Wednesday, December 18, 2013

Message from Alise: Another "Good" Secret of Mine!


Happy Wednesday Tutoring Family!

First of all, I want to apologize for not having my usual postings, but it's been a busy year. I promise we will be back on track for 2014.

It's been a long time coming, but I am so glad that the time is finally here! For the past five years (really seven), I have been working on a few special projects that are very dear to me. Throughout these years, I have discovered a lot of things, including getting to know why I am here--my life purpose. I can tell you this...I am so grateful to be able to share my gift with the world and I give all the Glory to God. 

I pray that it brings you much happiness and most of all, it blesses you to help others believe in themselves and go far too. As I have said many times, there is a special place in this world for tutors and I am committed to helping you discover it as well.

Just today, I have launched the first of many gifts that are forthcoming to you.

Get the details here:


Dr. Holland-Johnson Launches 12 New Online Courses For Tutor Business Owners http://www.prlog.org/12257869


If you haven't already, please make sure that you get connected by signing up on one of my mailing lists. 

If you are tutor business owner, you want to make sure that you sign up on the mailing list located at www.expandyourtutoringbusinessblog.com

As always, happy tutoring!

Alise

Thursday, November 28, 2013

Message from Alise--Happy Thanksgiving from the USA!

Today is Thanksgiving here in the U.S. 

And as so many of us do during this time of year, I count my blessings and acknowledge what I'm grateful for... including you.

I appreciate you for being part of my community. I appreciate that you read my emails and participate in our discussions. I appreciate that you give me feedback and "like" what I post. There are no words to really express my gratitude for your continued support.

The tutoring profession is a special one...

And I'm honored and grateful to be a part of your tutoring journey!

I know that you are gearing up for the 2014 tutoring season that is just right around the corner. If you haven’t already, please make sure that you are signed up on my email list to receive exclusive updates that I only share from my blog.  I will be making several announcements within the next few weeks so stay tuned. You don’t want to miss them so please make sure that you are signed up to stay “in the know”. You can find the “Join my Mailing List” here on the blog at http://becomingabettertutor.blogspot.com/.

As always, Happy Tutoring!


Alise

Tuesday, September 3, 2013

Message from Alise: Helpful Information about the "Smart Drug"

Happy Tuesday! Hope that everyone had a beautiful weekend.

I want to share with you an infographic about a drug known as the "smart drug". Here's the URL: The Smart Drug? The Use and Abuse of Adderall

This information will be helpful if you work with any clients who are in college or even secondary school.


Source: Additude Magazine, http://www.bestmastersprograms.org/smart-drug/

Sincerely,
Alise




Thursday, August 29, 2013

10 Reasons why Accounting Tutors are in Demand


Accounting is an important subject in all businesses, particularly in the management of capital, investment, and any other financially related matter at hand. Learning the subject requires a lot of skill and a meticulous eye for each penny that goes in and out of the system. Hence, the need for accounting tutors is in high demand. If you want to learn exactly why, here are ten reasons.

Simplified Concepts

Accounting tutors know how to break down the nitty-gritty behind the assets, liabilities, and revenue connection. They are equipped with the knowledge to explain these concepts in simpler terms, particularly for those new to the accounting industry.

Important in Financial Careers

Accounting tutors are vital in training students who wish to engage in financial careers. With a strong background in finances, these tutors specialize on the importance of money and the balance of such in a given firm.

Aid in Starting out businesses

Accounting tutors understand the nature of feasibility studies, proposals, and risk-benefit analyses, which are vital for starting out businesses. Students can learn from these tutors various tips on starting out on business ventures.

Insight on the market

Market analyses and trend development are vital in understanding business operations. Accounting tutors know how to manage these economic factors in order to help students who wish to own businesses later on survive in a very competitive market.

Assessment of various trends in society

Accounting tutors also understand how trends affect various factors of the economy or society, which can help students prepare for these situations once they engage in financial or accounting-related activities.

