Stefan: Petaluma tutor
Certified Tutor
I am a graduate of Oberlin College, where I primarily studied Spanish, Creative Writing, and History. I am currently planning to enter law school, and I enjoy writing novels on the side.
I have experience teaching and tutoring in both Spanish and English. I have worked as a high school Spanish teacher's assistant, an elementary school Spanish instructor, a high school writing coach, and an adult language learner ESL teacher.
I believe in turning students into teachers--helping learn the subject matter well enough that they feel comfortable explaining it to another person. I'm always eager to work with an individual student to develop a teaching and studying approach that caters to that student's individual strengths and needs. I believe patience, understanding and a positive, friendly tutor-student relationship is the key to quality learning.
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Undergraduate Degree: Oberlin College - Bachelor in Arts, History
- ACT English: 36
- ACT Reading: 35
- SAT Verbal: 740
- SAT Writing: 780
creative writing (primariily novels), law, immigration work, strategy games, reading, watching movies
- ACT English
- ACT Reading
- College English
- College Essays
- Conversational Spanish
- English
- Essay Editing
- High School English
- Languages
- PSAT Critical Reading
- SAT Reading
- SAT Writing and Language
- Spanish
- Spanish 1
- Spanish 2
- Spanish 3
- Test Prep
- Writing
What is your teaching philosophy?
I believe in developing an approach that works for each individual student. Some prefer real-world examples; some prefer more conceptual descriptions. Some prefer to diagram and others to talk things out. I want to be able to come up with an approach that works for each student, and I am willing to be flexible and inventive until that approach is found.
Generally, I like to try to turn the student into the teacher--to have them explain what they're learning to me. The true mark of having properly learned something is being able to explain it to another, and by trying to teach what one has learned, it's easy to identify which areas need the most work.