7 Signs of Highly Effective Tutors

Spotting an effective tutor is not as simple as it may seem. Fortunately, there are seven tell-tale signs of such highly effective tutors:

1. Subject Mastery
2. Teaching Experience
3. Preparation of Each Lesson
4. Use of High-Quality Material
5. Monitors the Effectiveness of Her Own Teachings
6. Constant Professional Development
7. Excellent Soft Qualities

This is a list of teaching qualities only. It disregards other selection criteria such as the hourly tutoring rate, gender-preference, driving distance, age, availability or learning disabilities of the student. While these criteria are certainly important, they are outside the scope of this article. Just one more note on these needs and criteria: They are different for everyone! So, be sure to know who you are, what is your budget and on what criteria you can make compromises.

We now discuss the qualities of highly effective tutors one by one.

Subject Mastery

It is certainly great if a tutor possesses a teaching degree. But in today’s marketplace almost every teaching professional has degree from a respectable university. Therefore, look at the following signs to judge his mastery of the subject:

– Deep familiarity with the subject. For example, if the tutor teaches web design or web development use his portfolio to judge his subject skills.

– Is the tutor’s argumentation logical? For example, are her points sequentially structured such that they build upon each other?  Or has she reasons why they are given in a different order.

– The ability to not only to convey the theoretical material but also to support it with relevant practical and specific examples.

Teaching Experience

Experience is mandatory and an integral feature of a professional tutor. It is desirable that it was the experience of not only the group but also private teaching. This point is very important because a tutor gains the ability to cope with the possible problems and conflicts, the ability to understand the student and see which way of learning would suit him, over time.

In addition, experience develops a holistic picture of the subject and understanding of the concept of teaching. That is, an experienced tutor will teach the child not in fits and starts, jumping from lesson to lesson, but systematically, step by step, moving from one topic to another, from simple to complex, while always keeping in mind the end result that you want to come to.

Another important thing for teachers and their students is the number of lessons per day or per week. A responsible tutor will not take more than 4 hours of lessons a day because it is expected that he/she spends about the same time for the preparation for each session. Moreover, tutors also need time for the analysis and evaluation of their work. Otherwise, we can’t say that the tutor becomes more professional.

Preparation of Each Lesson

This criterion follows from the previous one: preparation for lessons should be a compulsory component of the work of the teacher. Only detailed planning allows you to keep the interest of the student.

In addition, in order to make every lesson effective, tutors are expected to clearly see goal of the classes. Otherwise, at the end of training the student, his parents, and the tutor may be very surprised and disappointed with the results.

Use of High-Quality Material 

A professional tutor uses textbooks and tutorials that he considers the best – that is the most visible, structurally consistent and well-written. Moreover, he should be able to talk about this material in his own words.

Ideally, the textbooks in the classroom should be minimized, and the student may be offered various additional materials in printed or electronic form. Video, audio, e-books and Internet resources augment the classroom experience. They make the learning process richer, and therefore more effective.

Of course, in the twenty-first century tutor cannot work without modern computer technology. Special online programs, training CDs, and virtual classrooms are so useful!

Monitors the Effectiveness of Her Own Teachings

The quality of the teacher is measured only by the number of his successful students, and nothing more. No matter how interesting and captivating a lesson is if it does not lead to the ultimate goal. The work cannot be completed if there is no result at the end.

A professional educator uses different methods to measure the progress:

– comparing the initial level of the ward with the achievement;

– allowing students to assess the learning process in conversation or written survey;

– asking the opinion of colleagues or other third-party observers on the progress of the student.

In addition, a good mentor is not afraid of questions and is always willing to answer them.

Constant Professional Development

As you know, we have to run just to stay in place, but if we want to move forward – we need to run very fast. That is why a highly effective tutor is constantly engaged in professional and personal development.

A good teacher needs to be aware of scientific events, and better yet – to participate in them directly.

Unfortunately, learned information tends to be forgotten. Thus, to maintain the required level of knowledge, effective tutors need to refresh and renew details and concepts.

Development and professional growth, new ideas and methods allow the tutor to remain interesting for their students and to carry out unhackneyed, original lessons.

Excellent Soft Qualities

It means that he is punctual, consistent and able to create a decent environment for learning. A great tutor is always in a good mood, regardless of his personal circumstances. He never or very rarely deviates from the topic – and these deviations were most often indirectly related to the studied information.

The tutor communicates with the student as a friend, he is not dominating and he is creating interest in learning in general and in the specific subject in particular.

How can a student ascertain information about the effectiveness of tutors, you may ask? Just to name a few: Interviewing the tutor, calling up the tutor’s references and checking reviews on his profile page like here at TutorZ. There you will read genuine testimonials from real people about the tutor.