Helman, S. and Horswill, M. S. (2002). Does the introduction of non-traditional teaching techniques improve

psychology undergraduates' performance in statistics? Psychology Learning and Teaching, 2 (1), 12-16. Hill, R., and Reddy, P. (2007). Undergraduate peer mentoring: an investigation into processes, acivities and

outcomes. Psychology Learning and Teaching, 6 (2), 98- 103. Hixenbaugh, P., Dewart, H., Drees, D., and Williams, D. (2005). Peer e-mentoring: enhancement of the first

year experience. Psychology Learning and Teaching, 5 (1), 8-14. Lunsford, A. (1991). Collaboration, Control, and the Idea of a Writing Center. The Writing Center Journal, 12.1,

3-10. Newman, M. (2007). ‘Appalling’ writing skills drive tutors to seek help. Times Higher Education, 07 May 2007. North, S.M. (1982). Training Students to Talk about Writing. College Composition and Communication, 33,

434-441. Rae, J. & Baillie, A. (2005). Peer tutoring and the study of psychology: tutoring experience as a learning

method. Psychology Teaching Review, 11 (1), 53. Vygotsky, L. (1986). Thought and Language, revised and edited by A. Kozulin, Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press. Wingate, U. (2006). Doing away with ‘study skills’. Teaching in Higher Education, 11, 457-69.

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www.writenow.ac.uk

Centre for Excellence in Teaching & Learning

Savita Bakhshi s.bakhshi@londonmet.ac.uk