Homework Help Today - A Tutoring Blog for Students and Tutors » tutors

For Teachers: The Benefits of Tutoring over Summer Break

Diane Palumbo — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 19:18:12 +0000

Teaching can be one of the most gratifying career choices – if you’re a teacher, you probably get a thrill out of helping a struggling student understand a difficult concept in any subject. But what do you do with your summer downtime? Many students need summer tutoring, either to fulfill requirements for the previous school year, or to prepare for the upcoming fall semester.

There are tons of benefits for both teachers and students in tutoring arrangements. As a teacher, you can keep sharp on your teaching techniques, try out new ones, and stay up-to-date in your subject area. You might have found that after summer break, you feel a little rusty in the classroom – summer tutoring can be a great way to stay current and avoid this.

Helping a student who finds a particular topic elusive can be an emotionally rewarding experience in itself; and tutoring also provides the opportunity to earn extra money to put towards your well-deserved vacation or further education costs. Cash-flow can be a problem during the summer months for teachers, so tutoring is a great way to ensure you can keep paying the bills – and you’ll gain valuable experience while doing it.

Tutoring provides you with the flexibility to determine your own schedule, the amount of hours you wish to work, and where you work. If you love to travel and are adventurous, teaching English as a second language in a foreign country can be a unique experience. Or, stay at home and work with local kids to contribute to your community and prepare them for the upcoming fall semester (and enjoy the short commute!). Working with parents as clients can also be a satisfying experience as you get to know more about the community and the kids you teach during the normal school year. Many students who receive tutoring in addition to regular class time during the school year build lasting relationships with their teachers and often credit them as having a hand in their future successes.

Working over the summer as a tutor has the added benefit of allowing you to deviate from your typical subject area: maybe you teach English during the normal school year, but you have a hidden passion for math that you miss utilizing. Tutoring at a basic level can give you the chance to exercise some of those neglected muscles. Teachers are also in demand for adults and children for whom English is a second language. This chance to experience variety and make an important difference in someone’s life can be greatly appealing.

To re-cap, teachers who tutor enjoy the following perks:

Increased cash-flow/compensation for lost pay during summer months;
Rewarding relationship with students and parents;
Opportunity to set your own hours, work from home, work locally or even travel abroad;
Chance to try new things; keep your skills focused, and work in areas you might otherwise not have the chance to during the school year.

Visit Tutor Match to build a tutor profile and register to be linked with a student who needs your expertise this summer.

TutorMatch Review: How to Find an Online Tutor

Diane Palumbo — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 21:07:59 +0000

Finding a tutor can be a difficult and sometimes frustrating process. Thanks to the Internet, students and parents now have a free, easy way to find qualified tutors in their area. Tutor Match Tutoring Network is your one stop for all of your tutoring needs.

Whether you’re lost in math, need help in English, or just don’t understand a foreign language, TutorMatch.com can help you find a tutor to help. This is a free search service; there is no fee and you don’t have to give any personal information you’re not comfortable with. Just go to the Tutor Match Local Tutoring Search, type your zip code in the box provided, and you will be able to browse the list of tutors available within a specified radius of your zip code.

If you would like to become a tutor or get a job as a tutor, then TutorMatch.com is the place for you. It is free to post a tutor profile, or for a small fee, you can obtain preferred listing status and have access to more options and better exposure. Premium TutorMatch Profiles tend to attract about 3 times more student leads on average than free profiles.

Depending on preferences, sessions are scheduled for over the phone, in person, or online. The fees for tutors vary based on experience, but are affordable. To request a tutor, simply fill out a form, which will be sent to the tutor. Once he or she receives the request, they will contact you through the preferred method you have listed.

TutorMatch.com makes finding help for yourself or your child easier than it’s ever been. No matter what subject you are struggling in, Tutor Match has someone that can help.

March Giveaway Contest!
If you’re interested in becoming a tutor on TutorMatch and would like a chance to win a free premium membership, check out the Contest Corner for the free TutorMatch profile Giveaway this month!

How To Find The Right Tutor For Your Child Or Subject

Diane Palumbo — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 02:54:00 +0000

When children start having difficulty in school, their love for learning soon begins to fade. Poor grades, social problems, and even problems at home are the inevitable results. If your child is having problems at school, or perhaps you’re having trouble yourself as a high school or college student, finding the right tutor might be the answer.

Finding a tutor is the first step.

