Award-Winning Private Essay Editing Tutoring in Philadelphia, PA

"Today the student and I started out by reviewing money vocabulary we learned on Monday. We then moved into discussing personality vocabulary such as sensitive, sensible, aggressive, competitive, moody, manipulative, etc. He was familiar with some of the terms, but required explanation on a few. He needed to understand the nuances which distinguished some of the similar sounding terms such as sensitive, sensible, and selfish. We also discussed some opposites such as generous/stingy, shy/outgoing, etc. I created a card game and a matching game that we played to review the vocabulary after studying the definitions. We then did a speaking activity where we discussed situations and said what action we would take---based on this we would assign each other a personality trait such as patient, charming, honest, etc. I had him describe a picture at the end which was of a job interview and asked him about the emotions of the people in the picture. He did very well with all the vocabulary, and it is my belief that with continued practice, his English speaking skills will continue to improve. I asked him to review the vocabulary page over the weekend as homework and will quiz him on it next week. "

"The student took an exam to help distinguish a level of Spanish and English for future lesson development. Then we focused on the sound of each letter of the alphabet and different words that emphasize the sounds. The subtle differences between B,P,V, and D were noted as an area to focus on, since these sounds are sometimes used interchangeably in Spanish. "

"This week the student and I reviewed some phrasal verbs, and vocabulary related to phrasal verbs, and he did an extended writing exercise trying to use more complex, multi-clause sentences. We reviewed his writing, and discussed active vs. passive voice, and some grammar points."

"The student sent me another sample of her writing, and I emailed it back to her with editing suggestions. She has an informal presentation for work tomorrow, and she practiced it with me. I did not notice any grammatical errors, but she did have some struggles with pronunciation. We did some mouth exercises and then practiced the pronunciation of the words she found difficult. We practiced more pronunciation with a written passage on the Document Editor. Her main challenges in pronunciation are: "l" and "r," adding an unnecessary vowel between words, and differentiating between vowels sounds (short and long "i", and short and long "e"). We went over her presentation material a second time with closer attention to pronunciation on some of the phrases I found difficult to understand. I gave her a link to a website that allows viewers to practice and be evaluated on pronunciation along with videos. She expressed a desire for structured homework assignments and a curriculum that addresses her needs. I will email her 5 homework assignments for the week and prepare exercises tailored to her for next week's session."

"To begin the session, I showed a short introductory video that showed people meeting for the first time. We spent a lot of time reviewing the homework that I had left for her, which included a translation of some dialogues that we had previously worked with and a worksheet that had her put together sentences with a focus on conjugating verbs (to be, to have, to want) in the present tense. I guided her through a similar exercise today during our session; this time we were able to focus also on her pronunciation. Lastly we worked on describing a variety of emotions. "

"The student did pretty well. We did some review of concepts from previous sessions, including if/then statements and even statements (even if, even though). She had written some practice sentences using if and then, and then also some using her new vocabulary words from her book that she has been reading, and we went over all of them. I asked her about her book and she explained in great detail her opinions of the character. I reminded her to use "I would say" instead of "I will say," and we practiced a few other vocabulary words regarding this (rash, overachiever, futile, etc.). For tomorrow's lesson, she will be reading a short article and giving me a description of what she has learned. For next week, I have asked her to use some of her vocabulary words during the week in conversation and to write it down when she does, and also to write some practice sentences with her new vocabulary. She is always an incredibly positive student and a total pleasure to work with."

"We worked on learning how to say and spell colors, and they read Old Hat New Hat (too + adj). Then they worked on words with the short e sound. They practiced spelling new words with letter tiles, and I tested them on new words to see if they could spell without looking. They did quite well."

"We discussed essays from the student's previous English class. I gave her a homework assignment to learn more grammar, focusing on articles (a, an, the) and coordinating conjunctions (and, or, but, etc.). "