Knowledge of Accounting Software

One of the highlights of the accounting tutor is his or her well-versed knowledge in accounting software. It is the age of Information Technology, and in depth knowledge of computing device is a must. Your accounting tutor is armed with these principles and applications to help students out.

Industry Rules of Thumb

One of the perks of having an accounting tutor is his or her knowledge of the industry. He or she can teach students some rules of thumb to consider when preparing financial reports or handling financial activities.

Financial Planning Development

Accounting tutors also have a strong perception of planning, which is vital for managing financial information. This is strengthened with the managerial perspective accountants have, particularly in analyzing potential investments.

Strong Interpersonal Drive

On the attitude side, accounting tutors are trained to connect with people. Money involves people, after all, so it is vital that they maintain open lines of communication. This can help quite effectively in tutorial sessions because of the discussions that could occur regarding financial management.

Goal-Oriented

Most importantly, accounting tutors are very goal-driven. They see the end product as a vital asset to the success of an individuals. This enhances their potential for being in-demand because of their zeal for the goal.

 

Accounting tutors are necessary in any tutoring service because they provide a unique insight to the tutoring scheme, particularly with their strong financial background.

Are you an accounting tutor? What do you think is your strongest point?

Wednesday, August 28, 2013

Eight Instructional Strategies to Use in Tutoring


Being a tutor involves a lot of dynamic thinking. You should learn to get the students’ attentions and provide them with information that is not difficult to grasp. Basically, you should provide them with easy methods that are both interesting and informative. This can be quite tough if you teach subjects that normally require much concentration; however, here are eight interesting instructional strategies you could use when you tutor.

Realization Sessions

Most students will be wondering about the importance of a certain subject. They may feel that Algebra may be a pain and won’t bother paying attention because of this assumption, for instance. Focus on redirecting their thoughts and cite examples where the subjects can be put to use in everyday activities. This will help students relate to the subject matter a whole lot better.

Emotional Connections

If a subject makes people sad, show it instead of tell them. For instance, history topics tend to arouse emotions a lot, so try and connect with your students so they can feel the pain of the victims of World War II or perhaps the success of the Great Roman Empire. Take note of language use and emotional responses; people tend to retain information that has a certain emotional tinge to it because they can recall the ideas when they think of the emotion, so work with that.

Interactive Discussion

Engage your students by allowing them to share their ideas. Start with open-ender questions that will motivate your students to think. No matter how farfetched their ideas are, try to channel them so that your students are not intimidated. Interactive discussions are very good ways of improving self-confidence.

Practice and Repetition

Sometimes, an exercise in repetition is vital for allowing students to learn the subject material even better. Show them fun mnemonics to learn for the natural sciences or some techniques in solving math problems so that students can understand these concepts and equations with ease. Give them fun examples to try out so that they can enjoy solving.

Game Association

Relate the subject material through a game; this involves a lot of learning and team work. People enjoy playing games because of the fun element. If you channel in your tutoring scheme with this, you can easily tap into the learning centers of the students.

Reinforced Learning

Instead of focusing on one subject matter, show students the connection with other important topics. For instance, instead of focusing on just History, show how this subject affects Economics and even Geography, two other subject matters. This will widen the students’ scope of learning.

Skills Assessment

Assess your students’ skills by giving out tests. Then, help them improve. This cycle allows you to gage the level of learning your students achieved. Afterwards, you may adjust your teaching strategies to meet the level of learning at hand.

Positive Conditioning

Whenever a student answers a question correctly or scores a high score in a test, reward him or her. This motivates the student to perform well during the tutorial sessions. Positive conditioning also increases learning potential because of the desire to achieve success based on the initial reward. Students will be more prompted to be more active in the learning process.

Tutoring is fun, particularly if your students enjoy the sessions. Be creative in administering the instructional strategies to ensure effective learning and development during your tutoring sessions.

