I observed a math session conducted by Chris. At the beginning of the session, he asked the student if they had any questions from the previous week. The student had many hard questions that he was unable to work at home. Instead of Chris directly answering the questions, he was able to convince and motivate the student to answer the question, providing guidance on how to answer the question without giving the answer. This is something that I will like to include within my own sessions, as it provides the student with the independence and autonomy to answer questions that they previously had difficulty answering. This is an effective way of allowing the student to think outside the box and steer them back into the correct method to answer the question. It gives them the self-satisfaction of answering hard questions.

After this, he started going through the new topic, integration, with hard questions. He used the same approach as he did with the homework, allowing the student answer the questions but also introducing the new topic. This method of simultaneously solving the question with previous knowledge whilst also incorporating the new techniques to answer hard questions is something I would also like to include within my session. Sometimes they would get different answers and go through each method to see where they went differently. This allows for the student to see where they might of gone wrong within the question and adapt to the tutors method of approaching the question.

This session was done great, allowing me to learn new techniques that I’ll approach within my sessions.

James Bletsas