What is your teaching philosophy?

Learning is universal. I believe that effective teaching allows one to connect to many by accepting and acknowledging different learning styles. As a teacher, my goal is to foster the will to learn. So, I believe in teaching that makes everyone excited and desire the will to learn something new, and to share it with others. Most importantly, I believe as a teacher, one must teach others to learn, as well as learn from the ones that you teach.

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

I love to share pictures with others. Also, I love to share stories about myself. Most importantly, I love to hear from the students their interests, and important things in their life.

How can you help a student become an independent learner?

I will suggest a few tips as far as developing strong organizational skills, time management, acquiring intrinsic motivation, and setting realistic goals.

How would you help a student stay motivated?

I love to offer tangible and intangible rewards to my students. The use of verbal praise is very important to keep a student motivated. Also, allowing a student to self-reflect on their accomplishments promotes a student to stay motivated.

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

I will help the student analyze the problem. Then, creating steps or developing some form of a visual organizer can help a student understand a skill or concept.

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

Creating graphic organizers, summarizing a text, answering questions, as well as understanding story structure will help a student with reading comprehension.

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

I like for the student to tell me their goals and expectations for learning. Most importantly, giving a pre-assessment to a student is a great strategy that I find most successful. For one, it allows me to determine what the student knows and struggles with.

How do you adapt your tutoring to the student's needs?

I like to relate to my students. Also, being flexible and allowing my students to express their needs in their terms helps me adapt to their tutoring needs.

What types of materials do you typically use during a tutoring session?

I love to use manipulatives and interactive notebooks for math. In addition, I like to use graphic organizers and interactive notebooks for reading, as well.

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

I like to relate skills and concepts to real-life situations. I feel that if a teacher can relate their lesson to reality, students can learn it easier and find it more exciting. In addition, I like to create games and songs to help the skill that I'm teaching come alive.