Working as a private tutor is a rewarding experience. After all, you get the opportunity to be your boss, which includes setting your tutoring fee, determining how many students you want to take on, and fixing tutoring timings, says private tutors in Calgary. However, no business is easy, and to become a successful private tutor, you must think strategically about your work.
Whether you are a seasoned tutor or new to the tutoring world, you will be well aware that each student is different, and what works for one doesn’t work for another. So the purpose of this blog post is to give you some tips on mixing and matching your tutoring.
Here are the top 5 tips suggested by private tutors in Calgary to become a good private tutor:
- Customize your teaching to the needs of your student: Most tutors teach all students the same way. But if you want to be effective as a tutor, you must tailor your teaching style to the student’s requirements. For instance, some students may need a more explanatory style of instruction than others. Also, learn to modulate your lessons to the age group of the students you are teaching. Younger children respond better when you use creative or demonstrative methods of teaching.
- Keep it fresh: A lesson plan that may be interesting for two or three lessons will cease to be so once the novelty wears off. Surprise your student by introducing new activities in a class (e.g., games testing their maths skills, songs illustrating a theme or poem recently studied, or a brand new app that encourages them to put what they have learned to practical use).
- Be patient, be innovative: Some students can grasp concepts at a quicker pace than others. Don’t despair if you find that you have to repeat ideas you have already spent a considerable amount of time explaining. If you find that your students have problems retaining information, try to use memory retention techniques like mind maps, which take a visual approach to synthesizing and memorizing large quantities of information.
- Ask your student how you can improve: Sometimes, it pays to get to the point and end a tutoring class by asking how you feel you can make the class more beneficial to them, suggests the private tutors in Calgary. Some students will ask for more variety; others will tell you that you are going too fast and need to spend more time on the basics. At this stage, you can also suggest ways you feel your student can make the most of what you are teaching them through additional projects they can complete in their own time.
- Make it personal: You can probably recall a teacher that changed your life, inspired you to become more academic, or gave you the gentle push you needed to make it into University or the course of your choice. What made this teacher so special was probably the personal interest in you, their gentle understanding of your circumstances, obstacles, and goals. This teacher or tutor probably walked that extra mile to bring you a book you needed or told you how much they believed in your ability. It is amazing how something as simple as a lack of confidence in one’s skill and capacity can be a student’s greatest downfall.
Try to be that source of inspiration for your student, says private tutors in Calgary. Point out the areas you feel they have talent in; encourage them to write if they express themselves well. Sometimes, something as simple as telling your student they are amazing is the only thing they need to reach for the stars.
