Don't Forget to Ask

posted by WyzAnt tutor: Karina R.

My latest thoughts have again been inspired by one of those little surveys WyzAnt like to ask their tutors. This time the question was about what we, as tutors, think parents should ask of us before hiring us to help their children. A seemingly innocent, simple question which, nevertheless, left me thinking.

To be honest, I hadn't really considered this before. I do a lot of the asking in the other direction: I ask parents what grade their child is in, what the class is, whether there is anything special about the class, the school, the teacher or the child I should know about, how easy or complicated their schedule is, how their student is struggling in the class and why exactly they are looking for a tutor. I ask the students themselves a whole lot too, ranging from what they think about their teacher, to how often, when and where they study, to what they do during the class. But I had never really stopped to think about how important it is to be asked good questions by the parents, too.

Of course, part of the reason I don't think about this is simply because I instead consider what information to provide, without being asked. But the two things are not necessarily the same thing. As a tutor, I have learned to gauge a student's understanding of a concept from the questions they ask. It happens quite often that a student asks a question they consider very simple, a minor detail, which leads to a very in depth discussion of some very basic, key concept that would have made things much more complicated, had it been left unexplained. Questions help me uncover deep rooted conceptual problems. They also help me learn about the way of thinking of a student, by showing me that one certain way of explaining something didn't quite work, and I should think of another one. In summary, a student's questions help me get to know the student much better.

Just as knowing my students well is an essential part of my job, so is knowing their parents. Of course, I won't interact with my students' parents as much, and their learning style doesn't really affect me, but they play a very important role in my students' academic lives, so knowing them is also very important. And just as I can learn a lot about a student from their questions, I can also learn about their parents. Yet, sadly, not all parents ask as many questions as I wish they would. Apart from the basic inquiry about my experience teaching a given subject, and more mundane details such as schedules and the like, few parents ask anything else. This means I have to get to know them slowly and incompletely via the limited interaction we have in the few minutes before and after a lesson, if they are there at all!

As a teacher, I always encourage my students to ask questions to me and to their teachers at school, so they can learn as much as possible. Today, I would like to encourage parents to do the same. Ask us questions to get to know our teaching style, what our thoughts are on how we will structure lessons, what we think about your children's learning styles, or even simpler and more personal questions just to get to know us as a person. A lot can be learned from a question, as well as from the answer to it. Let's make sure we all learn as much as possible.

The Tortoise and the Hare at School

posted by WyzAnt tutor: Karina R.

A recent survey question from the WyzAnt people got me thinking. The question asked how many hours of tutoring in took, on average, to help a student go up a letter grade. I found myself hesitating before answering, because I have done two different types of tutoring, with two very different results. In the end, I decided to answer based on my favorite type of tutoring: 7 to 10 hours.

Let's think a little bit about what this means. With most students, I meet once or perhaps twice a week. So, in the best case scenario, 10 hours of tutoring means 5 weeks, or over a month! This might sound like a lot, but it really is the type of tutoring that I prefer. It's the "tortoise" modality, instead of the "hare" one. Let me explain what I mean.

In the story of the race between these two animals, the hare simply starts running as fast as possible. Surely enough, he gets off to a great start, leaving the tortoise far, far behind. It is indeed possible to take an approach to tutoring that matches the hare's. Tutors can "teach to the test," focusing only on those details that will be in the exams, teaching the students to watch out for the things they'll be sure to find, and showing them a couple of tricks to get a higher score. This, when done well, can certainly help the students increase their grades very quickly. The problem appears when it's time for the hare's nap.

Like the hare in the fable, who forgets to consider anything other than his own speed, students studying only to take a test are leaving behind and ignoring a multitude of very important and very useful tools. More importantly, they are turning their tutoring into a one-purpose-only experience, whereas they could be incorporating knowledge and skills that would help them with a range of other classes and situations. The tortoise-tutor would take longer to bring those grades up, but the ideas and abilities the student takes away from such a tutoring session will mean the next grade up will come much more easily, and the next one even more. What's more, after some good quality, tortoise type tutoring, the student might not even need a tutor anymore!

It seems to me that speed tutoring creates some type of addiction. The student won't really learn how to reason and solve problems on their own, so they will always need to go back to the tutor, so they can learn the next bag of exam tricks. The student will literally become dependent on the tutor to keep those good grades that were so quickly obtained. Like the hare, the race to success will consist of quick bouts of intense hyper-specific learning, followed by a nap of sorts, where the student won't be able to run the race at all. Following the tortoise method, on the other hand, might mean that the first race will be won very slowly, but it also means the student can keep going at a steady pace, without the need to stop and ask for more help every step of the way. Only the tortoise student can truly master a subject.

So next time you're looking for a tutor for quick help, ask yourself: do I want to be successful at this test, or do I want to be successful in school in general? If you choose the latter, find a tortoise tutor.

Karina R.'s Blog at WyzAnt.com

Don't Forget to Ask

The Tortoise and the Hare at School