How can I find my old pictures?

[tara]

My daughter is in year 4 at primary school and she seems to need more help with her spellings and maths which l think most kids dont enjoy doing.But we want her to not struggle and have a chance at grammer if she wishes.So we are sending her for private tuition every week starting this week.They will help her with maths and englis and have very good results.Who else sends there children for private tuition and how have you found it helpful with your child ?

[Alis girls]

I do Tara as my son 9 needs help - he is not unintelligent - just er lazy and doesnt like school - also lacks confidence. My ES now 15 also went to get him ready for entrance exams. Good idea - costly but good - most parents do it - some over do it some recp kids are being tutored not because they have a prob but the parents do

[sari]

I personally don't agree with private education, or tuition. This is my view, and however, I acknowledge that many others do! have you spoken to her Teacher, and/ or the SENCO ( special needs co-ordinator)? Your daughter may just be going through a plateau, before she makes a big jump in learning..children don't, in my experience, climb steadily on a graph, it seems to be peak and plateau..or peak and trough.....

 

I understand you are anxious, my daughter is in Yr 5, she's also a late August baby..so could have been in Yr 4, if she'd been a few weeks younger. She is Gifted and Talented in Literacy, but in the lowest group for Maths......she has been having "Maths Club" at school...a booster class once a week. I would ask for a meeting with her Teacher, and see if they have any concerns. She may just need a different way of learning her spellings, or actually using them, as that's the point of spelling! I'm a Communication Support Worker, but have worked as a Teaching Assistant, and Learning Support Assistant, and have supported children with both specific and non-specific learning difficulties. Sometimes children just need a confidence boost, and a different way of looking at things. I personally have shied away from extra tuition, and Kumon Maths etc, as I know my daughter would seriously resent it, and it would damage her confidence.

PM if you want to chat, or need any thing else from a TA!!

[Becka]

I think there's nothing wrong with tutoring children. Many children respond very positively to individaul education and it can really boost their classroom based learning. It all depends on the child's approach to learning. I can think of some children who would benefit from extra tutoring and others who would not benefit since much comes down to the child's learning style. Also, some schools excel across the curriculum, some on most of the curriculum and sadly some don't really reach the mark in all areas. As a teacher, I wasn't offended if a parent asked for extra work or enquired about the suitability of a tutor. As educators we're all working towards the same goal and would like the best outcome for each child.

[sadietoo]

I have always taken the view that we did not pay for our children's education , and therefore when they needed a bit of extra help, happily we could provide it. I note what you say Sari, but it depends.on the school and the child. If your child is generally bright, in my experience they get overlooked when it comes to extra help, as there are others more needy than them...that doesn't mean that they wouldn't do better if given the same opportunity as those receiving extra help. It seems to me some times that schools have decided that mediocre is good enough as long as it looks ok on the league tables.

 

Both of my children have had some extra help . My DD had some extra French but that really was just a continuation of the lessons that they had as littlies because it wasn't taught on the curriculum. My DS dipped out of French in year 9 when he decided he didn't want to take it at gcse, and couldn't be persuaded to continue (a decision he now regrets!). My DD had help in years 10 and 11 for maths (specifically for her GCSE) and got her grade up from a C to an A, which did her confidence the world of good. My DS has had some extra maths tuition for his A levels only, but he is not alone, and others from his class are also now going to his tutor. These are all able students, and so after the A levels are over I will be having a word with his 6th form about the appalling standard of teaching they have received in this and the previous year. But that's another matter altogether!!

[Mrs Webmuppet]

Whilst we didn't use private tuition for LMW did do quite a bit of work with her at home, because quite simply she wasn't getting sufficient help in the classroom as the teacher and the TA were busy helping the less able kids and leaving the more able kids to plough through worksheets. When I mentioned this at parents evening the teacher was of the opinion that as LMW was in the top half of the class that was fine.

 

As a result of the extra work at home she is now far more confident at maths. I spoke to a parent of one of LMW classmates ( another bright kid) and she was of the same opinion that the staff were too busy sorting out the bottom half of the class to worry about the brighter kids.