The first place to start looking for tutoring assistance is in the educational system. Teachers and professors will often moonlight for a little extra pay and give a student the extra help he or she needs. College towns usually have no shortage of tutoring skills available. Tutors can be found in the student body of the college or university by contacting the institution’s office of student affairs or hanging a note with your phone number in places student gather to eat and study.

Checking for online tutoring services will produce good results. Tutorial services connect the student with a tutor who will work with him or her as needed. The results will be improved grades, an increased comprehension level and a better all-around attitude toward the learning process.

Another place to look for tutoring assistance is the local social services agency. Referrals to excellent tutors may be available since the need is a common one. An excellent tutor can sometimes be found this way.

A potential tutor should never be hired without at least a minimal checking of references. It certainly would also be worthwhile to check with a site like Family Watchdog, which contains a database of known offenders. And just to be sure, always be present or nearby when a tutor meets with your children.

Successful Tutor Testimonials from TutorMatch.com

Diane Palumbo — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 01:55:36 +0000

Occassionally we get emails from both students and tutors who have had a good experience working with our tutoring referral website, TutorMatch.com. Since I’ve taken a short break from blogging over the holiday I thought now we would be a good time to get back into it by relating some of these positive testimonials:

Alicia G, an english and reading tutor from Canada, writes: “Hello. I want to thank you for receiving my first client from you. Please keep the students coming!”

Susan K, a French and Spanish tutor from Schenectady, says, “I tutored a student through your company and it worked out very well. Thank you!”

And John Z, a multi-subject tutor and the Founder of Westside Tutoring in Lakewood, Ohio, has written us several times. “Excellent response! Thank you for the referrals. Good quality referrals unlike some other tutor referral websites, you actually send people in need of assistance. Well done TutorMatch!”

“Once again, I would like to thank you for an excellent referral. I have a client for the next two weeks at a decent wage and the promise of more work and mentoring down the road, soon. Very nice. By far, your website has returned the best results.”

” Once again, TutorMatch.com has proven to be the best of the tutor referral sites I subscribe to. Not only have you sent quality leads but they have resulted in ongoing relationships that have paid many times the fee to join. Once again, well done and thanks!”

Those are just a few of our most recent testimonials … please keep them coming, and I’d be happy to feature them here!

Website Review: Teacher’s Servant for Tutors and Teachers

Diane Palumbo — Thu, 06 Nov 2008 13:38:22 +0000

I recently came across a new website, called TeachersServant.com, which I thought might be useful to tutors. It’s a time management solution for teachers and tutors which need to organize lesson plans, schedule tasks and reminders, and generally stay on top of any kind of schedule. It offers a basic free plan for less than 10 students or classes, and a premium service for under $10 monthly. I emailed the owner, Dmitri, in order to ask him a few questions about this new service and see if any of our tutors can find it useful.

Q. Please tell our audience a little about what TeachersServant.com is all about:

Teacher’s Servant is a web-based service for self-employed teachers and tutors. The luxury of being your own boss requires the burden of wearing many hats. Not only are you the tutor but also the accountant, scheduler, marketer, and sales representative. Teacher’s servant steps right there and minimizes managing overhead of tutoring. Teacher’s Servant provides easy student, class, schedule, payment and expense management services. We offer a free plan, so teachers and tutors could start using Teacher’s Servant without any commitments and expenses right away. Our integrated schedule gives an ability to have personalized schedule linked to student and classes. On top of the “typical” scheduling capabilities Teacher’s Servant helps keep track on attendance, payments and expenses. Teacher’s Servant also gently “reminds” with notes from the previous lessons and helps stay organized with integrated To-Dos. Reach reporting functionality gives teachers and tutors instant outlook on any data that they might need – from simple invoice for a student to a complete “Income vs. Expense” report that would minimize tax preparation or just help analyze financial performance.

Q. When did you start TeachersServant.com, and why?

The idea of the service belongs to my wife Marina, who is a private music teacher. She was overwhelmed with papers, spreadsheets and calendars and was looking for a simple to use integrated solution to manage her teaching data. After extensive marketing research we’ve discovered that this need is really unaddressed despite substantial interest from the tutoring and teaching community. So, we’ve decided to fill this niche and in August 2008 Teacher’s Servant was launch.

Q. Please tell us a little about yourself, and your background:

I have more than 15 years of experience in IT industry where I worked as a developer, architect and for the last 10 years as a project manager delivering customized solutions to my clients. Recently, I have established my own company – ZoomOnTime, Inc. The first product ZoomOnTime launched was a web-based timesheet solution for small and medium size businesses. ZoomOnTime also provides time management consulting.