Tuesday, August 27, 2013

10 Ways to use Pinterest for Your Tutoring Business


In any business endeavor, enhancing branding is vital for attracting clients. This increases sales and, as a result, the overall profits that you would gain. Pinterest has taken an important step into enhancing business potential. This social network takes photos and videos into a new light where you could cater to the visual thirst of people, which is a strong selling point. To get in the mix of Pinterest for your tutoring business, here are ten ways just how.

1.       Beef up on the photo-and-video collection

Having a Pinterest account means that you should have a wide collection of photos and videos, because they will be shared among various people. If you haven’t built up your collection, now is the right time to do so. This will boost your reach, particularly as people are interested in visual content.

2.       “Pin” your site

Allowing people to connect with Pinterest will boost your tutoring service reach, because it provides an increased opportunity of connection that is very much good for any business. “Pinning” your site or adding a button will allow your visitors to conveniently share photos, particularly those of your interactive tutoring or any other interesting images you post on your website.

3.       Put Your Brand Out There

In Pinterest, you can put your brand out there by connecting your company email and setting up an account for that purpose. Branding is vital for any business, so you should make sure that you maximize this opportunity to ensure that your company grows in terms of familiarity and exposure.

4.       Enforce Your Brand with Appropriate Messages

Once you have your brand out there, you should focus your content on supportive messages. This is done through establishing a motto and having your images reiterate certain elements of the motto. If your tutoring business has a “We Teach for Life” motto, for instance, have photos with interactive learning and student progress.

5.       Infographics Command Pinterest Pages

The visual appeal of Pinterest is strengthened with the knack for infographics. Provide interesting statistics about your tutoring business to reel in your customers. Informing your clients is a vital to increasing business potential.

6.       Engage your Audience with Memorable Content

Make content work. Always focus on giving your consumers more than what they bargained. You can drive memories effectively by showing photos of your group sessions. Emphasize on emotions to really capture the interest of people.

7.       Optimize Visibility

Visibility is vital for any business, so make sure you provide options so that your customers can communicate with you. Have comment boxes open and be engaging in listing down your contact details.

8.       Take part in the conversation

One key factor of maintaining a strong Pinterest connection with your prospective clients is to take part in the conversation. Answer responses and read what people are saying so you can understand the interests of your consumers, particularly their various requests.

9.       Hashtag your content

Hashtagging is vital for enhancing relevance and social search access. Just like Instagram and Twitter, you need a mechanism to allow people to find your photos. Hashtag them with your brand or a relevant search so that people can reach your site more easily.

10.   Focus on an effective content distribution strategy

Last, but not least, distribute your content based on your marketing plan. If you have one, stick to it. If you don’t, then start one. Frequency and planned releases are vital for maintaining a strong market reach. You should make it a task to maintain a periodical release of content; people want information time to time.

Are you an avid user of Pinterest? What is your secret blend to success?

Wednesday, August 14, 2013

QuizEgg: Product Review (Online Assessment Tool)


As a tutor, you should learn to use the right tools to assess your students’ performance. This will give you an idea on how well they are performing so you can make adjustments to your teaching style, should the need arises. One effective student assessment tool is QuizEgg, which can be accessed from your browser. The role of this tool is that it provides your students with an assessment tool they can easily access so you can gage the performance level and retention that your students have after each session or after a series of sessions. Here’s what you definitely need to know about this online assessment tool.

Extensive Question Types

QuizEgg allows you to generate assessments of various testing types, which allow you to simulate school tests for your students to answer. These are true-or-false, multiple choice, fill-in-the-blanks, word list, essay, and multiple response.

Of the six question types, all are automatically scored except the essay, saving you the time needed to check with an answer key. The abundance of question types allows you to be creative in how you handle your assessment schemes. You can vary things up to give students a challenge or keep it simple so you can track progress quite effectively.

In Depth Student Progress

Another great feature of QuizEgg is that you can learn which questions your students answered correctly or incorrectly. Additionally, you can learn how quickly your students answered the quiz and what these answers were.

Learning these details will provide you with insight on your students’ progresses. It is important to note that something as simple as the time it took for a student to answer the quiz can determine that the student is picking up things slow. Such analysis can give you an idea on how you should modify your teaching style for future sessions.

