How to Get the Most From Your Tutoring Sessions

By Jordyn Austin on April 12, 2017

College students sometimes enroll in very challenging classes. Most colleges and universities offer tutoring services for students who need help with their coursework. If you are struggling in your classes, you should look into your university’s resources and find the help you need.

Tutoring is a widely used resource for students who need one-on-one help for their classes. Tutoring has many benefits including helping students be academically successful. If you can utilize a tutor, you want to make sure you get the most out of your tutoring sessions. Here are a few tips on how to get the most out of your sessions.

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Arrive promptly

You should always strive to arrive on time. Arriving on time shows that you respect both your time and your tutor’s time. Tutoring sessions are not generally very long, so you want to make the most of your time while there, and this starts with arriving on time so you can start on time. Being prompt ensures that you and your tutor get through the entire lesson plan for that session.

If you arrive late, your tutor may have a hard time trying to fit everything in and checking for your understanding.

Come prepared

Along with arriving on time comes arriving prepared. This could mean many things for you personally. If your tutor gave you chapters to read or exercises to do, you should come with those completed and ready to discuss. Coming prepared also means having all needed additional tools like paper, notebooks, pencils, textbooks, and laptops.

When you arrive with all your materials, it saves time from the tutor having to find a way to provide for you. Don’t ever expect the tutor to provide these kinds of materials for you unless you two have specifically discussed that as an option.

Study required material

Part of coming prepared is also doing all the required work from your classes. Tutoring provides supplemental help and understanding, but you should still complete your assignments, read your chapters, and study for quizzes and exams. In fact, if you are not understanding something in your homework, your tutoring session is the perfect place to try to get a better understanding. Coming with specific issues helps the tutor better tailor the session to fit your needs.

Ask questions

When you come to your tutoring sessions, never be afraid to ask questions. If there is something you don’t understand in class or in your reading, bringing it up to your tutor is the best way to get that information cleared up. Sometimes students think some questions are too silly to ask, but nothing is ever a “dumb question.”

It is better to ask and get a clear understanding than to miss a question on a quiz or exam. Asking questions helps you to not only understand the material better but also to explain the concept to another student who might be struggling with it.

Express your needs

Whenever someone else is tutoring you, it is important to express your needs to this person. You should tell your tutor the best ways you learn. Whether you are a visual, kinesthetic, or auditory learner, you should let your tutor know. This will help your tutor plan to teach you in the way you learn best.

You can also express to your tutor what kind of supplemental materials help you learn. Supplemental materials can include anything from flashcards to YouTube videos. If you know that you learn best with particular materials, let your tutor know what those materials are. This will not only enhance your learning but also meet your needs.

Be open-minded

Even though you should express to your tutor the best way you learn, you should also be open-minded to the tactics and materials they might have. Their method might differ from anything else you’ve ever done, but you never know what can really help you. If you kept an open mind and something still isn’t working for you, don’t be afraid to speak up about that, but at least be open to trying new methods and tools for learning. This will definitely help you to get the most out of your tutoring sessions.

Stay organized

Staying organized is another of many ways to get the most out of your tutoring session. Knowing where all your materials are and where you left off the week before can really help your sessions run smoothly. Although it is your tutor’s responsibility to stay organized, your own organization helps too. Staying organized in your classes helps you to also stay organized in your tutoring sessions.

Use whatever you need to stay organized including planners (either electronic or paper) and apps on your phone.

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