A tutor’s insight on exam preparation and student engagement

Bright Heart

Bright Heart tutor Harris discusses his passion for tutoring. He explains how he motivates students who struggle with maths, and his experiences with neurodiverse students. He also offers advice in general and tips for exams.

A tutor's insight on exam preparation and student engagement

As many exams are now taking place and many students get nervous about maths, we held a Livestream with Bright Heart maths tutor, Harris. He is an experienced maths tutor who works with students with a range of needs.

In this video, we cover how he started tutoring, tips on exam techniques and advice for students who find maths difficult. The session was hosted by John Salmon, M. Ed., with questions timestamped below.

Bright Heart's livestream

Key questions covered in the livestream

1:00 -- How did you get into tutoring??
4:40 -- What inspired you to help students with special educational needs in general??
7:45 -- The tutor’s most important role is to provide bespoke instruction to help the students learn to learn. What advice can you give students on how to improve study skills?
12:25 -- Please share some tips and techniques for exams.
21:35 -- What specific advice can you give students who suffer from maths anxiety or who feel that they cannot cope with maths?
26:45 -- Can you provide examples of how to make maths more meaningful for everyday life by using hands-on activities and practical examples?
30:15 -- Please share experiences that allowed you to improve engagement and boost the confidence of your students, both in person and online?
34:00 -- Closing

We hope this video was helpful!

Please feel free to get in touch with us should you have any questions about tutoring, for maths or other subjects. We enjoy talking with parents and helping our students by tailoring learning to their individual needs.

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16th December 202023rd December 2020

Handling anxiety and tutor engagement tools

A live Q&A discussion about anxiety and some excellent practical tips for student engagement with Bright Heart tutor, Emily.

Bright Heart

In a live Q & A, John Salmon, M.Ed, has an enlightening discussion with Bright Heart tutor, Emily. Student anxiety as well as some good tools for student engagement are covered.

Handling anxiety and tools for student engagement - a tutor's perspective (Livestream)

We recently held a Facebook Live Q&A with Bright Heart tutor Emily. This was a follow up from her well-received blog on practical tips for anxiety and self-care.

This was hosted by Bright Heart director and former headteacher John Salmon, M.Ed.

Emily discussed anxiety during lockdown and what she has observed in her students. She also discussed some handy tools for engagement, especially Minecraft, which is always popular with younger students!

Please watch directly on Youtube or below, and see the list of key questions covered for your convenience.

Key questions covered

1:08 -- Signs of anxiety noticed in students during and post-lockdown
4:47 -- Different strategies and activities used to help cope with anxiety
11:13 -- Negative consequences noticed for children having to switch to online learning during lockdown
13:40 -- The positive impacts of online learning and some positive experiences shared (and tools)
22:45 -- Strategies and best practices to keep students engaged online who aren't initially interested
25:20 -- Some anecdotes shared when building rapport
27:05 -- Closing words by John Salmon

Do you have further questions about anxiety?

We would love to hear from you on our Facebook page, or feel free to get in touch with us directly.

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14th May 202018th May 2020

Facebook Live Q & A about homeschooling during lockdown

Bright Heart director John Salmon, M.Ed., answers pertinent questions live on Facebook about homeschooling during lockdown.

Bright Heart

In a live Q & A, John Salmon, M.Ed, addressed parent’s typical homeschooling concerns due to lockdown.

Facebook Live Q & A about homeschooling during lockdown

We recently held a Facebook Live Q & A to address parent’s questions about homeschooling during lockdown. This was hosted by Jacqui Mackway-Wilson, our social media manager, with questions answered by Bright Heart director and former headteacher John Salmon, M.Ed.

Key questions covered

0m49s -- Learn more about John
2m33s -- Typical challenges seen during lockdown when it comes to online learning
5m40s -- Pointers for parents to structure the school day at home for their children
9m51s -- How can technology in general and online tutoring in particular better support parents and students during lockdown?
13m48s -- What about learners with special educational needs and challenges that SEN students are facing during lockdown?
18m33s -- What signs of stress or distress, related to this online learning, should I be aware of as a parent, particularly as a parent of a child with special educational needs? And how can I help my child navigate this?
22m22s -- What should I look for when selecting a tutor, whether for online or in-person support?
27m22s -- Listen to John’s concluding remarks

What has been your experience of education during lockdown?

We would love to hear about it on our Facebook page, or feel free to get in touch directly with any questions. You can read about the experiences of a Bright Heart student, parent and tutor in a recent blog here.

We have written a series of blogs about education during lockdown which you may find useful: Homeschooling tips for parents during Coronavirus lockdown, Questions (FAQs) about learning, schools and exams during lockdown and Pros and cons of online tutoring and tips for parents using an online tutor.

Bright Heart will continue to offer guidance and support during this challenging period.

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7th May 20208th May 2020

Personal stories of homeschooling and online tutoring during lockdown

Unique educational perspectives are shared from a student, parent and tutor during the current lockdown.

Bright Heart

In this next instalment we look at some of the personal experiences of homeschooling from those affected by lockdown.

Personal stories about homeschooling and online tutoring during lockdown

In light of these challenging circumstances, we reached out to the Bright Heart community for their perspectives on homeschooling and online tutoring during lockdown. Thank you for all your insightful comments and questions.

Special thanks to Tom (student), Steven (parent) and Angela (tutor) for sharing their experiences with us and agreeing to have them published.

Tom (student, aged 10)

Let’s start with one of our most enthusiastic and brilliant young minds, Tom. He has fully embraced online tutoring during the last month and a half. It has been such a pleasure to see how much Tom has progressed during the last year. It has been especially rewarding to know that he has been able to keep the good work up during lockdown, despite all the added challenges.

