Erica: Waterloo tutor

Certified Tutor

I am passionate to help students improve in their reading. I enjoy reading and want to help others be able to enjoy and understand what they read. It is important to me to help students build their confidence in reading to feel more confident in themself and their academic ability. As a result of improvement in reading, students may feel confident in sharing what they read with others. Improving reading may also allow students to discuss current topics and have more knowledge about common interests through reading and comprehending what the student is interested in.

I have experience working with students in third grade as a reading intervention teacher during the 2014-2015 school year. Students read aloud and I followed along to make sure they said the words correctly as they read. I also asked comprehension questions while the students read to make sure they were understanding what they read. More recently, I have been a substitute teacher, and help students with their subject areas. To do this, I ask students how they are doing. I also ask what they need help with.

During my senior year in high school, I earned my Girl Scout Gold Award by leading literacy tutoring at the Boys and Girls club. I had a student read and answer the questions that I asked. Students that I worked with did great at reading and answering questions from the literacy book.

I graduated with a Bachelor's degree in special education (K-12) and elementary education (K-6) from The University of North Carolina at Greensboro.

The subject I tutor is in reading. Reading is my favorite subject to tutor, because I feel it comes easy to me and can be interesting to learn from what the student is reading. There are always more books that can be read and knowledge can be gained from the book.

I believe a teacher needs to have high expectations for the student and care for the student. The teacher needs to be dedicated to guide the student to understand what is taught. At the same time, the student needs to be dedicated to work with the teacher and persevere to understand and improve in education. Teaching is a two-way street, a give and take. The teacher and student must work together. It is not just one side that needs to put in effort for the student to understand what they are learning.

My tutoring style is providing differentiated instruction. If a student struggles to understand, then I think about and implement another way to help the student understand the content. I may ask the student a question or explain to the student verbally. I may also show the student in writing what I am trying to explain this way the student may understand better verbally or through writing.

Outside of academics, I enjoy going for a walk, listening to music, knitting and chatting with friends.