Monitoring student progress is important in establishing proper academic development. You shouldn’t be rigid in your teaching patterns. Adjust depending on the results so you can garner optimal results in future tutoring sessions.

Effective Tutoring Component

The bottom line of QuizEgg is that it is an effective tutoring tool you can utilize for your tutoring service. As an add-on service for your assessment needs, you could save the time it takes to manually record these tests and to have students take them during the sessions. Channel their free time through QuizEgg and you can modify your tutoring style accordingly.

Remember, being a tutor means you should continue to be a teacher. Assess your students’ performances and you can understand where their weak points lie. Help them work on that through the assessments and you can provide even better teaching for your students. This helps them in the long run because you understand their growth gradually.

Being a tutor requires ensuring that your students understand what you’re saying. With QuizEgg, the right assessment tool can facilitate you with easy-to-make tests and great monitoring applications in the service.

Tuesday, August 13, 2013

How to Handle Your First Tutoring Session


Tutoring is definitely not a walk in the park. You can’t just waltz in to teach students what you know; it is a sophisticated art that requires preparation and psychology so that you can provide the services you have properly. During that first tutoring session, you might have the jitters and even stutter during the session, but if you want to know how to handle your first tutoring session, here’s what you need to keep in mind at all times.

You Will Get Nervous

Never think that you won’t get nervous during your first tutoring session. In fact, accepting that you will get nervous will allow you to adapt to the situation more readily. When you expect things, you tend to build up confidence because you know that anxiety is just a phase. This personal conditioning is a secret to overcoming stuttering and mess-ups in your tutoring session. Always remember to accept that you will get nervous, but take note that you should overcome such anxiety.

The acceptance stage is important in conditioning yourself for your tutoring session. This gives you a head start in managing your emotions properly so that you don’t have to face any hiccups while you’ve established great momentum in your tutoring session at hand, so learn to accept the nervousness.

But You Will Overcome it Smoothly

When you understand that you will get nervous, you will learn that you can overcome it smoothly. This allows you to gain composure more readily and you can kick off your tutoring session without any problems. The nervous sensation lasts about thirty seconds to a minute for some individuals, so spend such time conditioning yourself so that you can provide your tutoring with ease. During those nervousness moments, try to talk to your students so that you can ease up the tension a bit—it helps.

And You Will Focus on Giving Rather than Taking

Because you have overcome your nervousness, you can establish yourself as a tutor who gives and not takes from your students. Nervous tutors usually require more input from their students because they are not in the right condition to teach. This is healthy to an extent, but you should always remember that tutors exist to guide students and this is done with specialized teaching methods that give more than take. When you overcome your emotional torture that is anxiety, you will find yourself beaming with confidence and making children smile.

Handling your first tutoring session simply means overcoming that fear you might have boiling within you. It may haunt you for the first thirty seconds to a minute, but it will hide away in the deepest pits of your psyche if you know how to handle this fear. Be aware that you will face it and understand that it’s just a phase. It’s as simple as that. Focus on your clients and you will carry on your tutoring quite effectively. Always keep in mind that you should give quality service, so don’t waste it on stuttering around.

Wednesday, August 7, 2013

Five Components of the Anatomy of Your Tutoring Session


Every tutoring sessions follows a sequence, because it is that orderliness that makes tutoring something that students can grasp easily. It is important that you understand each component of your tutoring anatomy so that you can guide students effectively and provide them with the right adaptation they need when you tutor them. These five components include the icebreaker moment, the outline, the implementation of the agenda, the interactive modules, and the closing. Knowing what each component really is in depth will give you better insight in channeling your tutoring service.

Icebreaker Moment

The icebreaker is your set-things-in-the-mood jive for your students. Sometimes, tutoring sessions can kick off with an awkward start, but with icebreaker moments, you can tune in your students with an activity or two so that they become mentally ready for the lecture. Icebreakers are great for multiple group sessions because this builds interaction among the students, which can help spearhead your tutoring session quite effectively.

