1. Good Tutors
Hiring the right tutor for your child is one of the best things you could do for his/her education, self-esteem, and learning process. A good tutor not only teaches the subject matter, he/she also guides, gives inspiration and motivation to your child.
So how do good tutors “look like”?
Firstly, it is important to engage a tutor with the relevant education in the subject areas they specialize in. Tutors that have years of experience vs those that are fresh from schools each have their own strength. Each has their unique ways in handling children.
Secondly, Despite the importance of having many years of experience, knowing our Singapore MOE syllabus inside out, is not only equal, in fact more important than anything else.
Take for example, Primary level Mathematics. Although one might think that Maths is simply numbers and the basic calculations are just but addition, subtraction, multiplication & division. This might not be the case here, as one thing stands out in our Mathematics education is the extensive use of the Model Method, the spiral structure of the Singapore mathematics curriculum, which serve as good pictorial representations. This is where many adults who could be experts in Mathematics got stuck, as they were not exposed to this method during their earlier school days.
Take another example, Primary level Chinese. In China, school students do not have such a thing as oral learning leading to the oral paper that carries 25% weightage in our PSLE, whereas here we have. Our secondary level Chinese syllabus has to cover various social topics, and these social topics are to be of relevancy to our local context and some on international issues.
The same goes for our Science subject, just to quote an example, covering Astronomy and or how to build space station is not in line with our vision, thus is not in syllabus.
Hence, an experience tutor, has to be a tutor of relevancy as well.
Thirdly, a good tutor understands what true education is about, it is to teach students knowledge, develop their brains, by training their minds to think, awaken their curiosity to want to find out, and inspire them to want to know more. A good tutor is not one, that provide students with answers to copy, so that they do well for their school homework only.
Fourthly, a good tutor also encourages his/her students by acknowledging each milestone achieved.
Fifth, no matter how good a tutor can be, if the tutor cannot stay committed to the tuition, in the sense that he/she cancels lessons frequently without valid reason, especially if the student is going to sit for national examinations in that year. The best advice we could give to parents is, drop that tutor.
Lastly, a good tutor will be able to set the right direction and motivate the student toward the goal set. Depending on the student’s attentiveness, a tutor will normally take about 4 to 6 months to help the student see improvement. Nothing beat the joy of “Oh, I can do it!” Therefore, helping the student to see improvement is crucial as the student will start to have confidence and hence interest in the particle subject.
2. Attentive Students
This may come as a surprise, but yes, attentiveness is a necessary mindset, as well as a skill. A child should learn and master it, as it will go a long way. Teaching attentiveness to your child not only improves their focus but also sets them up for success in life. Teach your child to stay focus, say for at least 30 mins, if this is the max he/she can do in the beginning, have a short break, play a short game, such as hangman or do origami, then continue with the lesson; not the other way round of starting a lesson with a game, then the lesson.
There are many benefits in teaching Your Child to Pay Attention:
a) Improved Listening Skills
This ability to listen will be especially useful when they’re focusing on their studies or listening to their teacher in school, homeschool or tuition.
b) Being attentive is also a key factor in the learning process
After all, it’s hard to learn if you aren’t paying attention! By teaching your child to be attentive, they can focus on the task at hand and absorb new information much more effectively.
c) Better Decision-Making Skills
Would you believe that teaching your child attentiveness can actually help them develop better decision-making skills? It’s true! This important ability to think critically and make informed choices will benefit your child in all aspects of life, from school to their future career.
d) Increased Empathy and Understanding
Being attentive can also help your child develop empathy and understanding towards others. When kids are paying attention, they’re more likely to notice the feelings and needs of their siblings, friends, and others around them. This awareness allows them to deepen their understanding of others and respond with kindness and compassion. The end result? Fostering strong, healthy relationships, which is so important in today’s complicated world.
e) Stronger Self-Discipline and Self-Control
Finally, teaching attentiveness to your child is key to helping them develop self-discipline and self-control. By learning to focus on their tasks and resist distractions, they’ll become more skilled at managing their emotions and actions. This is super important for their success not just in school, but also in their personal relationships and overall growth.
Self-control and attentiveness together will be a huge help to your child all through life!
Source: https://www.thecharactercorner.com/
One of the ways to enhance attentiveness is to Reduce Distractions
One of the main distractions comes from electronic gadgets. In our modern society, it is inevitable that many children have access to handphones and tablets. This is especially so for the secondary students, as their schools’ timetables are given in softcopy, dissemination of information from their schools is via WhatsApp messages and emails. Thus, they cannot don’t have handphones. However, for a tuition lesson to be productive, it’s best to put aside their handphones during the lesson.
