A bit concerned about tutor

[fm]

I don't group tutor but I should imagine that it is almost impossible to give the level of attention that might have suited your daughter in a group situation. The tutor could not justify it as far as the rest of the group was concerned. Indeed, I would only recommend group tutoring to the high end, confident children who thrive in such a situation.

Don't despair too much about the NFER non-verbal. They bear little connection with the KE exam. I have had students do very well in these but be unable to cope with the 'one-off' nature of the KE exam, and vice-versa.

In the little time you have left, I would:

a) have her absorb as much vocabulary as possible
b) practice Cloze tests on a very regular basis as this will definitely bring some improvement
c) find non-verbal examples involving cubes and 3d to practice, and do in 5 and 10 minutes chunks rather than do whole papers
d) make sure she has a thorough knowledge of fractions, decimals and percentages, and the relationship between the same
e) make sure she can read data (from bus timetable, mileage charts, pie and bar charts) from as many differents sources as you can find


Above all, ensure she realises that she will not be able to answer a significant proportion of the exam but she should just keep ploughing through it and not get distracted by worrying about how she is doing and whether she is going to pass. 100% of her focus should be on whichever section she is doing at any one time, and then it should be forgotten about it.

Good luck.

[mad?]

But, from my own experience, I find there is very little connnection between the opinion I have formed in my head, what comes out of my mouth, what a parent then hears, what they relay to others and what eventually comes back to me via the grapevine.

Me too!!!

[yoyo123]

i find the same thing has happened when I read the work i have set in class...

[hypertension]

thanks alot everybody esp fm for your advice....i will definitely follow your advice...like i said speed is my main problem...she has mastered algebra brilliantly in the past week and actually looks at questions and wants to work it out the find x way...
i am working on her vocab...will the download on this site help???
i know all tutors are not the same and somewhere over the past year something went wrong....but i'll try my best with her and carry on absorbing information from this site....my 1st choice is QM so i have some time...

again sorry brummum i seem to have hijacked your thread.....

[brummum]

Hello all

I seem to have the opposite problem to you hypertension - the tutor says my son is extremely able , gets 98% in maths papers, 96% in VR nearly every week. But we have looked through some of the maths papers and found some answers marked as correct when they are in fact wrong. It feels like she's (unitentionally) setting us up for a big fall.

He has one to one, so I can't ask any other parents what they think of her. He hasn't done any timed tests yet - there are only 6 or 7 lesson left and I'm beginning to panic! He can't really do them at home as I have two very noisey toddlers and no spare room for him to go to.

Other things in general bother me - I tell her things one week, and by the next she's forgotten and asks me the same question again. Like what school my DS goes to, things like that.

I told her last week that he is struggling with fractions, decimals, percentages - so they spent the session doing VR

We are now going through books to get him to grips with that - whilst paying her

One of the moms at his school is a tutor, she home schools her children and at least one of them attends CH, so I'm going to pounce on her in the playground as soon as I see her.

Its sickening to think that we have paid well over £1000 over the past year, do these agencies actually check that their tutors are capable, or are they just interested in getting their cut?

[brummum]

KenR

Just in case in I have to do all this again with my next son - how do I check that the tutor is a good one? Are they any particular questions I should ask or references that I should see?

This one came recommended by an Agency and at the time I didn't know anyone else using a tutor - wish I'd known about this forum sooner

[hypertension]

Brummum..
yes that is the opposite to my situation...this is the point at which you need to take over...i too have a younger child who is a handful...and i am on the verge of a nervous breakdown but the fact that this is my childs future is whats driving me...
i am the most unorganised person but i have just downloaded the maths and vocab builder off this site...
and i have had to go back to basics and teach myself fractions from scratch...where my DD is helping me with other topics like ratios.
but i am actually very surprised how my DD has improved...i am aiming to work real hard on maths this week...with vocab dotted in here and there.
I simply cannot sit back and let my DD do the test without a fair and reasonable chance..
then whatever the outcome is at least I'll know i tried my best with her...
and if i can do it so can you brummum...
and yes do pounce on that tutor...i'm sure she'll be able to help you...
good luck again..

[um]

not once did this tutor ever go through a question with her that she got wrong...some topics were not being taught yet in her school...so i would have expected that if i am paying for a tutor he helps her with them...but again i was told other children were doing ok without any further explanations..
She has 3 pieces of grammar work that have yet to be marked where his assumption was to hand out extracts and assume the child will do it correctly...not explaining anything at all..
For the past year i have been filling in most of the blanks in teaching with my DD..whilst the tutors job was just to hand out homework and go through Bond papers..

I am starting to think this is the same tutor my son had before we found a better one at the eleventh hour...really, what are parents paying for (and having to transport their child to, which is a hassle) if a tutor will not even explain wrong answers?
My son's original tutor did just this - rarely explained anything, just set loads of worksheets and occasionally some homework - that was rarely even marked.

I am angry that a lot of tutors seem to get by on doing this - I am sure I could set up a tuition school where I cram 20 kids to a class, give them Bond photocopies, and charge them all £10 an hour. But it would not be morally right to do that.
Perhaps this forum could set up a clear parent's guide to finding a good tutor, for example:
Understands the exam application process in your local area
Understands the exam format with your local area
Actually marks the work
Explains incorrect answers
Keeps parents/guradians up to date with their child's progress
...that would be a start?

[KenR]

Hi Hypertension and Brummum

If you want to drop me a PM with your email addrs I will forward a few bits and pieces that might add a bit of variety to your preparation.

The one thing I would say is that 1/2 term week is key, really good opportunity to keep them switched on. make sure they do a couple of hours per day. One thing I would recommend is to get a quality broadsheet newspaper and get them into the habbit of reading in detail a number of interesting articles. Perhaps select a few articles, and think through 8 to 10 questions that the child should be able to answer.

Regards

Ken

[hypertension]

Thankyou KenR...you are a star..
i have pm'd you..