Outline

The outline is probably the most important part of your tutoring session. Students will expect something from you, so make sure you provide the outline in a clear and understandable manner. Outlines allow your students to gage how long the lecture would last and what information they will learn during that session. Always keep in mind that your outline must be brief and to-the-point; most students in tutoring have short attention spans.

Implementation of the Agenda

Your outline contains agenda that you must implement during your tutoring session. Always ensure that whatever you place in your outline should be implemented accordingly. This develops your credibility and provides students with the right depth of information that they can handle during that session. Ensure that your tutorial sessions involve clear concepts that you presented beforehand to ensure that these sessions are carried out as smoothly as possible.

Interactive Modules

During your tutoring sessions, interactive modules involve question-and-answer portions and some activities that you may have in store. This keeps your tutoring session alive. Make sure you have these strategically placed in your tutoring session so that you can channel out boredom and filter out enthusiasm. Tutoring is also about establishing that connection with your students, so develop such communication with interactive modules.

Closing

Finally, the tutoring session you kicked off effectively must end with the same treatment. Prepare some additional advice you’d like to share with your students so they are motivated to attend the next session. The importance of the closing is to summarize the whole tutorial session with an important message for your students to retain. Having a good first impression matters, but having a great lasting impression matters even more.

The anatomy of your tutoring session involves a five-fold plan that will keep your tutoring on top of its game. Always remember to provide your students with the right treatment they deserve. It is this conditioning that will allow them to retain information more readily and become more active in their academics. Focus on the goal but ensure the journey is well worth it.

Tuesday, August 6, 2013

Using Instagram to Promote Your Tutoring Business—Is it Worth it?

Tutoring businesses require innovative approaches in enhancing their profits. By enticing people to hire your business for their tutoring services, you need the right tools to promote your business right. In this day of social media buzz and technology running around on high-paced speed, tapping into these avenues of communication can lock in your consumer and promote your business altogether. One of these social media tools is Instagram, which allows you to upload photos and share it with people. Why does it work? Here’s how.

You Can Show People How Interactive You Are

Many people fear tutoring businesses that do not show actual tutorial sessions. Although this may be difficult because of the confidentiality most clients would have, you could request permission from some of your clients to take a photo of the session for documentation. Like the adage “a picture is worth a thousand words,” one photo of your tutoring session can prove to validate your business and to show how much you interact with your clients. With a lot of smiles and a lot of material in the background, you could definitely reel in interested clients in no time.

It Establishes Transparency

One thing about photographic evidence is the power of transparency. You definitely show everyone that you know your business and you have nothing to hide. Proof is what everyone is looking for—and Instagram can help you provide the necessary evidence you need for your clients to trust you even
more. Tutoring businesses are built on trust, so make sure you build this up properly with the right measures taken for your clients.

It Taps into a Wider Market

Instagram is open to a whole lot of people. This can boost your market penetration, especially since most people who require tutoring use social media. This will allow you to add in a little advertising if you do things right with your Instagram photos. Never forget that each action you take to the public is a measure to enhance your business.

Tutoring requires continued advertising so that you can enhance your business position at hand. With the value of Instagram, you can tap into a wide array of users who utilize social media. Most of these are young adults and students who require tutoring, so you would definitely enjoy the added business opportunity for your tutoring service. Learn to utilize Instagram to its fullest by providing photos that will entice clients to use your service.

After all, credibility lies in the visuals. Always focus in enhancing your business image and present your tutoring service in a total package through every snapshot you take. Remember the smiles and provide your clients with a sneak peek of the services they will enjoy should they commit to your tutoring service. No matter what, focus on enhancing your market approach because social media has a way of spreading the word faster than conventional advertising. Don’t overdo and you will definitely gain a new perspective in the marketing scheme for your business’s growth.

Thursday, July 11, 2013

Message from Alise: A Couple of Updates

Happy Thursday!

I know that each of you are enjoying your summer and are looking forward to the new tutoring year.

