What makes someone a BAD tutor? (1 Viewer)

integral95

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So I stumbled an article about good and bad tutors, but I'd like so hear some personal experiences from my fellow peers here.

So have you had a terrible tutor? if so then how?

I'm a tutor myself, and let's just say that greed hasn't overcome my morals.
 

boredsatan

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In my opinion, a bad tutor is a tutor who expects high standards from his student without offering much assistance.
 

Queenroot

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I tutor and get paid probably minimum wage for a tutor
so yeah defs not greedy

I try to explain things the way I like things explained to me - might not be the best approach but i think my students understand
 

KingOfActing

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Imo a bad tutor is someone who only teaches the course content exactly as is and doesn't try to explain anything beyond it, shutting down questions that don't lie exactly within the scope of the course (every time I hear "you don't need to know that right now/for this course" I cringe - is it that hard to even give a short 1-2 sentence explanation?)
 

WildestDreams

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Someone who expects you to turn up to every.single.lesson without letting you take breaks coz there too greedy for money.
 

He-Mann

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Too many to list but the some important ones are:

1) Often times has trouble explaining concepts

2) Hard to approach e.g. even they may appear 'nice', but are passively condescending

3) Gets uneasy when a student knows more or solved a problem that the tutor could not solve

4) Unaware of a student's progress, hence strengths/weaknesses/growth rate

5) Rarely pushes students out of their comfort zone i.e. students are rarely challenged and thus exhibit low growth
 
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integral95

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I tutor and get paid probably minimum wage for a tutor
so yeah defs not greedy

I try to explain things the way I like things explained to me - might not be the best approach but i think my students understand
Yeah as long as they understand, you've done your job :D.

Imo a bad tutor is someone who only teaches the course content exactly as is and doesn't try to explain anything beyond it, shutting down questions that don't lie exactly within the scope of the course (every time I hear "you don't need to know that right now/for this course" I cringe - is it that hard to even give a short 1-2 sentence explanation?)
Ahhh I get what you mean, yeah some tutors don't seem to enjoy the subject they're teaching.

Someone who expects you to turn up to every.single.lesson without letting you take breaks coz there too greedy for money.
Brah did that happen to you? Feels bad with your savings.
Too many to list but the some important ones are:

1) Often times has trouble explaining concepts

2) Hard to approach e.g. even they may appear 'nice', but are passively condescending

3) Gets uneasy when a student knows more or solved a problem that the tutor could not solve

4) Unaware of a student's progress, hence strengths/weaknesses/growth rate

5) Rarely pushes students out of their comfort zone i.e. students are rarely challenged and thus exhibit low growth
Haven't known someone who's like that, how does that even work?

But I agree that you should definitely cast aside your ego and arrogance in order to properly teach without an attitude.

Bad attitude.

All I gotta say.

Bad attitude as in "YOU ARE SO DUMB, THAT EVEN MR BEAN WOULDN'T HANG OUT WITH YOU"?
 

boredsatan

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If a student gets bad marks even with a tutor then can the tutor be considered a bad tutor?
 

Mr_Kap

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If a student gets bad marks even with a tutor then can the tutor be considered a bad tutor?
Not neccesarily. When i was in year 11/12 I had a REALLY good tutor for 2/3 unit maths. Got high 90's for 2u, and ended up dropping 3u after trials because i got 33% and i had been planning on dropping it for a while and really didnt give a shit about 3u. My tutor tried motivating me, offered extra support, told me exactly what i needed to do to improve weaknesses etc etc etc, but in the end i couldnt be stuffed.
The tutor can do everything they can, but if the student doesn't do enough themselves and gets a bad mark, doesnt mean tutor is bad.
 
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strawberrye

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Someone who expects you to turn up to every.single.lesson without letting you take breaks coz there too greedy for money.
In some ways, this is not necessarily greed for money, but rather consistency in study and routine makes it easier to teach and monitor progress. Perhaps when you become a tutor you will learn to understand that tutors appreciate predictability-it is almost like imagine you have a job, and suddenly being told a few hours or day before-your shift got cancelled. Often students don't give enough notice and the tutor has set aside time for them that could be used to do something else. Whilst it is understandable that some students might not be able to turn up to lessons during assessments, however it is also a sign that they are not managing their time well enough to balance tutoring commitments with other things in their life. Having the discipline to go to tutoring lesson and commit to homework can be a starting point to improving one's academic results.
 

seanieg89

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A tutor so fixated on their way of doing things that alternate approaches/partial solutions are considered wrong and the student is steered towards the tutors method.

Even if a students solution/proof is incomplete, the tutor absolutely owes it to the student to give an answer as to whether or not that method would have worked, and its pros/cons vs other methods. Stifling creativity in math is very very bad.

Most tutors could probably learn a thing or two from their students methods too! Even it is something like "this is why approach X to class Y of problems is not taught as the standard way".

Same goes for tutors who dogmatically stick to a set way of explaining a concept that a student is struggling with, repeating the same thing over and over and getting frustrated etc. Most concepts can be described in pretty different ways, and different students will have different ways of naturally understanding abstract concepts. Being a good tutor/teacher is about understand the material well enough that you can approach it from many different viewpoints, rather than just one. (This is important to being good at math in general, but you can get away without this level of understanding in high school.)
 

davidgoes4wce

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If a student gets bad marks even with a tutor then can the tutor be considered a bad tutor?
No I definitely don't agree with this.

I think there are 5 major factors in order for a student to succeed.

1. Good teacher/tutor
2. Being diligent and hard working
3. Being honest to themselves
4. Requiring a bit of luck. (i.e getting a topic that is a strength of the students)
5. The ability to learn from their mistakes.



I say factor 2 is the most important.....but I'd weight each of those five equally. None of the blame should ever fall ALL upon the tutor.
 

davidgoes4wce

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Also a bad tutor depends on what kind of level you tutor at

1. Tutor Primary- a tutor is expected to provide homework sheets. I learnt this first hand, I have seen the amount of homework companies such as: North Shore and Pre-Uni give to their students. I have seen their course material first hand. If you are seriously considering becoming a good primary tutor you must also be well stocked with primary sources, know the syllabus well and be able to get the motivation up. (a lot of kids understandably at that age are not fully academic inclined at that age)

2. Tutor Secondary- a tutor is expected to provide homework (albeit less than Primary) and be there for the student outside tutoring hours (Snapchat or text messages etc).

3. Tutor University- a tutor is expected to be knowledgeable and up to date with uni content. It isn't sometimes easy to remember stuff that you have covered a year or so ago.University is like a game, if you master the game, then you will do well in your tests /exams. Lecturers are lazy as and don't tend to change questions around too much.
 

boredsatan

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No I definitely don't agree with this.

I think there are 5 major factors in order for a student to succeed.

1. Good teacher/tutor
2. Being diligent and hard working
3. Being honest to themselves
4. Requiring a bit of luck. (i.e getting a topic that is a strength of the students)
5. The ability to learn from their mistakes.



I say factor 2 is the most important.....but I'd weight each of those five equally. None of the blame should ever fall ALL upon the tutor.
4. luck
this can sometimes be the sole factor that differentiates the best from the very best.
 

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