Craig: Waterloo tutor

Certified Tutor

I graduated with a B.A. from St Johns College in Santa Fe, NM, the sister campus to St Johns College in Annapolis, MD. St Johns is a four-year program with one set curriculum. Everyone takes the same subjects, which include philosophy, math, literature, history, poetry, music, art, science, and foreign languages (Ancient Greek and French). All together, it is called the Great Books program. Graduates from St Johns (called johnnies) have a double major (philosophy and math) and a double minor (science and language). St Johns was one of the best experiences of my life.

It was during my junior year at St Johns that I had my first experience tutoring. The mother of a 7th grader I'll call "Ricky" posted a notice in the student lounge looking for a tutor for her son. I answered the ad and began tutoring Ricky one hour per week. Ricky was in danger of being held back a year because he was failing math. It's not that he couldn't do it, he just wasn't interested. He was interested in magic and loved performing magic tricks (David Copperfield was his hero). He was good, too. What he hadn't discovered yet, however, was how much magic there is in math and how math is everywhere. For example, he didn't realize how much math there is in music--both in rhythm and melody. He didn't know or care why the beat on eighth notes is twice as fast as the beat on quarter notes or why the sound of C and G sounds more "perfect" than the sound of C and F#. These are math questions and everyone in the world is born knowing the difference between rhythmic and nonrhythmic and harmonious and inharmonious without being taught--we can hear the right answer, which is pretty magical.

Ricky survived 7th grade and he ended his 8th grade year with a B+ in math.

Years later, I checked the archives of the Santa Fe New Mexican (the local newspaper) and learned Ricky graduated with honors among the top in his class for all subjects.

After college I moved to China for a couple of years and taught English to university students--mostly at the Foreign Affairs College in Beijing. This school was where China's top students prepared to go into China's diplomatic corp. It was also an extremely rewarding experience. I even received standing ovations from two of my classes on the last day of the semester--an event as unusual in China as it is here in the States.