I just wanted to drop a few lines to let you know the following:


  • I have released two more tutoring books to help you on your tutoring journey. The two titles are the following: 

(a) Dr. Holland-Johnson's Expanding Your Tutoring Business: The Blueprint for Protecting Your Learning Organization
(b) Dr. Holland-Johnson's Starting and Operating Your Online Tutoring Business: The Blueprint for Running an Online Learning Organization.

You learn more about them by clicking on this link.

  • Last but not least, I wanted to let you know that new postings will be available in  mid-August so please do stay tuned.

Happy Tutoring!

Alise

Tuesday, June 4, 2013

Tutoring Trends in Education--What this means for you?


Education continuously grows as technology does. As people adapt to newer trends in the ever changing world of information, tutors have to follow suit. Students have lower attention spans now than they did before, so tutoring has been difficult to sustain student interest. As a result, it is important to realize the various tutoring trends in education that will provide you with better insight in managing your students properly. After all, they deserve the best treatment, so here's how you can definitely channel that treatment for their benefit.

Adapting Technology into the Tutoring Scenario

First and foremost, a tutor who embraces technology is one who embraces almost 90% of the youth today. This is an important trend that tutors must integrate with. Smartphones roam the market and tablets are "in" right now. Most students carry their tablets to school and use them for almost everything academically related, so blend in and make sure you channel such technology through your tutorials. You will find out that the outcome will be very productive and your students will catch on quite easily with your tutorial.

Maintaining the Short Attention Spans

Short attention spans are the bane of every tutor, especially in providing students with quality education. You can maintain your students' attention spans by keeping the lecture as interesting as possible. Use moving images and other vivid explanations to maintain your students' interest. It's all about charisma in action. Through this, you can ensure that your students learn from you as effectively as possible.

Expanding through Paperless Tutoring

Save paper. Channel your notes through digital media and keep things as paperless as possible. Some students may prefer the traditional pen-and-paper note taking, but make sure you limit the use of paper. Being environmental teaches more than just saving the trees, it teaches students to make the most of what resources they have available. It is important to inculcate such value for continuity to ensure the smooth development of tutoring services for future students.

Focusing on Clear Objectives

Students want to know the important details. The rest depends on their initiative to learn. Focus on clearing out what's necessary and establishing the important facts first. Based on their low attention span, they would want what matters to be out there. Your students will also retain more information when presented clearly and succinctly, so make sure you take note of this and enhance your teaching strategies.

Establishing Interactive Tutoring Schemes

Lastly, interaction is vital in maintaining liveliness in your tutorial session. Prepare activities that will help your student learn things through actions rather than monotonous lecturing. This adds spice to your tutorial sessions, which provides strong positive feedback to your students.

Educational trends must be taken into consideration when you deal out your tutoring services, so integrate and innovate. Your students deserve it. After all, as educational trends occur, tutors respond very effectively in enhancing that student-to-tutor relationship that is important in providing quality service and inculcating positive values for the betterment of student development.

Thursday, May 30, 2013

10 Tutoring Apps for Reading


In tutoring, assigning reading material is a great way for students to expand their learning when they have free time. In that way, you strengthen the various perspectives of students and enhance their memory retention, vocabulary, and stock knowledge in the process. In this digital age, reading has taken another new wave of mediums that students are very much comfortable with. For instance, your student may have an iPad and he or she can download some of these ten recommended reading apps for his or her perusal. Of course, as a tutor, you should integrate with the latest trends, and this is one great venue to do so.

Zite - Your student can catch up with the latest news updates through his or her iPad. This is very useful for building stock knowledge and even letting your students search through the various reading options available by this app.

Flipboard - For that sleek, magazine-style reading sensation, your students can enjoy this app, for free. You can select various websites to gather news and then check the updates during your free time. This will help your students learn about the latest trends in whatever topic they wish.

Google Currents - Similar to your Google Reader, this reading app allows you to save content for reading offline. You can also embrace the easy-to-use interface for your reading convenience. It comes free so try it out.

iBooks  - You can easily download PDFs and other books from the store, especially text book material. This will definitely help your students out whenever they want to check against a reference without the bulk of carrying the book around all the time.

