Typically, what does a tutor actually do when they tutor english?

[Nomvalt]

Say, if you got a tutor for English, how would one typically tutor you? Would they just be asking you to write a whole bunch of essays for them to correct/mark? Just another curious VN member.

[Hutchoo]

Yeah.. good question :S I have no idea what an English tutor does.

[Russ]

Say, if you got a tutor for English, how would one typically tutor you? Would they just be asking you to write a whole bunch of essays for them to correct/mark? Just another curious VN member.

I did some one off tutoring for a couple of months a while ago and it broke down something like this:

got her to send me some of her previous work, so I could work out what level she was at
annotated the work before the first tutorial so we could have a chat about where to improve/she had some feedback and examples
discussed different techniques that could be used (eg ways to link to text in creative)

then either worked through a previous essay or worked to develop a plan/structure for a new essay (ie actual practice)

I would say that in English, as opposed to something like maths or chemistry, there's an expectation that the tutor will mark at least one essay between sessions (assuming they're weekly)

[24lover]

yep. Marking essays is a big part of it!

Depends what the student wants to do though. Here are some things I find are popular with students:
Exploring prompts for text response or content - so which contentions to use, what examples should be incorporated, how to structure etc.
Going through an article together and analyse the persuasive techniques (this is a major problem area for many students who find it difficult to figure what to write in essays)
Focusing on key passages in novels/films...and much more!

Then there's other stuff like discussing how to tackle English in general, which book should they focus on, how to approach the exam, how to study for the exam, talking about VCE overall etc.

[dptjandra]

Depends a lot on the student and teacher.  I think it is only truly worthwhile to have regular English tutoring (at a Year 12 level) if the tutor has studied the book his or herself.  With the obvious exception of language analysis, it allows the tutor to help with your writing style, but also give really worthwhile readings into the text/context which they know actually work in an essay.

When I tutor English, I read over their essays, often comparing my own thoughts with comments suggested by their teacher if applicable.  I also show them some of my essays, give out guidelines and tips to constructing the different types of essays (including "hot" phrases or language techniques to look out for), go over vital scenes and quotes from each text and the ideas covered, as well as example paragraphs of how those themes can be used, relevant real world examples and philosophical quotes for an expository essay and also practice at the hardest part of essay writing - the planning stage for obscure topics.  Usually this is covered in a rather hefty set of notes written when I did Yr 12 (which is the reason why a teacher who did your texts is so important).

Hope this helps

[werdna]

dptjandra how many English students are you/have you tutored this year? Considering you've read all their texts..  :laugh:

[crayolé]

Douglas was an excellent tutor for the time I had him. Taught me everything I knew about language analysis and even marked every one of my essays throughout the year. Extremely diligent and hard working!
 Although he hadn't studied any of my books in school, he kindly offered to study them in his own time but I declined having found someone who had

[dptjandra]

Haha - I only had about 3 English students this year (some on and off).  Stuck more to the sciences and methods purely because the course is so much more unified!

Thanks, crayola, btw