After two years of part-time tuition, I officially launched Bounce full-time seven months ago—and it’s been fantastic. The students I tutor are a breath of fresh air, and during the last two and a half years, a few things have become crystal clear:
Firstly, confidence is crucial, and many students lack it. I teach someone, hesitant about their ability, who has a writer’s eye for crafting paragraphs yet has no idea that many others struggle to look beyond the sentence they’re writing. Another young man has a genuine curiosity about words and sentences that will drive his learning forwards if he lets it, yet he doesn’t feel confident in his talent. The majority of my students suffer from a lack of confidence, and some session time is devoted to building this up.
Another key challenge is that many students struggle with revision. They’re not sure when or how to start, so we need to discuss explicit strategies and techniques for effective revision.
Thirdly, For UK students, the pressure to memorise quotes for closed-text exams often leaves them feeling stuck. There’s a huge divide between educators around whether we should expect students to do this or not. Personally, I feel it puts too much unproductive pressure on students, especially those not particularly interested in the texts. Encouraging them to pick out quotes and gently start to memorise them a handful at a time is a key strategy, reminding them that they’re not required to be word perfect.
Finally, some students feel the friction between what they’re asked to do and what they want to do, making rereading texts a painful challenge. In order to help with this, I’m releasing videos of the main texts that students study for literature which takes them through the whole text and includes analysis and key quotations.
It’s a work in progress, and I listen with interest as changes are spoken of at government level. For now though, we need to support our young people through these tricky exams with confidence, curiosity and motivation. They deserve it.
If your child is struggling with confidence, study skills or motivation, please reach out to see how I can help.
