Pythagoras Theorem Explained

Ever wondered how Pythagoras Theorem, the so called 1st theorem of Elementary Mathematics is proven as such?

Here’s an interesting video and method which you can explain to your Secondary students!

Make your tutorials fun and interesting!

Fun with Fibonacci

For JC students learning Series in A’ Level maths, have some fun watching this video of how Fibonnaci numbers are observed in nature and how they are being “applied” in plants!

Tutors, show this to your students when you are teaching about Series to inject some fun into this seemingly boring topic!

Tutoring Guide Series: How to help a student who is lagging behind?

Drawing parallels from the famous illustration by Zhuge Liang, often recognised as the greatest and most accomplished strategist of his era during the Three Kingdoms period in China in novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms:

[A man has fallen into a terrible malady.

First the physician must administer hashish, then soothing drugs until his viscera shall be calmed into harmonious action.

When the sick man’s body shall have been reduced to quietude, then may he be given strong meats to strengthen him and powerful drugs to correct the disorder.

Thus the disease will be quite expelled, and the man restored to health.

If the physician does not wait till the humors and pulse are in harmony, but throws in his strong drugs too early, it will be difficult to restore the patient. ]

~ Zhuge Liang in Romance of the Three Kingdoms

A tutor can only effectively help a student who is lagging behind by first finding out the root cause of the student’s academic performance.

Each student holds a different lock and a personal tutor will have to find the key to the lock!

While it could be tempting to hasten the learning for the student in order to improve within a short time period, however the personal tutor or private tutor will have to understand that if the foundation is not laid and true understanding of the content is not attained, it will not be beneficial to the student as new content is being introduced.

Why?

This is because usually the content learnt in higher grades are based on the content learnt in lower grades and going up from one level to another e.g. (Primary 4 to Primary 5) would follow a T-shape trend for different topics- increase in breadth and also in depth.

So, help a student who is lagging behind by leveraging on what private tuition can best do- personalising and planning what is appropriate for the individual student. Prepare and customise lesson plans according to the student’s needs. Also, remember to explain and discuss with student and parent why your lesson plan will help the student.

Of course, to sum it all,  “administer” the right “medicine” for your student!

Tutoring Guide Series: Tutoring Professionalism (continued)

Mastering Tutoring Professionalism

What does it mean by being someone’s “tutor”?

First, know the definition:

A tutor is a teacher who gives additional, special or remedial instructions and often privately.

&

Professionalism is about exhibiting professional character, behaviour and spirit.

To make it simple, here’s a list of how a tutor can exhibit professionalism (the points are not in any particular order, all are important!):

1. Be punctual for all lessons and be well-prepared. (This very much applies to all professions and jobs..)
2. Be reasonably well-dressed in appropriate attire. Ask the guardian/ parent if they are comfortable if you really, really need to.
3. Be responsible and accountable. (Make sure you exchange contacts with guardian/parent and inform in advance of any unforeseen events if required)
4. Always put yourself in the tutee’s/guardian’s/parent’s shoes and try your best to accomodate if necessary.
5. Make  sure you are available to help if necessary. Extend your help and you’ll be appreciated, especially in exam crunch time. Its all about imparting your knowledge, right?
6. Remember to make lessons enriching, interesting and fun as much as possible!
7. Communicate, communicate and communicate! Improve on your delivery of speech!!
8. Discuss lesson curriculum planning with tutee. Keep the guardian/parents updated, always.
9. In scoring As, its “No goals, no glory” not “No guts, no glory”. Hold goal setting sessions with your tutee! Set reasonable, attainable goals and paste it on the wall in front of the study desk!
10. Analyse and know your tutee’s learning style and adapt your teaching style to suit it. Read our Tutoring Guide Series on more about this.
11. Last but not least, know the above 10 points and you are on your way to master tutoring professionalism! =)

A point to note is that tutors could act as mentors too. Advice based on personal experience for example, on studying methods sharing and exam preparation techniques like mind mapping or memory-tagging system can certainly show how much you can make a difference in your tutee’s lives.

Make the extra mile to make lessons more fun, more enriching and more impactful to your tutee today!

Share the same traits as what is described above? You might want to know more about tutoring via ConsultAtutor.com!

Financial Education for the young

OR teach your child about REAL money sense?

Teach your child about choco money

Have you ever thought of why there are students who graduate from tertiary institutes not knowing how to manage the money that they earn?  

Lack of financial education in schools and for the young by parents could possibly be the reason why.  

