Do I Need a Tutor?
This is a question that many parents and students in Calgary struggle with. Everybody thinks getting a tutor labels their kid for life. No it doesn't, different students need a tutor for different reasons. After being a professional tutor for 16 years in Calgary (where does the time go?), here is the range of reasons my students have needed my help.
Bad Teacher
About 50% of students. Scary, huh?
Everybody knows that being a teacher isn't a job. It's a calling, it's something you do because you are passionate about it, like being a police officer, or a doctor.
No it isn't. In most jurisdictions (and Calgary isn't an exception), you can't just call yourself a teacher and start teaching. You need a teaching certificate issued by the government (provincial government), and the government requires applicants to have completed a university degree or certification in education (B.Ed., a 2-year program at the University of Calgary if you are doing it full-time and already have a bachelor's degree). And in most jurisdictions (like Calgary), you can teach anything at all, as all teachers have the exact same B.Ed. and certificate. No, there aren't any specialties. You can teach math, science, English, gym, whatever your heart desires.
Now watch this. You've just spent 2+ years completing these studies full-time, you have student loans, you're broke and Calgary is expensive. You undertook this journey because your life's dream is to teach Shakespeare to teenagers. You browse teaching jobs in both Calgary school boards, but there aren't any openings for high school English teachers for the upcoming school year. They do need a lot of math teachers though. It's the same pay, it's the same hours, it gets you in the system, it gets you teaching experience and you don't need to move away from Calgary. All you have to do is re-learn algebra and trigonometry and quadratics over the summer to get you ready for September, then bide your time for an opening for a high school English teacher, maybe in a year, or two or three.
Yes, teaching is a job, staffed by human beings. The have good days, they have bad days, sometimes they're stuck where they're at, sometimes they hate their boss or had a fight with a colleague, or there's trouble at home. Now they need to make trigonometry relevant to 3 dozen kids (including yours), and they've just figured this thing out for themselves last night.
On the other hand, some teachers are exactly in the subject that they wanted to teach, and they just go "full-nerd" on the poor students, teaching them concepts 1 or 2 grades higher than their current leveldespair teacher. While some students will thrive being pushed and challenged, other students don't even want to be here in the first place, now the teacher is making things harder? Some teachers do lose sight of the fact that they are here to guide students at their pace, not to nerd-out for their own enjoyment.
Tutors only teach those subjects they are really passionate about, because when you are 1-on-1 with a student and the parents are in the next room, you need to demonstrate confidence and competence. Anybody can spot a phoney. If the student's issue is a bad teacher at school, a tutor will make all the difference in the world (I almost always see grades increase by 20 points in the first 2 or 3 weeks if the cause is a bad teacher). Try to recruit a few of their friends from school, make a small study group (max 4) and split the bill with the other parents.
Test Anxiety
25-45% of students' minds go blank during a test.
Yup, it's THAT common and the 2nd leading cause of bad grades. An exam, a test or a quiz, it's just an expectation to perform that goes by many other names. And just like in real life, there's apprehension and stress and anxiety that precedes it because there's judgement that follows it. There it is, a stapled stack of 4 or 5 sheets of paper laying face-down on your desk. The questions may be asking about chemical formulas or right triangles, but all you can think about is what other people are going to think about you, about your worth as a person and how much trouble you may be going to be in because of what you are going to write down (or forget to write down) on this thing in the next 20 minutes.
The modern school system is awesome at teaching students how to use formulas and how to solve triangles, but when it comes to dealing with stress and performance anxiety, setting goals and objectives, time management, holding yourself accountable to yourself, there isn't anything anywhere in the entire curriculum and most people struggle with these topics late into adult life. Ironically, students taking part in high level school sports get taught this.
A tutor spending some 1-on-1 time with a student can quickly determine what kind of grades the student should be getting based on their level of understanding and their confidence at answering questions in a comfortable and non-intimidating setting. If the test, quiz and exam grades don't meet these expectations, the tutor can spend some time finding what the exact cause is and give the student tools to cope. For some students, test anxiety is so deeply engrained, it becomes strongly associated with physically being in a classroom. For these students, classes that are 100% online (including tests and exams) can be a life-changer. I have personally seen half a dozen students just suddenly get over their hang-ups and score way higher grades (without cheating), simply because "the exam was scary anymore."
