A writing consultation is a chance to share your writing with a fellow student and get honest, helpful feedback.

Here’s what to expect when you come to the StudioLab for a writing consultation:

1. One of our consultants will introduce him- or herself and ask you a few questions about your assignment and what brought you to the StudioLab.
2. We’ll ask you to explain the thesis of your paper (what your paper is about in response to the assignment).
3. We’ll spend the next 30-45 minutes talking with you about your writing.
4. Someone will read your paper, most likely aloud (it might be us, it might be you–we’ll get to “why” in a moment).
5. We probably won’t finish reading the entire paper, especially if it’s a long one–we only have 45 minutes.  Yes, there’s a reason for that.

So…… you probably still have some questions.

• Why should someone read the paper aloud?

We’ve all made those little, easy-to-fix mistakes that we somehow just missed.  We left out a verb, or we repeated a word a word or phrase.  When you’ve written something, you know what you meant to say.  So when you read it to yourself, your brain automatically fills in the gaps.  Reading out loud, or even better, letting a consultant read aloud, helps you to hear your words in addition to seeing them, and it makes you more likely to catch those mistakes your eyes would otherwise gloss right over.

You may have seen this optical illusion about reading scrambled letters floating around the internet and social media.

• Why only 45 minutes?

We’ve found that nay longer, and everyone involved gets mentally exhausted.  It gets hard to focus, and the quality of work seems to go down a bit.  So after 45 minutes, we’ll set a few goals–we’ll help you figure out what to do next.  Then we’ll end the consultation.  We’ll help the next student, and you’ll think about what we worked on during the consultation.  Remember, you can always make a follow-up appointment, or come back again later for another consultation about the same paper.  We don’t limit the number of times you come to see us, just how long we focus on one paper or project at a time.

• What won’t happen in a writing consultation?

Strictly speaking, we won’t do “grammar checks.”  This means that we can’t read your paper and circle the grammatical mistakes you’ve made or fix the grammar for you.  However, if you have questions about grammar, please ask them during your consultation!  We can help you understand any grammar questions you may have or mistakes you’re making.  Then we can help you learn how to spot those mistakes and, most importantly, how to fix them.  If we see a recurring problem in your paper, we’ll point it out and help you learn what to look for yourself and how to avoid making the same mistakes again.  We want your grammar to improve in your writing, and that won’t happen if we just point out the mistakes or if we fix things for you.

• What should you bring to a writing consultation?

A pen or pencil, a physical copy of your paper (preferably), and yourself!  If you prefer to edit straight from the computer screen, then we can make that work.  We just find that having a printed copy of your paper very helpful, especially so you can compare before and after revisions to see what works best.

Still have questions?  Email studiolab@furman.edu, call us at 864-294-2323, or visit us on the lower level of the Library!