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Siana

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Everything I have I carry with me. - Bias of Priene, one of the seven sages, 570BC.

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Siana’s Qualifications

Education & Certification

Undergraduate Degree: Universitatea Politehnica Bucuresti - Bachelors, Control Systems Engineering

Graduate Degree: Institut National Politechnique de Grenoble - PHD, Control Systems

Hobbies

Animals, Music, Painting, Art, home DYI projects

Tutoring Subjects

Algebra

Algebra 2

American Sign Language

AP Chemistry

AP Physics 1

AP Physics 2

Arithmetic

Calculus

Calculus 2

Chemistry

College Algebra

College Chemistry

College Physics

Conversational French

Differential Equations

Discrete Math

Elementary Math

Elementary School Math

Finite Mathematics

French

French 1

French 2

Geometry

High School Chemistry

High School Physics

Languages

Math

Middle School Math

Multivariable Calculus

Organic Chemistry

Physical Chemistry

Physics

PRAXIS

PRAXIS Core Math

Pre-Algebra

Professional Certifications

Science

Statistics

Trigonometry

Q & A

What is your teaching philosophy?

Everyone can learn any subject. The way any one person learns is unique to their journey. Therefore they have to discover the path by building efficient neural synapses based on their knowledge, experiences, and strengths. The teacher's role is to optimize the process.

What might you do in a typical first session with a student?

Greet. I would ask which broad subject to focus on, what is the student's schema, background, and learning goal. Then channel focus on the topic that needs work. Decompose the issue and ask specific questions leading the student to use their own knowledge, notes and resources. Verify comprehension by asking the student to resolve a similar topic.

How would you help a student stay motivated?

By reminding them the goal they had set, and if sometimes it seems unattainable, reminding them about the intermediate successes they would have experienced along the way.

If a student has difficulty learning a skill or concept, what would you do?

Initiate "mind mapping" to find which knowledge needed to learn the new concept is reliable enough to be used to connect and infer missing pieces of information. Then lead them to gradually fill the knowledge necessary to form a whole concept. Last, but not least, testing the new connections will have to be done within a week for the short-term memory, and then around 3-4 weeks for the passage of the new acquired concept into the long-term memory.

How do you help students who are struggling with reading comprehension?

First determine student's learning typology: auditory, visual, kinesthetic. Then in the student's schema, create parallels or contrasts, groups of meaning, interpolations, and extrapolations and through Socratic questioning let the student figure out the meaning inclusions and the exclusions.

What strategies have you found to be most successful when you start to work with a student?

First determine the student's learning style: auditory, visual, kinesthetic. Then let the student explain why they think they go in a learning impasse with regard to the specific concept. After asking questions to find out what the student could use from their own knowledge base, experience, or prior skill, build associations and inferences leading to the concept to be acquired. This will ensure that the student would be able to retrace their steps and build stronger neural networks to support the new knowledge.

How can you help a student become an independent learner?

By leading them to find the way to solving a problem through answering questions, i.e. the Socratic method. Also by practicing different solutions to the same problem so they would rely more on their most convenient way to approach problem solving. Then challenging them to a new problem to allow them to find what they need to apply and if they don't have all the information to go find it in their available resources.

How would you help a student get excited/engaged with a subject that they are struggling in?

Building associations between similar classes of concepts across different disciplines might trigger the recollection of a problem solving or skill they have in another domain. The way they could relate to what they already know might ease the fear/unease in the new application and open the path to curiosity about what else might be dealt with in a similar manner.

What techniques would you use to be sure that a student understands the material?

First, the student has to not just copy or relate back what he/she heard or saw written, but paraphrase. If they cannot, then split the inference tree and allow them to respond in their own words to specific questions. Then rebuild the inference tree, and allow them to rephrase the whole process.

How do you build a student's confidence in a subject?

Finding the student's schema is of essence as any person has to touch more or less the basic aspects of the disciplines that are taught. Maybe not all students have had a previous contact with a particular subject, but, generally, these students are not the ones to fear the subject. If the student has struggled with a subject, then finding first the little they do know would enable finding ways to build more knowledge. The student would have to be led to find their own way to internalize the learning process so they trust it and feel that they can rely on the acquired knowledge. If the student has had the knowledge, but lack of continuous practice made them lose confidence, then praise every successful recollection thereof, then start from that knowledge and rebuild the neural pathways.

How do you evaluate a student's needs?

First ask the student what they need. If they don't know, then ask questions about the student's background/schema prior learning experiences. Basically asking any decision-tree like questions will help build an image about what situation is the student experiencing overall. Sometimes family, disability, schooling past or present experiences may have an impact on his/her learning process.

How do you adapt your tutoring to the student's needs?

Asking questions and using what the student already knows is the starting point. Then after the initial learning process has been applied to a new concept, recalling the process in a week will help fire back the neural pathways and get the knowledge into the short-term memory. Finally, recalling the process in adjacent contexts and after three weeks will enable the knowledge to be stored into the long-term memory.

What types of materials do you typically use during a tutoring session?

Pen, paper, computer, dictionary, textbook, and notebook... not necessarily in this order... But the really indispensable one is: the BRAIN.

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