TUTOPAR-LLE: an experiment in peer tutoring

Abstract

Re-structuring of undergraduate courses in conformity with the requisites of „Bologna‟ has meant, among other things, a change in the access requirements for the two foreign language courses of the Institute of Arts and Humanities. Students may now enrol to study German, French or Spanish having no previous knowledge of these languages. The subsequent and inevitable disparity in the language levels of first year students has been problematic for language teachers. „Bologna‟ also entailed an emphasis on student-led rather than teacher-led education. With this in mind, one attempt to overcome the problematic of disparate language competence in the European Languages and Literatures undergraduate course has been through the implementation of the peer tutoring programme „Tutopar-LLE‟, (two editions completed). It also aims at reducing problems of university adaptation and increasing study efficiency. This presentation will use questionnaires and personal interviews to examine the tutor programme from various perspectives (tutor, tutee, language coordinator), while showing how experience gained from a previous tutor programme, TUTUM, helped shape it.