Get the Most Out of Your Session: Bringing Your Prompt with You

by Melanie

Get the Most Out of Your Session: Bringing Your Prompt with You

When you come into the Writing Center, there are several things you can do to ensure that you get the most out of each session. One of these things is bringing your professor's prompt in with your assignment. As tutors we can only do so much to help you with your paper if you don’t bring your prompt because, well, prompts are important!

Admittedly, it is easy to forget to bring a prompt in for many reasons. But for the tutor, being able to read your assignment’s prompt is invaluable. Not only can we see exactly what your professor has asked for, but we can ensure that you have understood the prompt correctly. Misreading or misunderstanding one simple word, such as “analyze,” can propel an entire paper into the wrong direction, and if your tutor can’t see that, then they won’t know the best way to go about helping you.

Whether you are doing an email OWL or a face to face appointment, if a tutor doesn’t have the prompt, it can be extremely hard to see what, if anything, needs to be addressed in the paper. Not having a prompt requires us to base our understanding of the assignment on the contents of your paper and what you tell us about the prompt.

When you bring in your prompt with your assignment, you are opening the door for a more direct appointment. If you are worried you may forget to bring in your prompt, feel free to copy it into the comment box along with what you want to work on when you sign up for an appointment with the writing center. It is always our goal to help you grow and better yourself as a writer, so we can work with you with or without your prompt, but the best way to get the most out of a tutoring session is to bring it along with you!