After just a couple of weeks in the PSY 204 course I feel that I am learning a lot of useful things. The guest speakers and videos we have viewed have helped to give me a better understanding of the intricacies of the tutoring process. From the first of the Tutoring Video Series I learned about how to combine academic abilities with specific goals of tutoring in order to get the most out of the time you have with a pupil. The session conducted by Mr. Cortez on lesson planning seemed like a very good place to start in teaching us how to become better tutors. Mr. Cortez was very thorough about the different elements hat should go into any lesson plan. Although I was familiar with some of the elements such as the objective and purpose, there were some elements such as the anticipatory set and the modeling aspect that I was less familiar with. Mr. Cortez's approach of reinforcing the main points of a lesson plan really showed me how much one needs to keep driving home the main points in order to get the message across. In the session conducted by Ms. Aleshire on Communication Skills I thought that her introduction was a very effective way to begin her message. In giving us good and bad directions to make a party hat she was able to vividly illustrate some of the issues regarding communicating effectively with others. I also found that many of her points during her session coincided with the Video 5 of the Tutoring Series. Specifically, elements pertaining to reading body language and facial expression really seemed to complement that information that was presented in the video. The part about asking more open ended questions as opposed to closed ended questions is something I know that I will have to try and remember during my tutoring sessions. Being aware of my pupil's body language will let me know if the student is really understanding what I am explaining to them. There was one part of the video that was a little confusing to me though. In the beginning the video talked about using the Socratic method as well as tests and quizzes in order to get a diagnosis through observation. Unfortunately I am not all that familiar with the Socratic method, so I will have to inquire of either Ms. Aleshire or someone else about exactly what that is and how it applies to tutoring. Although I have not started my job tutoring yet, I am looking forward to applying some of the methods I have learned so far in order to strengthen and improve my tutoring abilities.