Good tutoring is more than the action of teaching. There are a few factors that can help you determine if the tutor is effective. For example, the student should be actively engaged in the process and not just sitting passively. They should be free to ask questions and point out areas where they don’t understand.
Tutor’s response to the Child’s Action
What is the tutor’s reaction when the child does something correctly? Do they congratulate them and then move on? Do they ask follow-up questions to determine the thinking of the child? Asking follow-up questions is vital because children sometimes draw conclusions that may occasionally produce the right answer, but may not provide the correct answer next time.
How do they react to the wrong answers? Do they provide the right solution and leave it at that, or do they push further to know why the child chose the answer? Asking the student to explain their answer helps examine their thinking and identify areas where they went wrong. You can then correct the errors better, and they will not repeat the mistake.
The language that the tutor uses will also help you determine if they are doing something right way. Do the phrases the tutor uses indicate they do most of the thinking for the student? Do they talk non-stop and give a lot of examples without engaging the student? Ideally, the student should be the one doing the most thinking.
The tutor should allow the child to make mistakes and then help correct them. Children learn the most when they recognize that they made a mistake, and then work towards correcting these mistakes. The tutor should not intervene to stop the child from making mistakes. Instead, they allow the error to happen, then help the child identify the mistakes and fix them.