Q. What kinds of service does TeachersServant.com offer for students and/or teachers?

Teacher’s Servant is oriented for teachers and tutors. We currently don’t provide direct services for students (however, they could receive automated lesson reminder from tutor’s calendar).

Q. How often do you update the site, and where do you get new content and ideas from?

Being relatively new service, we have new releases quite often (usually once or twice a month). Teacher’s Servant is customer oriented service, so majority of ideas are coming from our customers – teachers and tutors. We receive direct request/ideas from our users and also periodically reach out them soliciting feedback. Also we are actively working with local tutors and teachers in one-on-one and interest group set-ups to better understand their needs and challenges.

Q. Are you planning any new additions or features to the site? What’s next for TeachersServant.com?

We have a number of minor additional features in our pipe-line that are scheduled for roll-out in the next 4 months. Among them are email reminders for To-Dos, reminder integration with SMS, automatic student invoicing and a number of reports. For mid-term future we are considering to provide our users with personalized web-pages, student collaboration services and lesson plans integration. We a looking for our teachers and tutors to help us prioritize these additional features so we can deliver what is mostly needed first.

TutorMatch Pledges Proceeds to Charitable Volunteer Tutors

Editor — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 20:08:55 +0000

TutorMatch (http://www.tutormatch.com), the leading online tutor referral service, announced today that 10% of all proceeds for the month of October will be donated to the Chicago-based Volunteer Tutoring organization, the Tutor Mentor Connection.

The Tutor Mentor Connection (http://www.tutormentorconnection.org/) describes their mission as dedicated to improving the availability and quality of comprehensive, long-term, volunteer-based tutor/mentor programs in high-poverty areas of the Chicago region and other large US cities through an ongoing, dynamic exchange of ideas.

“Our organization feels it’s time to give back to the Tutoring community, ” says Diane Palumbo, a press representative for TutorMatch. “We’re in a helping industry – we connect tutors with parents and students who need additional education. We can’t forget that there’s plenty of parents who need these services but simply can’t afford them.”

TutorMatch is an online tutor referral service. Tutors can create a profile about their tutoring services on the website for free or get a premium listing for a small yearly subscription fee. In turn, parents and students can search the database of thousands of online and local tutors for free. Tutormatch protects their privacy and doesn’t even require them to register or sign up with the site. Parents and students then interview potential tutors online and have their choice to meet with them one-on-one in their own neighborhood, or hire them for online tutoring services.

“For there to be tutoring/mentoring in poverty areas we don’t just need tutors, ” says Daniel Bassill, President of the Tutor Mentor Connection. “We need donors who help pay the rent and other costs of making a tutor/mentor program available.”

That’s where TutorMatch decided to step in. “We’re a small online educational resource site, so we can’t compete with the international conglomerates commercially, ” says Palumbo. “But we feel it’s just good corporate responsibility to provide support for the most important resource our country has to offer – children in need of education.”
TutorMatch Tutoring and Homework Help is an online tutor referral service which has been connecting students and tutors online since 1996. Besides their primary online referral service, the company also offers the Homework Help Today blog for both students and tutors.

Making Astronomy Tutoring More Interesting

Diane Palumbo — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 21:03:56 +0000

Many astronomy students are faced with the reality of the depth of study once they enter the second chapter of the textbook. Students take the class thinking that it will be all constellations and stars, but don’t realise the true scientific theories presented in higher levels of the course. For this reason they decide to hire a tutor to solidify the information learned in class, and to enrich the experience, causing the information to remain within the mind.

As an astronomy tutor there are many things that you can do to ensure that the student retains the information. Making the literature interesting is a key part of the process, as much of it is theories and formulas.

Consider a trip to the local planetarium to consider the real scope of the universe and to provide experience with the formulas required to calculate distance. For many students, this is the ultimate perspective, as it all seems to come together once the magnifying is demonstrated in person. Many of the theories and formulas associated with astronomy have to do with distance, and therefore this valuable tutoring tool is available for low cost, throughout the duration of the tutoring sessions.

Consider taking into account planetary events that may occur throughout the duration of the course. These events are a valuable teaching tool, as they are a valuable period as the “how” and “why” of the events can be determined. This is a valuable time to discuss planet rotation, lunar and solar eclipses, even the changing of tides.

Science has more to do with theories and formulas so many children, adolescences and even adults learn by example and do not fall under the visual or auditory learning processes. For this reason, it is important to step outside of the classroom, the home and the library to examine the astrological events the world in a matter in which they can relate.