[Willow]

the staff were too busy sorting out the bottom half of the class to worry about the brighter kids.

 

I tutored my youngest for just this reason. In most lessons in year 6 until SATs the top set were taken off with the TA to keep them occupied and reduce numbers in the class whilst the teacher taught the rest. I was tempted to pull him out of school to homeschool for the year as the only teaching he was getting was at home... his teacher was good but the pressure was on to get all up to a level and the top set were already there.

 

There are great books available, home tutoring was time consuming as I needed as much time again to prepare and mark but it was very rewarding. He's now in a school that gives him plenty of work so I don't feel the need to top it up.

 

My eldest had a superb teacher - best primary school teacher I've come across but he moved school and he's the head in trouble for scaring his pupils with too realistic a ww2 exercise

[tara]

My daughter is feeling whats the point.She feels the teachers shout at them rip pages out of there books and dont test them or mark there homework.l Have a appointment with he teacher next week but her teacheras been away as she had a big operation so they only had her for the first 6 weeks when they went back in the new year.So they have had all different teachers from then on.My daughter is very unsettled has lost interest in learning as there is no continuity.

[Old Speckled Hen]

I think it depends on why you are doing it.The lazy child springs to mind and I would say unequivocally...YES. If it is to supplement existing lessons, perhaps because they are lacking in some aspect,teacher has no time to expand things properly, disruptive children etc etc then I think it is very useful.

My daughter does private tuition from GCSE through A to degree level. I'm afraid she has, sometimes,to teach ALL levels how to write an essay even before they get round to course content.

My worry is for those pupils who have to cram for school entrance.

Again, using my daughter as an example, there were two or three girls every year who had been crammed for entrance and completely floundered once they got in and couldn't keep up.

[Clash City Rocker]

My daughter had 10 sessions of private tuition in Maths before her A-Levels last summer.

The tutor was recommended by her school.

Each 1 hour session was used for revision work.

My daughter got the grades she required (B grade) to go to her choice of university in London.

[Seagazer]

I agree with private tuition although I don't think it works generally if you are trying to get a child to pass the, say, grammar school test but then struggles to keep up. I don't think that is fair on the child.

 

DD had a tutor before her GCSEs in maths and physics. Her maths had dropped a couple of grades from where she was predicted so the tutor helped her gain confidence again in her abilities and she got an A*.

 

She also tried one for physics as the teacher (for that I mean dinosaur) at school was of the opinion that girls couldn't really do physics as it was a 'boys' subject The tutor turned out to be an elderly gentleman and unfortunately of the same opinion, so we only had him once. We complained to the school and she was moved to another teacher and she got a really good grade in physics.

 

YS had a tutor in the last year of primary and the first year of secondary and it really boosted his confidence. His maths came along really well. I think this has helped him now in year 8 and I would have no problem in getting him another tutor if we thought he needed one.

[Alis girls]

Theres obviously pros and cons - the common thing I see is parents saying my child lacked confidence. This is a big prob with my 9 yr old now - lack of confidence. Hes not stupid but is er lazy - is this a boy thing? Or are girls as bad. My friend said her daughter of 10 is lazy.

[Seagazer]

Its probably generalizing but my DD is very driven, always has been. She could read and write really well before she went to school. She asked us to get her a tutor. She's still the same now at 23.

 

My middle child, a boy, is so, ummm, laid back he's almost horizontal about studying etc. He's working but is an apprentice and goes to college. He got a D in his maths and had to retake it for 6th form as you needed a C. He didn't do any studying but put just enough effort in to get a C. He said there was no point in trying too hard as he only needed a C.

 

My YS is a mixture of the two though, he wants to do well, he reads a lot and if its a subject that interests him then he gets as much information as he can. On other things though he does as little as possible.

 

They're all different and I should think in some children if you had a tutor it could turn them off. We knew that YS had come to the point where he didn't want the tutor any more and that was fine.

