Tutoring Session – How to Structure a Good Tutoring Lesson

Being a good tutor means more than just being an expert in your field. A good tutoring session is vital to building relationships with your students and gaining their trust. For a successful future with your students, it is essential to identify their strengths and weaknesses. We put together a few tips on structuring a good tutoring session.

The First Tutoring Session

Be on time! Do not let your students wait. If your tutoring session is at your student’s house, don’t be too early. Remember that your students often have a busy day and feel pressured and stressed if their lesson starts earlier than planned.

Dress to impress. How you dress as a tutor is important. Do not over and not underdress. Wear clean and straightforward clothing and nothing too distracting. Look professional, but don’t forget that you are not working in a corporate environment.

The first tutoring session is always scary for the student and the tutor, as you don’t know each other yet. It is better to be over-prepared but don’t do too much. The first lesson should be used to start a relationship with your student. Try to make the lesson fun so your student will look forward to the next one.

Don’t start right away with exercises. Talk with your student about what they would like to focus on in the coming lessons, get to know each other, and also laugh. In the first session, you must find your student’s strengths and weaknesses to prepare for the following lessons.

Ask your students beforehand to bring all their books and sources so you can get an overview of what they should already know and where to pick up.

Prepare one exercise that helps you to estimate their level. Don’t do too much. You still don’t know what learner type your student is. That may take a few sessions, and until then, you need to improvise during the tutoring classes. If the lesson is too difficult, that demotivates, and the student may give up already after the first session. If the lesson is too easy, your student may be bored quickly. Ask for honest feedback so you can improve for the next lessons and motivate your students to learn.

Do the exercises together. Never let your student do all activities alone. These tasks are better for homework.

Establish a Good Relationship

It is vital to building a good relationship with your students. Often, this relationship comes quickly, but at other times, it may take a few sessions before the student opens up. The success of this relationship reveals the personalities of your student and yourself. Talk about yourself and tell your students a bit about your life. But be careful. There is a fine line between a personal and a professional relationship. In a good tutoring session, the tutor should not talk more than 1/3 of the time.

Knowing your field is also not enough to become a distinguished tutor. Your interaction with the student plays a vital role. This implies that you build a positive and effective learning environment. The most important quality is to find a common language to establish emotional contact. Without this, you will not be able to adjust the program if necessary. Knowing the student better will help them increase their interest in the subject.

Evaluate and Understand the Needs of a Student

When you first meet the student, start by assessing what they know and their aims so that you can prioritize what to teach during your tutoring sessions. To achieve this, ask the student what topics they are good at and what they like about the subject they will be working on.

Let your student speak freely about the issue so you can understand the extent of their knowledge. This way, the student will feel valued. The student must study with confidence in themselves. Don’t make them feel bad when they make mistakes. Always focus on what they are good at not to lose their motivation.

Work Together to Set Goals

After establishing the student’s needs, work together to identify and set goals they can achieve in a reasonable amount of time. By giving them the responsibility to move toward goals, they will involve more.

Write down the objectives so that the student can easily follow them. Once you have identified the goals, center each session to cover a specific one. And before handling any of these goals, let them know in advance to prepare physically and physiologically.

Familiarize With the Needs of the Student

Depending on the lesson’s length and your student’s mood, you may find them tired during your tutoring session. Remember that your students also have other subjects and pressure during their school day.  Therefore, if they seem tired or in a bad mood during a session, cheer them up.

For instance, if it is a language course, you can occasionally suggest that they translate, listen and sing songs instead of grammar exercises. You could also watch cartoons in that language and see if the student can follow the story coherently. A good tutor should be flexible with their teaching style and always have a fun activity in mind.

Sometimes you can also prepare some small gifts for students. When students complete a stage of study seriously or make progress in the exam, it is very necessary for the tutor to reward them. You can customize some lapel pins for them as small gifts with inspirational and fun pictures or words. Every student wants to be affirmed, and giving them substantive rewards can further stimulate their interest in learning. These lapel pins are beautifully crafted, high quality, and durable. I believe students will be encouraged whenever they see these pins.

Be Ready for High-quality Remote Teaching

Since the fast development of telecommunication, it happens that some of your students might turn to distance learning for a number of reasons. In that case, to ensure a highly-interactive teaching environment with your remote students, preparing yourself with high-quality video conferencing devices as well as stable internet connectivity is of great necessity.

According to your specific needs, a premium headset or a speakerphone might be enough. But if you pursue higher quality and more intuitive face-to-face teaching, it is recommended to find an HD1080P webcam or camera instead of using the built-in camera on your laptop. Of course, solutions differ a lot in multiple scenarios; thus, choosing the right device for you based on your own teaching environment and your student’s needs is what matters.

Adapt Your Teaching Method to the Student’s Learning Method

Not all children learn the same way. Some students work best alone, while others learn better in a group or with a guide. Therefore, give them a chance to work and learn in their preference. This will help them edge closer to their goals and realize significant progress. Change the tuition from face-to-face to online tutoring via webcam if your student can not attend class on time. Classes online are better than no classes at all.

If the student’s grades do not improve, but you notice significant effort on their part, help them to recognize their efforts and avoid discouragement along the way.

Be Prepared

Part of your tutoring job is to prepare your lessons well. Your salary compensates for the preparation time. It is always better to be over-prepared than under-prepared. Bring recourses, books, laptops, songs, or games, so you always have a plan B if A does not work out. Write detailed lesson plans. You can use lesson planners that may help you to keep an overview of each student.

Use quality materials. This translates to having your own set of materials, which you consider the best written, structured, and demonstrate any theoretical calculations. You should choose not only good teaching material but also be able to explain to the student why you chose it. Provide your student with additional materials, use the latest technologies in teaching, and make the educational process more interactive.

Write a Tutoring Contract

To avoid misunderstanding and, therefore, losing focus on what is important during the tutoring session, you should be upfront with all agreements. A tutoring contract would help both parties understand the agreements, such as late cancellations, payments, putting classes on hold, or changing fees.

Bottom Line

A good relationship between a student and a tutor is vital for successful tutoring. This is one big advantage that a tutor has compared to a teacher. Understanding your student’s learning styles and goals is important to see improvement. Don´t do too much but enough to push your students towards their goals. Focus on what your students do well, and find ways to improve their weaknesses together.

The demand for tutoring services is big, and the competition is high. Avoid becoming one of the many, take responsibility, and increase the level of your knowledge. Keep improving yourself and your educational program.

We hope we can help you with our tutoring tips and wish you all the best for your tutoring sessions.

3 thoughts on “Tutoring Session – How to Structure a Good Tutoring Lesson”

  1. The tutoring tips that this article offered were extremely helpful. I am so glad that I took the opportunity and time to read and absorb such good information.

    Thank you,

    Reply
  2. I recommend a tailored balanced approach. I write up short feedback reports and then discuss their progress via phone or email every six months. Homework is given out twice a month and also goals are always reviewed and then updated. Areas of weaknesses and strengths are shared prior to starting out.

    Reply
  3. Tutors should match their student’s aspirations, therefore your attire is important in demonstrating your own standards. Tutors should wear smart-casual clothing and be well presented. If you are teaching a primary-aged child, you would not wear the same as for lessons for business accounting. As in everyday life, like it or not, your students and their parents will make an immediate judgement of your suitability based on your attire, so dress well.

    Reply

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