Why arrange tuition for your child?

What is tuition?
Private tuition is very different to school teaching. Whereas teaching may take place in a noisy and distracting environment of 30 mixed ability students, private tutoring allows the opportunity for one-to-one individual direction amongst quiet and focussed surroundings.

Tutors provide personalised education. A tutor is able to learn more about your child’s personal needs and requirements. Each session is tailored to suit each pupil with the aim of increasing their understanding and achievement.

Over the progress of tuition, tutors are able to develop a deep understanding of how a student learns. They may discover potential problem areas, assisting students to overcome  learning barriers. If your child has become unmotivated as a result of the tedium of school work, tutoring can help spark their interest – incorporating individual interests into subject matter where it would be impossible in a classroom of 30 pupils.

Fundamentally tutors allow for a greater sense of control and direction in learning. They can work with you and your child to set academic goals, as well as a structured plan to achieve them.

Why might I want to arrange tuition for my child?
Parents typically contact LST to arrange tutoring for one of three broad reasons:

1. The school teacher’s teaching style does not suit your child
This is a very common problem, especially for students of science and maths. Some students are more quantitative in their learning – requiring formulae and derivations. Others are more qualitative, wanting imaginative descriptions and practical analogies. If a teacher’s style of teaching does not match with your child’s learning style, this can be incredibly detrimental to their learning. The cumulative nature of science is that later work is built on the foundations of earlier material. As a result of your child being unable to learn effectively, they may fall further behind through no fault of their own. This can lead to decreased confidence and lowered grades.

In a classroom, one teacher may be faced with around thirty pupils, each with different abilities, different rates of learning, and individual strengths and weaknesses; yet despite this, for the majority of the lesson the teacher will be forced to treat his class as if it contained just one student. He or she will orate from one end of the classroom, unable to gauge how effectively each pupil is assimilating the lesson. The lesson plans will be designed to fit the needs of the average pupil; and the teacher will proceed at a rate suitable for the average pupil. A bright child may fail to grasp one point and fall behind, not want to draw attention by asking a question in front of the whole class.

In Science there are many different ways of understanding concepts or getting to an answer. The nature of a classroom is that typically only one approach is discussed. A good tutor will identify how your child visualises scientific concepts, adapting their teaching style to be most effective. The tutor will be able to appreciate your childs unique perspective and ensure that the subject is broken down and taught in the most approachable and appropriate fashion

 

2. Your child has fallen behind with their school work
There are a number of reasons your child may have fallen behind – perhaps due to illness, absence or as a result of not have been taught earlier material in a suitable fashion.

The form of school teaching unfortunately does not allow for individual assistance to bring your child back up to speed. This can have potentially disastrous consequences as the exams loom. Students can feel stress and anxiety as they are forced to learn a years worth of material from scratch a few weeks before the exam.

A good tutor can work with your child to develop a schedule of tutoring sessions and targeted homework, ensuring that all problem areas are dealt with and that the fundamentals have been learnt effectively. This ensures that appropriate material is understood and consolidated long before exam season – allowing your child to spend their time effectively practicing exam questions rather than learning unknown material.

 

3. Your child is not being stretched at school.
Some students are not satisfied with preparing for exams, but want to follow their individual scientific interests deeper and further e.g. in genetics, astronomy, or calculus. Your child may be left feeling frustrated and bored by the slow pace of progress and lack of support in the classroom. Some students find that their questions are not satisfactorily answered by their teachers.

Given the current shortage of qualified science and maths teachers, many currently teaching science are not necessarily specialists.

An enthusiastic and engaged specialist tutor is able to work with these students, taking them beyond the syllabus and sharing their passion for the subject. These tutors allow students to follow their interests, supporting them with interesting problem sets and recommended reading. This ensures that your child is not held back unnecessarily by an arbitrary teaching schedule.

 

Arranging tuition

If you are interested in discussing tutoring options for your child, please do feel free to get in touch.

Further articles of interest can be found at Parent Resources.

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