Poor Study Habits
About 25-35% of students.
Who wants to study? Yes, studying is important, as is doing homework and handing in assignments on time. But it's not very fun, though, is it? And there are a lot of distractions and more fun things students would rather be doing. Explaining to a student that they need to study or do their homework is like asking someone to calm down. It just never works.
Student or not, what a lot of people need in order for them to do what they know they should be doing is some form of accountability to someone else, or a sense that there's no way to not do this. A lot of adults function that way with regards to chores: left to their own devices, the chores will not get done; if their significant other or a friend is hanging out with them with the intent of getting these chores done, somehow the energy and volition needed are right there and the chores get done.
Parents can sit with the student and be that presence: you don't need to know math to get your kid to do their math homework (unless they get stuck). Just make a 1 hour long "homework date," and sit at the kitchen table with your kid and their books. Quite often, I find that the 1 hour I spend each week with these students is forcing them to actually spend an hour per week doing some homework. And once the habit is in place, the habit grows. They start doing their homework on their own and leave the questions they got stuck on for our 1-on-1 time. And then their grades jump way up all of a sudden.
Poor Learning Environment
About 20% of students.
The modern school system expects students to sit in a large awkward room for most of the day in groups of 30 to 40 and soak up everything that a parade of teachers is belching out. While some students can function in an environment like this, others can't. As an adult, I find that as much as I love learning new things, going to seminars and conferences is often a major drag. I need to apply considerable effort to prevent myself from tuning out whomever is standing at the front of the room. I am very interested in what they have to teach me, but they're not talking to ME. It's called "stage talk." The emphasis is on the "performance" (the intonation, the energy, the projection) not on the "communication" (are they getting it? do I need to expand this point or can I move on?).
Taking notes is one good way to remain engaged with the presenter, but this needs to be intensive, and this is now a competing effort with trying to understand what the message is. Some students can manage this, for others, they need something else. In most school boards (and definitely in Calgary), there are more and more alternatives to a traditional learning environment. The most common are self-learning systems, whether online or by booklets, often supervised at the school. The student has access to tutorials for general guidance on a topic and the teachers can answer specific questions, but the brunt of the work is done by the student at their own pace. A tutor can be a valuable resource for these learners.
Another cause of poor learning environment can be at home. I have had students where the parent or a sibbling would wander in during our class and strike a conversation with the student while we are trying to figure out a Physics problem or a Math concept. I have also had parents start doing the dishes right next to where we are studying (kitchen table). Like seriously? How's the kid supposed to focus with this?
Need Better Grades
About 10-20% of students.
Doesn't everybody want better grades? Yes, I'm sure everybody wants better grades. But here, I'm talking about students applying for academic scholarships or university programs that are hyper-competitive and need to keep their grades up. Quite often, these are good students that already have good grades, but one bad quiz or one bad test and it brings their average down 3 or 4 points and their entire life is ruined.
I often enjoy these students, since they already understand the subject matter and I'm just making sure they're bullet-proof. These are the students with whom I need to come up with crazy problems to solve, to push them, and try to have a little fun with the subject, to prevent stress and anxiety, to alleviate parental pressure and to allow them to enjoy the subject matter by geeking out in a safe environment.
Student With Special Needs
About 10% of students.
There's all kinds of special needs, not everybody needs to get labeled. For some students, the classroom environment is just a bit too fast and they need a tutor to go over the subject matter just a little bit slower, or they need to baby step from lillipad to lillipad for each chapter of each unit. Other students may not be visual learners and their teacher isn't verbally explaining things in a good enough way for audio learners, or they need to move around and do things with their hands in order to learn (these are the ones that can't sit still for long and always fidget). Some students just need the subject matter to be less abstract and more "real." A tutor can cater to these types of needs.
Useful Links
Alberta Education: Steps for Teacher CertificationBachelor of Education