Critical Thoughts on Rachel Templeton's Consultation (Just Kidding)

     Today I met with Rachel, who consulted a paper I wrote for my Native American literatures class. It was an interesting experience, especially at this point in the class, when most of us have hopefully started to develop are own style to approach consultations for when we work in the writing center next semester. Rachel was great, and made several points and raised several questions that made me step back and consider my paper from a new angle. It really was useful. Simultaneously, I found this assignment useful because I was able to see a different approach (a least a potentially different approach to what I think my approach might be next semester) and how it worked. Rachel was fairly direct and asked lots of questions. She was sure to move the chairs closer together, made the consultation dialogue-based, and considered what I had to say very important. This is not at all a critique on her work. Nevertheless, I noticed how I would have done things a bit differently. I would have probably stated more clearly what I thought should be done. This takes us back to the facilitative vs. directive conversation, and yes, facilitative is far better. But sometimes, asking questions when answers are clearly desired are unnecessary in my view. Questions should be used to truly generate ideas, not to point out error when error can simply be pointed out by saying: ERROR! Maybe I'm being a bit dramatic here.
     In addition, I noticed how strongly personality makes a difference when approaching a consultation. Some of us might have to force ourselves to ask the student personal questions and to make small talk. I will likely have to stop myself from asking to many personal questions or gossiping about what happened last weekend at the lodges, etc. But seriously, personality plays an important role that can be used to our advantage. We can zone in on our area of expertise (or interest) which we are partial to based on our likes and dislikes while simultaneously being sure to hit all of the hot spots...asks some questions, do the consultation appropriately, be facilitative, etc. But the bottom line is that students come back to consultants because they like what they find....not every consultant is the same and for good reason. Beneficial diversity exists to support a diverse student body (yes, even here at Richmond).