Science 360  - For students to build up their scientific knowledge, you can introduce this to them. This app continues vivid images of various scientific concepts to give your students a better understanding of the material.

Press Reader - Your automatic connection to the major newspapers, this app will give you the insights on what really matters. Let your students increase their awareness by immersing them into journalism.

Amazon Kindle - The Amazon store has a wide collection of books for your students to enjoy. Downloading this app opens them up to the various classical pieces and contemporary works of great authors.

PocketPhonics - For effective reading based on pronunciation, you can help students who have a hard time through this app. Various recorded sounds are available for your students to learn how they ought to be pronounced. There is a lite version available.

Reading for Kids - This app gives your student that push toward reading material that he or she wouldn't. There are creative ways that you can teach your student to read, and here are a 100 ways to do that.

Zinio - Zinio is your go-to app when you want that sleek, magazine style for your documents. Play around with this fun design available to ensure a dynamic appeal to your reading experience.
These apps are definitely tailored to providing your students with the right reading experience that they deserve. So recommend these and you will notice positive results.

Wednesday, May 29, 2013

Why Values are Important in Tutoring?


Tutoring is a career that is sensitive when it comes to values and principles. You won't be plainly teaching your students material for their enrichment, but you will be imparting values as well, and these things do not come lightly. You are going to be a mentor to a lot of kids, so make sure you understand that you have as much responsibility as a tutor because you are a moral compass, not to convert people, but to guide them the right way. As a result, values shouldn't be taken as something as trivial, but should be inculcated in the best way possible. Here are some pointers for you to reflect on.

Values are usually Engraved

The thing about values is that they are engraved in the minds of your students. Especially if you have the influence to redirect students' thoughts, you should remember that these values will be taken note of and even wholly embraced by your students. Always remember that they are there to learn, and whatever you introduce to them, they will listen. Focus on providing values of good study habits and effective learning to help them defeat their weaknesses. Most students need that extra push so exert extra effort to provide them with the necessary actions you want of them. Values help shape students, so be wary that they can be engraved and not forgotten, so choose what values to impart.

Values will be Practiced

Students you tutor have their priorities misplaced. When you provide them values, they will definitely practice them. So, ensure that these values are positive and developmental. If you inculcate the need to interact with their peers, your students will eventually catch on and implement this in their everyday lives. Putting values to practice is basically every tutor's dream, especially when they see their students being responsible in managing their time and school work. This makes values very much important for any tutor, because, as mentors, you will be giving them that insight and growth that they deserve.

Values make responsible Citizens

Most of all, values teach students proper ethics and conduct. If you report to the tutorial early and provide them with adequate information and interaction, your students will be more responsible when they, too, work later on. They will learn that punctuality matters and proper etiquette is necessary. These simple gestures will already shape how students view their tutors, so make sure you optimize your time and provide the necessary values to help your students, not only during their academic lives, but also for their work lives later on.

Values are very important in tutoring because they provide them with the necessary background and assets in handling situations more responsibly. Basically, it provides them with ethics that is necessary to enhance their conduct as citizens. Educate and inculcate these values to ensure that your students grow and learn about important life lessons, one step at a time. After all, as a tutor, you are more than just a person who shares knowledge, you’re a person who shares a piece of your soul to your students so make it count—help others with their own academic journey and dreams.

Tuesday, May 28, 2013

The Nuts and Bolts of Crafting a Welcome Letter to Clients


When a client avails of your service, you should give them a welcoming letter so that they can understand how you work. After all, your clients deserve to know your "classroom" rules and how to handle different aspects of your tutoring services. This can be done effectively if you know how to write an effective welcome letter. Always consider that your clients want to know more about your work process, so if you're wondering how to write that welcome letter, here are important points you should always consider in writing it.