Astronomy Resources:

Related Blogs on astronomy

Impact Day 2008

Related Blogs on planets

Related Blogs on science

Choosing a Second Language Tutor: Native Speaker vs. Educated Professional

Diane Palumbo — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 14:45:12 +0000

Choosing a tutor for a second language, be it German, French or Spanish, is not a decision that should be taken lightly. Whether the reason for learning the language is a trip abroad or simply personal growth, proper enunciation, vocabulary and meaning are crucial in the development of the language. For this reason it is important to choose a native speaker of the language or a person that has been extensively trained in the language, preferably in a post-secondary institution.

The benefits to hiring a native speaker of the language are the influence that culture will have in the teachings. This tutor has more than likely been exposed to cultural occurrences like food, songs, and beliefs that can enrich the tutoring environment. This information, along with the natural ability to teach dialect and proper pronunciation of the words, combined with the natural phrases used in everyday conversation, are the reasons that many choose to enlist a native speaker of the second language in which they are trying to learn.

Contrary to these thoughts, there are many benefits to choosing a professional tutor that has been educated in the second language to teach the student. Technical aspects of the language will be covered with concise curriculums, and the lessons will come with the expertise of teaching techniques that are shown to these tutors through the course of their education.

Using a post-secondary educated tutor will ensure that the basics of the language, the foundation, will be taught before the knowledge is expanded upon and grown into phrases. This technique for learning languages is most effective for those looking to grasp the concept of the language from the bottom up. Although it may take longer to speak as a native, the teachings will remain in the mind solidified as knowledge.

Find an online tutor to teach you a langauge over the internet:

Online German Tutors

Online French Tutors

Online Spanish Tutors

To make the choice, consider the following aspects:

What are the reasons that the tutor is being hired?
How long does the student have to learn the language?
What does the student expect to learn in this time period?

It may be quicker to learn the essentials from a native speaker of the language, rather than to begin with the foundation.

Regardless of the choices, speak with the tutor in the initial meeting to discuss the plan of action, curriculum and objectives of the tutoring sessions. Creating a plan of action and practice are two of the essential counterparts to learning a second language.

Improving Reading Comprehension in Classic Literature

Diane Palumbo — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 12:39:27 +0000

Many high school students have a difficult experience with their first classic literature assignment. The archaic prose of works by Dickens, Melville and Shakespeare can prove difficult to understand and seem like a whole other language. So how do we break the barriers between literature and learning?

There are a variety of ways that we can increase comprehension when reading literature. Using these techniques increases the comprehension of a classic novel in a variety of students and can result in successful comprehension of the piece of literature.

One of the top ways to increase comprehension of literature in the classroom, and with tutoring tactics, is to compare the text with a modern day interpretation of the literature. Learning by comparison can be helpful. Comparing classic literature to modern situations can also help students. Often younger generations will be more adept to learn the themes of classics they are able to identify with. If the tutor is able to provide some mirroring within the classic to modern day situations, the student is more likely to learn the information.

Providing a translation for texts written in poetry can also prove helpful. Since poetry is a language all its own, especially with Victorian authors such as Byron, Keats and Shelley, providing a text with a contemporary translation under or opposite of each line in the poem increases comprehension for the student.

Using textual clues such as descriptive words to gain the feeling of the literature can improve comprehension greatly. These identifier words can create recognition of one word, which can lead to the comprehension of one phrase, which can lead to the comprehension of the whole page.

These are just some techniques a good tutor can employ to help their student’s grasp of reading comprehension with classic literature; find a tutor near you to learn more!

Resources for Classic Literature

Hello, and welcome to Homework Help Today!

Diane Palumbo — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 14:15:33 +0000

Hi, my name is Diane Palumbo, and I am the new owner of the Homework Help Today blog. I wanted to just write a quick note and say hello to everyone stopping by. In the coming months I plan to manage this blog about everything related to my professional field, which is tutoring and teaching. I’ve been working in the tutoring and professional mentoring field for about 10 years now, and have gained quite a bit of experience, so hopefully I can impart some of that to you!

This blog has basically 2 audiences: there are tips for people who want to become or already tutors, and there will be some tips for people looking for tutors.

In the interest of full disclosure; I will explain that I do work for TutorMatch.com, the premiere Tutoring and Homework Help website for Tutors. If you’re interested in becoming a tutor, or if you want to find one near you or online, then TutorMatch is the place you want to go!