In the Singapore pre-tertiary education system or most of the others all around the world, emphasis is placed on science, technology or the arts. The curriculum setting focuses on depth in these fields and hence would not be able to allow subjects like financial management or investing. Nonetheless, financial literacy workshops held in schools are on the rise. What is more important however, is how parents play their role to educate their children from young. It is critical that parents inculcate wise financial management habits in their children so that they know how to better manage their money that they earn once they step out into the working world.  

Here are some tips we would like to share:
1. Basic fixed allowance over e.g. a week or a month enough to cater to your child’s required meals and other necessities but not in excess will teach them the preciousness of money.  

2. Big ticket items and holidays as reward for hard work or plan it with your child in the basic fixed allowance by increasing it with a fixed daily savings plan for your child.  

3. Let your child do the groceries paying at the cashier counter and when she is old enough (Primary 5 at least when % is taught), explain to her about how the GST is added on top of the sub-total bill.  

4. If you are investor-savvy, educate your child by letting your child own a share of reputable listed companies under his name and teach them about how it can grow and might also depreciate due to business failings. (Recommended when your child is of certain age preferably above 12)   

5. Borrow some money management books with interesting illustrations or share with your child personally your experiences and educate them about the importance of saving, investing wisely and the pitfalls of greed.  

6. Last tip: Open a savings bank account for your child early!  

Financial education for the young is important for the bright future and dreams that your children want to pursue. Start now and think about how you can contribute to your children’s financial literacy today!

The Importance of Parent-Tutor Communication

Ever got into a situation that you found out a tutor has been working on foundation mathematics in a tutorial instead of high-level questions/sums that you have been expecting your child to practise on without knowing that the tutor is trying to work from the bottom first? Here’s where a well-maintained and well-communicated relationship between you(a parent) and your tutor will play a crucial role.

For communication to truly work well between the parent and tutor, it is imperative that conversations are regularly carried out. Face-to-face conversations are the most effective and allows the tutor to convey important information like student’s progress, weaknesses, personality flaws, lesson plan to parents and vice versa. Alternatively, if schedule does not permit, conversations via a phone call (not sms!) should be carried out as frequently as possible. On the other hand, sufficient room has to be given for the tutor to explore various teaching methods suitable for your child. So why is it so important other than simply conveying important information of the student between parent and tutor?

The reason is simple. A tutor commonly conducts tutorials once or twice a week and most of the time spent on the student is on teaching, guiding and clarifying the student’s doubts. For truly effective learning, sufficient preparation work has to be done before/after tutorials. Hence, the role of the parent in taking part in the child’s learning is all the more important as the child has to continue on the preparatory work at home and consistently.

To assist the parent and tutor into putting in place an effective communication channel that helps in preparatory work, various monitoring tools can be implemented like the ConsultAtutor One-to-One Tutoring Monitoring System.

Now that we have shared with you how important parent-tutor communication is. Don’t wait! Start getting more involved in your child’s everyday learning by discussing with your tutor today!

How much does private tuition help? – The economist’s view

Or    ??

 In Singapore, everyone knows how much emphasis is placed on education and the importance of having a quality education. This results in stiff competition for all major examinations as students work their socks off to vie for places in either top schools or the school of their choice.

Private tuition has already become a social norm in Singapore, but just how much does private tuition help? Well, we would say that it depends on many factors that are unique to each child. In general, some of the factors could be:

1. Character and learning style (visual/ auditory/ kinesthetic)- more on this in the next part of our EduSnips series

2. Level of knowledge in the subject

3. Learning pace

4. Setting (E.g. One-to-One tuition or in class) 

5. Delivery medium or delivery method preferred

Some other factors in rather more “tangible” terms would require backing by research and studies. In fact, a recent Straits Times article by a NUS economist has even looked into how private tuition expenditure is correlated to performance in examinations. Based on  2 separate studies of students in Hong Kong schools and South Korean high school students in national university admissions test, the findings are as summarised:

1. Higher proportion of students in higher forms received private tuition

2. Higher proportion of students with higher-educated parents received tuition

3. On average, 10% increase in expenditure on private tuition improved test performance by 0.56 percentile

4. Based on 2008 PSLE students admitted to secondary schools data, spending on private tuition to increase test score by 0.56 percentile would make a difference between being on borderline and being at top of cohort of admitted students to a particular top school.

(Png, 2010)

This interesting article  reveals studies done by various academics backed with measurable metrics gives a different viewpoint on “exactly” how much does private tuition help. You can read the entire article here and some of the community’s comments here.

Excerpt from:

Ivan Png. (July 1, 2010). StraitsTimes. In Ask: NUS Economists. Retrieved July 13, 2010, from http://bit.ly/cvh6If