Explain Your Tutoring Service

First things first, explain how your tutoring service works. Include the mission or objectives so that your client will know where you're coming from. Also, this gives your client a clear idea on how you handle your business. Having your client aware of the different parts of your business is important to ensure that the both of you maintain a strong working relationship. He or she would know what to expect from you and as a result, the both of you can work together with little misunderstanding.

Focus on the Specific Subject Matter

Elaborate on the subject matter your client has signed up for. Attach a syllabus or something so that your client knows what to expect during the tutorial service. Overall, provide him or her with a projection of how you're going to handle the topic so that your client can definitely know what to expect from your tutorial service.

It is important to explain the different aspects of the topic for your client so that your client can learn as you explain, with a background of the information in mind. Through this, you will find out that your client is more prepared, enhancing the tutorial interaction at hand.

Provide Agreement Notices

Where do you plan to have the tutorial? What is the specific schedule? These things will remind your client about your appointments. Moreover, it gives them a clear idea that you are serious in having them as clients for your tutoring service. This will establish the business relationship even more effectively, enhancing how the both of you deal with each other.

Agreement notices are effective reminders of commitment and development. This gives both the tutor and the tutoring client a sort of contractual agreement that they will uphold the given conditions drawn by contracts.

Request Suggestions

As a gesture of openness and as a testimony of your willingness to adapt to clients, it is important that you solicit suggestions so that your working relationship can improve over time. As a tutor, you will expect that clients may not accept how you handle things, so be open to whatever changes they want. The bottom line is to maintain a strong line of communication so that things work out the best way possible.

The welcome letter is your first impression toward a strong business relationship. Make it work and make sure it is written properly so that you effectively start out right and progress as smoothly as possible.
 

Thursday, May 23, 2013

Setting a Holiday Schedule for Your Tutoring Clients


Tutoring usually happens during school days, especially after classes. Other times, during weekends. But, one of the best times to handle tutorials would be during the holidays. Specifically, summer or even Christmas break. But, these are times when students usually prefer to relax from school work and just spend the time enjoying. But, if you can tutor over the holidays, that's a definite plus for your income and for the students. The hardest part is getting them interested in the whole scheduling thing, especially since you'll be taking their holiday away from them. But, here are ways you can motivate students to engage in your tutoring service even during the holidays.

Market Your Service as an Important Development Scheme

What you should engage on is marketing your service as a development scheme. Make students want to engage in your tutoring services so that they can supplement their knowledge during the holidays. It is clear that students would prefer relaxation over additional learning; however, if you provide them with the right incentive to learn over the holidays, you will find out that you can enhance the business projection of your tutoring service.

It helps to market your service properly by motivating students to expand their knowledge over an interesting topic. For instance, don't market your tutoring service for a simple Biology lecture. Market it as an additional discussion on let's say, stem cell and its development in society. Not only does this make Biology sound even more interesting, but it provides students with that uniqueness, making the subject sound a whole lot more interesting.

Focus on giving Advanced Lessons

You can also provide a schedule for tutoring during the holidays by providing advanced lessons. Students can learn a lot about next semester's topics with a few refresher courses over the holidays. This can help students prepare for the subjects to come and to enhance their learning curve so that they can perform a whole lot better next time around. Focus on providing parents with the opportunity that their children can enhance their knowledge for future subjects. The good thing about advanced lessons is that these provide students with the opportunity to learn something new while taking rest. They aren't pressured, and they retain most of the information at hand. Through this, students can gain better perspectives in the various lessons they learn.

Provide Promotions

The best way to schedule in tutor clients in the holidays is to offer your services at a lower price. This way, students would choose to engage in your tutoring services more readily because of the cheaper rate. Providing more services for lower prices can help your business flourish because you encourage students to pay for your service at better rates.

Getting tutoring gigs during holidays can be tough, especially since students prefer to relax. However, if you tap into the right measures for gaining business, you can earn a little extra by providing tutorial services to students who desire it. It's how you market your business that will determine how many students will enroll in your holiday “specials”.
 
What have you used as promotions or scheduling that has helped or hindered your tutoring services?