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Studying in College
Writing Before Writing
Tutor Reflections
Marketing Services
Electronics of Reading
Brainteasers

Welcome to the May 2005 issue of the Learning Center Newsletter!

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Welcome Back!

By Mon Nasser, LCN Founder & Advisor

In the February 2005 issue I posted a farewell note since that issue was going to be our last. Since then we have been contacted by many readers who expressed their sadness to see the newsletter's five year run come to an end. Some of these readers also offered to write for the LCN to help bring it back. Well I am pleased to announce that we have managed to put together enough authors... read more

In the Spotlight: What Does Study Mean in College

By Dennis Congos, University of Central Florida

Writing Before Writing: Coaching Students to Play and Plan

By Kyle Cushman, Vermont College of Union Institute and University

Pre-writing (also called "planning" or "exploration") is a stage of the writing process that is well-known to most English teachers. It is less familiar, perhaps, to faculty members from other disciplines. Pre-writing activities, such as brainstorming, can help students...
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In college, the word "study" includes many activities essential to understanding, learning, and good performance on exams. Unfortunately, many students do not know what to do beyond re-reading and cramming...
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Tutors' Reflections: The Benefits of the Training Cycle

By Kim Wensveen, 1st-year Anatomy and Physiology Tutor, Selkirk College, Castlegar, BC, Canada

Edited by Andrea Kösling, MA, Learning Specialist, Selkirk College, Castlegar, BC, Canada

Today, I utilized the training cycle in my session with my tutee. Through group discussion in our tutor-training sessions, we decided that the training cycle involves using diagnosis, modeling, practice, and reflection and planning. We based this on Gattis's (2003) training-cycle model of modeling, practice, and reflection and planning, but we added diagnosis because we decided that it is essential to know what the tutee doesn't know in order...
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Understanding the Millennial Generation: Marketing Your Services

By Julianne Scibetta, University of the Sciences in Philadelphia

The Electronics of Teaching Developmental Reading

By Linda Sweeney, National-Louis University

Literacy has been entwined with technology since the first human being picked up a stick and scratched signs on a cave wall. Most of us are aware of the various methods used to read and write through the ages: chisels and stone tablets, brushes and papyrus, quill pens and scrolls, typeset and printing presses. It's just that we no longer connect the word "technology" to any of this equipment, though we oldsters do tend...
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A colleague of mine once told me of a marketing campaign he ran to attract more students to his tutoring center for an open house. He blew up balloons and attached neon colored index cards on them announcing the center, drawing particular attention to the availability...
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Brainteasers

I must give credit to a popular game from which these questions are taken.

If you submit your answers to me at j.scibet@usip.edu, each month I will keep a tally. The highest points will be announced in next month's column. I try to choose ones that are relatively fair. Feel free to submit to me any good puzzles you may have.

1. Is it more correct to say "The herd of sheep is eating hay in the field" or "The herd of sheep are eating hay in the field"? (1 point)
2. If an average hen's egg is 5cm long, and weighs 300 grams, and an average peacock's egg is exactly twice the length and 2.5 times the weight, which has the greater circumference? (5 points)
3. Three switches outside a windowless room are connected to three lightbulbs inside the room. How can you determine which switch is connected to each bulb, if you may enter the room only once? (10 points)

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