offer writing samples. We have a writing contest for the summer party and we collect holiday memories for the holiday party. At these times, we ask students and tutors to enter a short story (or long if they want), we give them a topic ideas, and the tutor and student take it from there. We don't edit these entries; we publish them "as is" in a booklet we hand out at those two events.We don't need a summer or Christmas party to encourage our students to write. What we need is for you, the tutor, to prompt them -- give them some topic to write about and let them go. Tell your student the "essay" can be as long or short as they wish. It can be a personal story, a made up story, about feelings, or anything else they want to write about. Our director provides a new writing prompt in each monthly newsletter--this is a great starting point!
The following is a wonderful story submitted by one of our students at the prompting of her tutor. It's a perfect example of a writing sample and in this case, we learn something about another culture as well.
Read on!
Korean Thanksgiving (unedited)
By: Wonsook Lee
In September we have a big holiday in Korea. It's like our Memorial Day and Thanksgiving holiday put together. We make food and have a ceremony for our ancestors. Then we go to the cemetery.We have a big table with food. My deceased mother's and father's pictures are on the table. There is also a letter picture with symbols of memories of them that we give to them. We open every window and door and imagine that my mother and father come in. All the brothers bow to them one by one. A daughter does not bow traditionally, because she is not part of that family. She becomes part of her husband's family. After bowing, we talk to our parents silently about our wishes. I talked to my mother about my wish to have a health family. My mother died a few years ago and I was not able to go to her funeral. I wanted to go for this holiday to worship my parents. After the talking to our parents, we eat special foods. I was able to talk to my brothers over dinner and they talked to each other. They aren't able to get together very often.This celebration happens early in the morning. After we finish eating, we go to the cemetery. When we do to the cemetery, we cultivate the lawn around the tomb. We also take flowers. Some families bring the food to the cemetery, when they don't worship at home. They perform the ceremony there. Our family does it at home. On New year's Day, by the lunar calendar, we have a similar holiday to honor our ancestors, but we don't go to the cemetery on that day. Before the September holiday our family went to my big brother's house to help make the food. Usually a sister does not go to her big brother's house, because she would go with her husband's family. Since I was visiting from America, I went. My brother's house was so clean. Everything was put away so we could have room to make the food. They even put away the couch and table. My little brother lives far away, so he went to my big brother's house two days before the holiday and stayed there. Many things have changed in my country for this holiday. So many people are traveling before and after the holiday, that the traffic is terrible. Some people don't go to the cemetery. They stay at the oldest brother's house. They want to avoid the traffic. If some of the brothers don't want to go to the cemetery, the others take care of the gravesite. When the brothers don't have time to go to the oldest brother's house, they just send money or call and say they can't come. Traditional the oldest brother has the responsibility to take care of the parents. The reason is that the oldest brother inherits 50% of the parents' property. The other brothers divide up the other 50% of the property.
Please, take a minute and help your student create a writing sample to share. You can post on this blog to share and you can also use the blog to ask questions of each other, tutor to tutor, student to student, student to tutor.
Let the ‘blogging’ begin!
Sue
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