What is your teaching philosophy?

Setting clear learning objectives helps students and teachers engage in a collaborative learning process.

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

Talk about challenges they experienced, our learning objectives to overcome those challenges, and create a plan that works for both of us to meet those objectives.

How can you help a student become an independent learner?

Engaging with the student's learning style and tailoring lessons to their needs will make learning something they want to do, as opposed to something they must do.

What strategies have you found to be most successful when you start to work with a student?

To gauge what the student's comfort level with the material is and what their learning style is, and to create a plan based on those factors.

How would you help a student get excited/engaged with a subject that they are struggling in?

By translating the subject into a medium they find compelling-- for example, a student struggling to read Shakespeare might enjoy making a Facebook page for Hamlet

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

Informal quizzes as we cover material, and more formal methods of evaluation as we move from one topic to the next.

How do you help students who are struggling with reading comprehension?

By going very slowly through readings that are easy to understand, breaking out each word, and understanding its meaning. This is a technique I find very helpful for standardized testing.