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Private tutoring at a first glance might seem to benefit only the pupil, since it is he who advances thanks to his hours with a private tutor. While this is largely true, as we'll see, the tutor him/herself can benefit from giving private lessons, which can, as such, be seen as a kind of exchange.
How Home Tutoring Benefits Student
As we will see below, students can derive many benefits from private lessons. They are effective in the short, medium and long term, at several stages in the education of a child or adolescent.
Private Tuition: A Short-Term Exchange
What do we mean when we talk about tuition being a ''short term" benefit? Here, we are referring to help with a pupil's homework, in which the tutor takes on the role of supporting the pupil with her exercises for the next day or week of school.
To help a student cope with this unfamiliar workload, home tuition with a personal teacher can be an excellent solution.
The teacher will be able to show the student new approaches and methods, as well as how to 'embrace' the new tasks with which she is faced. The tutor will be able to provide guidance in time management, with which the pupil can better organise her increasingly pressured life. As well as in the organisation of the child's work, the private tutor can also assist by providing tailored instruction in specific areas. Through questions and personalised lessons and exercises, the best tutors can help a student to assimilate knowledge and progress much faster, leading to impressive gains for the student in the short term. Read our overview of private lessons worldwide elsewhere on this blog.
Home Tutoring: Exchange over the Medium Term
Home tutoring can also greatly benefit pupils over the medium term. Let's look at exams as an example of how personal tutors can help prepare students for the challenges they face. Whether GCSE or A Level tuition, or in preparation for exams in higher education, if the student feels that she has reached her own limits; that she's hit a wall in terms of realising her potential, that is when a private teacher can be of the greatest help.
Private Tutoring: A Long Term Exchange
The choice of subjects going into GCSE level is an important step in a child's education. Making poor choices at this stage can cause delays that are, while not irreversible, nonetheless inconvenient.
Why not help a student prepare for these important decisions by supporting them from the outset with quality teaching support?
Right from the start of secondary school, educational and careers guidance plays a role, whether pupils are aware of this or not. Every term counts and the entirety of each school year must be taken seriously, especially for those who have already settled on their intended choice of A Levels and even career choice. The increased intensity of lessons in the run up to GCSEs also provides school teachers with an opportunity to assess the relative strengths of each pupil.
How Home Tuition Benefits Tutors
While tutoring is undoubtedly beneficial to the student, the personal tutor, too, can derive many benefits from it, which is where the element of exchange enters into the picture.
Private Tuition: Another Way of Teaching
Teaching is a perpetual challenge. Throughout their careers, teachers must constantly adapt to:
- new curriculums
- new generations of pupils
- new tools and methods
- new classes full of different characters
The same applies to one to one tuition. Education, whether public or private, involves constant adaptation. This is even the case with one-to-one lessons with a single student. The pupil may, for example, be subject to real difficulties or blockages in a subject you are teaching. In such cases, it is up to the teacher to use his creativity to find ways around the impediment. Once the tutor achieves the desired results, however, it can only be of benefit to his professional development, in terms of experience, and so each new tutee, with the challenges she may present, is a valuable learning experience.
Additional Learning for those in Higher Education
Private teachers are often themselves full-time students in their higher education: Those studying to become the engineers, doctoral students, computer scientists, or teachers of tomorrow.
- How do you address a student's difficulties?
- How do you encourage him to improve his marks?
- How do you develop your own potential?
- How to unblock a student who's stuck on a topic?
- How do you approach a difficult character?
By practising teaching in the context of private tuition in the UK, the tutor can discover, for herself, the answers to these questions, and more.
Personal Tutoring for Personal Development
Teaching can be frustrating. Often the teacher, faced with a class of thirty pupils, cannot resolve the issues which prevent each from reaching his or her full potential. She is unable to devote the necessary time to each and every member of the class. Private tutors, on the other hand, find it easier, in a one-on-one setting, to help a pupil overcome blockages and meet learning goals.
Earning Money through Home and Online Tutoring
We have looked at the personal and professional benefits that teachers can derive from their private lessons. While both are very important, let's not forget that private tuition is above all a good way to earn a supplementary wage or a living. For those already in jobs, the extra hours always bring welcome financial reward, especially since they are often better paid than those spent teaching during regular school hours.
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