I have been having lessons with John for about a year now. I have a lot of ideas, but sometimes I have trouble organising them. John really helps me with planning my writing and putting it down on paper. I was a bit nervous about having a tutor at the beginning, but I have not regretted it since, as it has been a thoroughly enjoyable experience!

The transition from face to face sessions to online has been very smooth and I feel like I am learning just as much as before. I still look forward to every session and it is one of the highlights of my week. I would definitely recommend Bright Heart Tutors.”

Steven (parent of a Y7 boy)

One of our Bright Heart parents, Steven, wrote to us to share some of his family’s experiences with homeschooling. In his detailed account, he talks about the inadequate use of technology by the school and the anxiety that the mounting workloads and lack of in-person instruction has caused his son during lockdown. It is worth noting that teachers also feel overwhelmed and unprepared these days, despite having technological tools at their disposal, as no one could foresee the scale and complexities of the current situation. Steven decided to use our online tutoring service to help his son overcome his anxiety and guide him with his work on a daily basis.

My son’s school has decided to use Microsoft Teams as its remote learning platform. There were a few technical issues, which are understandable, but I’m not impressed with the way the school has organised these lessons, as the school has decided to host lessons to all or nearly all students at once per subject.

My child is in year 7, so we’re talking multiple classes in the same year group, or basically 100+ children per subject. This wouldn’t be so much of an issue in older year groups such as GCSE or A Levels since the myriad subject choices students could choose at this level means that each subject naturally would contain less children, but this presents a problem for younger ones. To keep things in some semblance of order, children are asked to mute their audio and keep their video off. Their only outlet for questions is via the text chat function. This results in either too many questions at once, overwhelming the teacher’s ability to teach and answer them at the same time, or where the teacher is presenting and not looking at the chat completely, a torrent of irrelevant chat and GIFs; hardly surprising since the children are only 12 years old and there’s potentially 100 of them in the same lesson.

In terms of presentation, a Maths lesson I observed had the teacher talking and demonstrating by using a camera pointed down at a desk whiteboard. This hints at teachers not being provided with the right equipment. A tablet computer or separate tablet device (with or without screen) is what they should be using. Perhaps this is part of the teething issues and will be resolved at a later date as the school gains more experience from this approach to learning.

Recently I also saw a pre-recorded lesson. It looked more professional, as the teacher had clearly taken the time to create the presentation deck and voice over during the lesson. However, this is not ideal as it wasn’t live.

The biggest issues I see with the above approach that need to be considered and rectified by the school are:

Why are classes so large? During standard school, physical classes are 30 children. This allows the teacher to split their time answering questions and teaching. This is not possible with class sizes approaching 100 children, either physically or remotely. As it stands, this is more "lecturing" than "teaching".
Why don't teachers have better equipment? Pointing a camera at a physical whiteboard does work, however, with the right equipment there are better options available that preserve resolution and are easier to read. Microsoft Teams has a digital whiteboard, which would be ideal with the right equipment.
From my understanding, the classes are recorded. But I don't see any way to access these recordings, when one advantage of remote learning over physical should be the ability to replay a recorded class. The school should make these available to the students after the lesson.

My child’s school remote learning implementation is not the greatest. Large class sizes, almost no ability for interaction or questions, no record of the class post lesson, results in an inferior learning experience. I think the school should lower class sizes by having more teachers present, thus allowing more interaction. It should make recordings available to the students afterward, provide more training and better equipment to teachers.

Hopefully as the school gains experience and more teachers become available to teach, some of these issues will start to diminish or even disappear. Hopefully this happens sooner rather than later. But from my observation, remote learning as implemented by my child’s school is little better than my child teaching himself. Only the fact that the classes are at set times and timetabled give any sort of advantage to this approach.

My son has learning difficulties and he was feeling overwhelmed and anxious with the technical issues, impossible workloads and lack of communication with his teachers. He is in constant need of support and encouragement and I therefore sought the help of Bright Heart to increase the number of tutoring sessions through their online platform. Having that 1:1 support proved to be invaluable for my son, who is now successfully coping with all the challenges which seemed insurmountable to him not too long ago.”

Angela (Bright Heart tutor)

Finally, one of our tutors, Angela, who made the transition from in-person to online tutoring relates her experience below, which has been educational for both her and her students.

Working as an online tutor during lockdown has generally been very positive.

I am currently 9 months pregnant so it has been a great way to continue supporting the students while not having to navigate the tube at rush hour! Overall, it has been remarkable to see how some of the children have adapted to and have enjoyed using the technology. I have seen them engage in novel ways with the material and some have demonstrated more agency in their learning. Having a screen in front of them, at a set time has also, somewhat surprisingly, been a good medium for those students who struggle to focus.

My students have benefitted from the consistency of maintaining weekly tuition and it has definitely given them confidence in using new skills. It has also brought about new skills for me, for example, forcing me to be more concise in my instruction and explanation. Overall, I believe that going forward, it is an excellent option for students and tutors alike.”

What has been your experience of education during lockdown?

We would love to hear about it on our Facebook page, or feel free to get in touch directly to see how we can help.

We have written a series of blogs about education during lockdown which you may find useful: Homeschooling tips for parents during Coronavirus lockdown, Questions (FAQ) about learning, schools and exams during lockdown and Pros and cons of online tutoring and tips for parents using an online tutor.

We also held a Facebook Live Q & A where we answered some common questions from parents at this time.

Bright Heart will continue to offer guidance and support during this challenging period.

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Category: Online Tutoring