What is your teaching philosophy?

Socratic. I want to help you figure out the answers, not give them to you!

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

Spend a little bit of time introducing myself, probably tell a "dad" joke. Once introductions are over, I want to assess what the student believes they need help on and how they best learn.

How would you help a student stay motivated?

I would try to demonstrate that there is progress made every session. Hopefully I would like to be able to break up sessions to reach small and minor milestones, so that way the students can appreciate the fact that they're progressing

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

Work with them to figure it out. This is a very general and broad question, but some strategies would be to reframe the concept or problem, approach it from a tangential model or analogy, or build up from what they already know.

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

Ask them to explain it to me, or "reverse" tutor me.