Do I need to get a home tutor?

One of the most frequent questions asked at parents' evenings these days is should I get her a tutor? 

Although I believe that suitably qualified tutors can be helpful for children with specific learning differences and difficulties, usually within the school or guided by the class teacher rather than externally, I have become concerned about the prevalence of engaging ‘academic’ tutors as a matter of course. I have known some teachers who I'm sure would be wonderful tutors, but others who have not been high achieving or successful in the classroom and would not be offering your child excellence or giving you value for money. 

One to one tuition at home, according to recent reports in the media, is as common as attending school. There are now more people offering private tuition than there are teachers in schools. None of these need to be qualified or to conform to reasonable standards. Having a Mrs Doubtfire demeanour, or a track record as a tutor for many years is not necessarily good enough. Companies exist to offer tuition at particular stages in the school career, to assist with 11+ entry, to prepare for public examinations, or just to top up what is being done at school. Many of these cannot guarantee results and an analysis of their success rates, for example in grammar school entry, correlate to the child's natural ability and the amount of rigorous rehearsal (which they can do with you or by themselves using resources bought from WHSmiths) rather than something magical these tutors have added in the many hours of paid extra. I have been frustrated by parents wondering why their children are making poor progress towards independent learning, when most of their child’s ‘individual’ learning is coached by someone sitting beside them. Whilst tuition can work for some, it is certainly not a panacea for academic improvement. 

It is worth remembering that tuition may actually be counterproductive: 

• Children who regularly work alongside a tutor soon learn that there is no expectation that they can, or should, manage independently. 
• Children used to tuition have a fear of getting things wrong and become reliant on instant praise, feedback, correction and support – failing to develop the resilience that is essential for effective learning. 
• Children who have intensive coaching for examinations often feel de-skilled and deeply demoralised if the tuition has simply raised them to an academic environment, set or school where they cannot really manage by themselves. 
• Tutors have no regulation: they may be wonderful, but there is no control over what they teach, how current their knowledge might be, or how effectively they work with children. 
• Ex-teachers may not be up to date with ever changing methods and syllabuses and can confuse their tutees, or give them conflicting methods or information to worry about. 
• Tutors are unlikely to have the same view of progression and continuity that the class or subject teachers have, because at school the teaching team will be working together to create something coherent in terms of learning strategies, linked knowledge and experience across the curriculum. 
• Home tutors will not be working from the plans for the year at school, and may worry you or your child about gaps and aspects of the syllabus that have simply not been covered yet for very sound reasons. 
• Tutors offering individual lessons often overstate or at least overestimate the ability of your child, who may cope extremely well in one to one sessions, but not necessarily in a classroom, or when later expected to work independently or under exam conditions. The confidence that a child shows the tutor due to close questioning, lots of praise, strong educational scaffolding and a coaching relationship is very different from the expectations of the school or during assessment. 
• Most worryingly, there are no safeguarding guarantees about an unregulated and unchecked person in your home. 

My advice as a Head Teacher is to use tuition only when advised to by the school: for supporting strategies for learning, for managing learning difficulties or in the short term for keeping the brain awake over long holidays. Make sure you have up to date references for anyone you invite into your home, and check on the qualifications and experience of the tutor. Grand results regarding other children are not helpful – that child may have a completely different set of abilities, skills and needs from your own. Tell the school if you have engaged a tutor, the most fruitful experiences will be those that mirror and complement the school curriculum. Visit the session each time to see what is happening, and if your child is overwhelmed, confused, tired or becoming reliant on too much ‘tuition’, support, praise or encouragement, then stop the lessons, they are simply not helping. 

Children who are doing perfectly well at school do not need to be discouraged by having extra work in their free time, nor another adult questioning their ability, impeding their ability to develop independent strategies and pressuring them over their results. 

