Tutoring help.?

Question

i'm going to start tutoring someone who is in 6 grade now but is soon going to be in 7th. I just have to tutor him in math and english. For math, I already have an idea of what to start with and what to do. However, I don't know what to start with when I tutor him in english.

Answer 1

Do you have any testing results to give you an idea of where to start?  First, I would give the student a choice of free writing on a subject of his choice, or of writing to a prompt such as describing a calendar picture.   This will give you an idea of spelling, grammar, punctuation, handwriting, sentence structure, capitalization etc.  Keep this  and do not worry about the student editing this.

If spelling is an issue:There is a list of most often used words in spelling, I would start with those for spelling. ( see first site below, start with first grade words and work your way up.  I think there are about 1200 words on the list.  The point is that the first 100 words make up something like 50% of all the words that you will write.  If the kid is still having problems with  spelling "was"  or "because"  start here.)   I use a highlighter to indiate words which are spelled correctly on test AND daily work.   If the stduent makes an error on daily writing, put that word back on his list.   Stress that these are NO EXCUSE words, they are to be spelled correctly in all subject areas whenever he write.

If sentence structure is an issue, check out the Appletree series which sytematically reviews about a dozen basic sentence patterns. ( The second site discusses basic sentence structures)

For grammar there is a great site with both information and practice excercises.  The site even includes  a link to tutoring manual, which might be helpful for you.  ( site 3 below)

For punctuation and capitalization this site has fun games for practice. ( 4th site)

Pace yourself and do not dally.  Do not be afraid to assign homework.  Hopefully, you can get through a review of the above so that you can get to paragraph structure fairly quickly.  ( last few sites  provide explanations and examples)

Although you would be wise to meet face to face on a regular basis, with a 7th grader, you may be able to do some of your tutoring on line.  For example, his assignment is a practice compare and contrast paragraph.  He writes a rough draft ans sends it to oyu.  You make comments and suggestions for revision and return it to him etc.   You do not want to do all of this on line because, bless his pointed little head, the student  could easily get a friend to  be doing the online stuff while he is out fooling around.   Work with the student  for awhile to get a feel for his reliability and honesty.Will you only be able to tutor him this summer, or will this continue into next year?  Once a week or daily?   If he has an indivisualized educational plan, ask if you can have a copy.

One last place to look for information is the Education Department for your state.  Go to the section on standards and see what was required for 6th grade and what will be required for 7th grade.

This might be important in math also.  I have found that, in our state, computation ( +,-,x,/ of whole numbers ) accounts for less than 15% of the test.   So be sure to use lots of fractions, decimals, percentages, measurements, and applied problems.  Include answers which require a written response, such as  explain how you worked this problem, or why is this answer wrong?  On many of the current state tests students must asnwer in a complete sentence, even on non Languae Arts tests.  We use a math journal and have the student write own deinifions and explanations of the processes.   If he gets a problem wrong, he can write the error and then explain how he corrected the error.   and so on...  Plan well, keep on task ( not long discussions about the latest movie), practice what he will have to be doing in classes this coming year.

Every two or three months, ask him to write a paragraph on a topic without any help.  Compare this with the original paragaph to see progress.

Good luck!



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Answer 2

If I were you, I would make sure he has a good sense of grammar and spelling. As a teacher myself, I have noticed children cannot write properly anymore.