For primary school students, say the lower primary students, they might not have access to the handphones, but there can still exist other forms of distraction. Some parents could have prepared far too much stationery for their child, such that during lessons, the child will be busy trying out the different fanciful highlighters, erasers and cute rulers, and so on, and from a few pencil cases.
Another scenario that is totally opposite from the above could happen when parents do not prepare sufficient stationery, say student has only 1 pencil and the lead broke halfway into the lesson, then the lesson has to pause as has to set aside time to solve this issue, which will be: is there another pencil or a sharpener? The worst is after searching high and low and found 1, turn out that the sharpen is already spoiled.
Last but not least, a proper place, say at least a folder stand to keep all the folders, assessment books, foolscap paper, exercise books will be great, as students will not waste time in looking for all these things during lesson and things will not go missing too. In this way, the student will not miss out any homework, because they cannot find them, when they want to sit down do them.
3. Supportive Parents
Education itself is to teach a child to be a better person and prepare and equip a child to be able to have a brighter future. We all know the importance of education. So how can parents provide a supportive role in your child’s education?
a) A good start will be understanding the learning curve
Everything we do involves going through a learning curve. For example a child learning how to walk goes through a process to become good at walking. Now there is no cruel parent who will ever tell their toddler that they will never walk. We keep encouraging them. The child herself innately believes that she will walk one day. Henceforth he/she keeps trying until he/she figures it out. This same process can be applied to acquiring any skill. First progress is slow. The pace picks up as we keep practicing and acquire more experience. Eventually we reach proficiency. At proficiency we have mastered the craft and we may plateau. The way to stay ahead of the game is to build another learning curve on top of this new skill. When we repeat this process endlessly, we get a chance to truly become everything we are capable of.
Source: https://themoneyengineers.com/2021/08/01/learning-curves/
b) What can be done to help a child reach the plateau part? It is through consistency and hard work. At the beginning stage of learning, it’s definitely not easy, take for example learning to play badminton, to play the game, one has to learn to serve the shuttlecock, and not everybody will master it within 1 or 2 tries. The easy way out is to give up, and the child will never know how to play badminton, swim, ride a bicycle, etc. On the other hand, if the parents encourage him/her to continue, to practice more (work hard), and to observe carefully (attentiveness) how others do it. When this child grows up, he/she will know how to play badminton, swim, ride a bicycle, etc.
c) Sometime there exists the temptation to score full marks for school homework of the student, in order to get stars from the school teacher. However, if this is done either with the help of the parents or tutor, it will result in 2 side-effects: the student will lose interest in learning and only keen in getting good results and the student will not develop critical thinking. Hence, guide your children to understand the why and the how, not give them answer directly.
d) Set aside a fixed time to revise and to do homework from tuition. Revision helps to enhance your children’s memories, while practise what one has learned helps to enhance understanding.
e) Despite all the above-mentioned, no amount of support is better than caring for your child. Do watch out if they are stressed out when behaviour like this happen: they are very hyper during tuition lessons. The reason behind it could be they are stressed out in school, for example the whole class likes to compare marks, from examinations to tests to even spelling. When this happens, teaching your child the right values and giving him/her a lot of assurance is important, and you may have to inform the school teachers too.
f) Inspire your child
This is such a common word, yet it can be very vague. Generally, The word inspire means to encourage or motivate. But inspire also means to “breathe life into” and this is especially apropos when it comes to children. We give them life but we need to constantly breathe meaning into their lives. Anything you teach or show a child has the ability to breathe new meaning into their existence, to open their eyes to new possibilities and new ways of thinking and feeling. Hence, to inspire a child is to make a child feel inspired and excited as they embark on their own journey of a lifetime.
Source: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/in-flux/202002/10-ways-inspire-your-children
Praise and Encouragement your child for any a small step forward, as small as becoming more attentive in class, this will propel them to want to do better. A word of caution, try to praise your child for the efforts put in, then the results achieved. This is because studies were carried out, and it was found that if children were praise for their efforts, they will be more than willing to put in more efforts; whereas if they were praise for being smart, they will not dare to try, because they are afraid that in case they don’t do well, they will no longer be smart.
You can also use a famous figure to inspire your child, just like Joseph Schooling looks up to Michael Phelps when he was still a little boy. This can work wonders for your child. Another word of caution is using a great figure to inspire a child is not the same as comparing him/her to someone slightly better, such comparison can hurt.
Conclusion
Taking all the above factors into account, you can find a tutor who delivers the best tutoring experience for your child that encourages confidence, motivation, and passion for learning in your child. Invest in the right tutor, and watch your child achieve new heights of success.
Choose My Home Tutor, the best home tutor in Singapore, for your child’s bright future. Our tutors give each individual personalized attention based on the learning needs of the child. Get in touch with us now for more information about our tutoring services and how they will benefit your child.
