In a crowded classroom, where an urgency to cover an overwhelming plethora of content in limited time takes precedence, a student hesitates to raise their hand – nervous of making a mistake, anxious about slowing a lesson’s pace. Thus, the moment passes, and the class moves on. Their question remains unasked. Confusion lingers, compounding as new information builds upon uncertainty.

In a tutoring session, however, that same student is able to speak up without hesitation. Their uncertainty seems to transform, evolving into understanding as tutoring facilitates a learning process tailored to students needs. This contrast seems to highlight a fundamental truth: students are naturally curious, with an innate capacity for learning, yet it is within the personalised framework of tutoring that curiosity may actually be turned into knowledge.

With a reduced student-to-teacher ratio, tutoring allows for adaptive instruction, able to personalise the pace of the lesson and the strategies of teaching. Tutors identify gaps in understanding and bridge them. This inevitably builds confidence as students’ knowledge grows. This kind of confidence is crucial, particularly in test-taking environments, where anxiety is often a major detriment to performance.

This efficacy of tutoring is not only apparent but well-documented. A meta-analysis of sixty-five independent evaluations of tutoring programs found that “tutored students outperformed control students on examinations, and they also developed positive attitudes toward the subject matter covered in the tutorial programs” (Cohen et al., 1982).

Whether refining writing skills, mastering numeracy, or deepening scientific understanding, tutoring proves to be an incredibly viable and powerful source of education.

Oliver Fletcher