[Willow]

I worry that saying boys are lazy lets them get away with thinking it's acceptable. My eldest son wanted to change one of his GCSE options to a subject that had no lab work, just reading, studying and essays. He'd missed a terms work so over Christmas hols he sat himself down several hours every day (except Christmas day) and not only caught up but overtook the class in the set reading.

Now when you look at the state of his bedroom you'd say he was lazy but he obviously isn't when he's motivated.

[debbier]

She also tried one for physics as the teacher (for that I mean dinosaur) at school was of the opinion that girls couldn't really do physics as it was a 'boys' subject

 

That does annoy me: quite honestly, people who have those sort of misplaced beliefs should not be teachers.

[ubereglu]

There are pros and cons, and I mostly disagree with it. It allows people who have more money (generally) to buy an advantage over other children who go to the same school and just have to put up with some poor quality teaching. (I should know, for my S1 maths module last year I had to teach myself all of the work and it was really tough going, but I did it and got an A in that module, which felt really good).

 

You've also got to look at it long term, and see just how much they need a tutor, after all they're not going to have one forever, so how are they going to learn independently and have the motivation later on?

[Saronne]

I really struggled with maths as a child and my parents paid for private tuition - not to pass any exams -but just to help me become functionally numerate! Having that tuition really helped a lot and the maths I learned has helped me function reasonably well on a day to day basis- and without a calculator!

I guess the only problem I've got with private tuition it is how some children won't get the help they need because their families can't afford to pay for extra tuition - and the teaching method at their school does not suit their style of learning. I wish there was a fairer system..

 

Saronne x

[Busybird]

Do you think that your child will respond to tuition, despite being asked to do school work outside of school time? If so then extra knowledge is never wasted. Some schools will not make an extra effort for individual children - they teach a class, not to individual need. After putting two bright kids through our local primary school (they were constantly bored), where I was treated as, at best, an irritation when I asked how I could help to bring them on, I opted to home school my youngest. He will return to school in September when he is old enough for secondary school as that school is excellent.

 

In an ideal world school would provide all kids with a good and sufficient education. We do not live in an ideal world.

[Clur]

We recently discovered our son is 2 years behind his peers in maths and has no grasp of even the basics. We've started him at Kumon to help him grasp the basics and to boost his confidence. We had been trying to work with him ourselves, but the battles were unbearable, and he takes directions from a third party far better. He was also confirmed as dyslexic in the past week, and so we have arranged for a tutor who specialises in teaching kids with dyslexia, to come and help him regularly. The school he goes to is good, but can't possibly give him the 1-2-1 teaching he needs, delivered in the way he responds. It's not reasonable to expect that, nor is it fair on his classmates.

 

I think it's a wide generalisation to say it's not right to privately tutor or educate your children, as it's not always down to money. When we first got our son a tutor, we couldn't afford it so paid on a barter system. Basically the tutor ate with us before she taught our son, and DH did odd-jobs for her. I appreciate not all tutors are willing to be paid this way!!!

[kitbag]

when I was at primary school, I had a tutor for maths as I just didn't understand any of it! This was 7 years ago now (I'm in year 13!) but I still use the things my tutor taught me!

I was also a late August birthday - a day later and I would have been in the year below. I found that it made a real difference and I was able to catch up with some of the more able children.

[sari]

I have concerns for children who are tutored to gain entry to a specific school ( re: the Archers!) as a couple of children ( siblings) I used to support at school had PT to get in to the local Catholic Independent school, and after 18 months returned to the local State secondary., because they just couldn't cope with the level of work and prep expected. Mum and I had kept in touch, as she was grateful for the help I gave her children, and I tailored their homework to their interestes..boy was car mad..so I made specific worksheets and problems for him. I know that for some children PT can help...but for some it just reinforces the fact they are struggling, and they resent it.

[Becka]

I suppose though, in some ways, having assistance in school also makes children realise that they're struggling. If you choose to look at it, children who have help in school are in some ways having extra assistance that the general class population doesn't have. Children of all abilities can benefit from extra help but very few schools have resources availiable for children at the more able end of the spectrum. Wouldn't it be great if the teacher class ratio was smaller and each child received the help and encouragement needed!