A parent I have known for many years spoke to me last week about her reason for stopping tuition after eighteen months with a very nice tutor. She said that she popped in on a session to discover, not for the first time, that the tutor was simply helping with the homework the class teacher had set and already prepared, no more, and no less - for £45. She said she felt pressured into organising tuition because all her friends had a tutor for their children. I asked if she had booked the lessons so that her child could have different work, more help or just more practice, but she said she had left it all in the hands of the tutor who was well qualified and came highly recommended. She said had not informed the school because she didn’t want us to think her daughter was getting help. She said that she had just come to the realisation that her child was actually doing fine, and that she was no longer going to worry about the extra mark or two the tutor could wring from the piece of work. I applaud, and I hope that the saved money is used for a really enjoyable family activity. 

Education is a holistic thing. Would your child benefit from a tutor? Probably not as much as she would benefit from you reading to her each evening if she is young, or taking her on a weekly trip to the library, or for older pupils taking the time to discuss coursework, promoting rational argument at the dinner table and engendering an interest in current affairs. 

What did she get in the test?

In our lives today we are all subject to review and audit. It has become so much part of our culture that what we used to think of as our daily work has become something under endless scrutiny, and rather than allowing for inspiration, creativity, rehearsal, formation thinking, practising and self-improvement, we seem to be obsessed with attainment test results, and have forgotten that learning is a process and not simply a one off packaged ‘result’.

So, unfortunately, much of we do becomes an instant measure of our self-worth. My own mother, undertaking a Diploma in Botanical Art for the Royal Society, in her mid-seventies, was very upset when her 8.4 grade average dropped to 7.9 due to a ‘badly’ coloured leaf. “The tutor liked the leaf shape,” she told me, “But the depth of colour was not right in the leaf veins”. When I pointed out that 7.9 was 79% and probably an A grade she was surprised. Nonetheless she was ready to go on to do battle with herself in the next assignment, despite not having practised or had a chance to get the leaf right – because she thought she had to go on to the next thing, and try to get that right in one bash too.

For me, education should not be like this, I believe it is a long and thoughtful process. Yes, educationalists have talked for a long time about building blocks that found and build learning, but that must not be understood as each piece of knowledge being a brick in a wall in its own right. Most of knowledge, skill and discerned understanding comes in a web or network of interconnected ideas. It takes time to season. Given that education in school takes place over at least thirteen years, there is some time for a well educated child to benefit from a gradual unfolding of the world of knowledge. It is well proven that early or rapid success is not the best precursor to lifelong achievement: look at Einstein, Mo Farrah or Churchill!

At my primary aged school, we have embarked on a holistic programme of giving the girls an opportunity each week to work independently at a task, under the sort of conditions she would face in a test, but with the work that she is doing in class. We believe this has a number of purposes. The first is Formative, where we can see what the child can do unaided, where she needs support or scaffolding, where she can think for herself, where she can practise the little aspects of setting out she has been shown such as where to put titles and date if not instructed. The second is Ipsitive where the child sees how she has done over time, and is able to make a pattern of her progress, comparing not just results, but also how she copes with the experience. The teacher can create a pattern to see what is developing and what needs help. This is not a comparison with others, but a proper examination of the development of the child over time, by concentrating on her progress in relation to her ability and her journey. The third is Meta-cognitive where a child comes to understand for herself how she learns best, what helps her when she is learning and what she needs to remember. It is the often unnoticed part of the process, where children become aware of their own ability, their own strengths and the things they can do for and by themselves that make things go right when they do them, and wrong when they don’t. Each child soon gets the hang of how this feels, and is encouraged to look through the work to see what she could have done, herself, to do better this time, or for next time.

This activity is not designed to be Summative however. It is not a close of play event such as GCSE or A level, it is not used in the way an entrance test or formal exam might be. It is not used as a measure of success, although success is valued, alongside good progress. It is not a test to check up what was learnt before moving on.

My belief is that excellent teaching and learning must include this space for children to rehearse, to come to an understanding about their work, to begin and then to become skilled at managing on their own. If these opportunities are not presented young, and repeated regularly then real learning, real depth of knowledge, effective skills, creativity, self-esteem, confidence, resilience and inspiration will not develop. Tests certainly have their place, at end of term or year, between phases and as rites of passage. They are a useful measure for the outside world or for parents of what has been achieved in a reasonable space of time. But in between times I believe children should be allowed to learn from having a go, free from the fear of their own results.