Tutoring: Learning How to Learn, Not Just What to Learn

After 35 years of teaching and tutoring, I can say with certainty that the most important goal in tutoring is not ever the one that teachers and tutors focus on most.  It is the most obvious, if you think about it, but it is almost never realized. The most important goal is to teach children how they learn, so they can solve many of their own current, and even future, learning challenges. Teach them not only how to master the subject but how to understand themselves first. How do you learn? What habits have not served you, some of which may be how you think about learning and your experiences with learning something new. What stuff has gotten in the way? If you don’t get leverage on yourself, then you will be in the same problem next time around. Why don’t most tutors do this?

 

There are a couple of reasons why:

 

First, tutoring, like any service, relies on repeat customers. A tutor doesn’t want to reveal all the secrets. Some are rather lazy. Many tutors are teachers who rely on extra income or college students who hopefully have some real skill, and they do the work for extra income. But some don’t want to take the time beyond remedial work. None of these are bad people, but they have limited, immediate, short-term mastery goals for themselves. That’s how we at 3 Amigos are different. We feel you are better served by teaching you to fish on your own.

 

Second, people like you, sometimes like short-cuts. You have larger  goals. Truthfully, I have had clients “use me” in order to gain some advantage, bolster a test score, pass a class, but that was all they were interested in. Good enough! But not as helpful to your child as going that extra mile to show them how they can overcome their own obstacles in future settings with similar material. Short cuts designed to solve the immediate problem can be just fine, but sometimes, they just delay another problem.

 

At 3Amigos, we use the same tutoring time to craft a different experience whereby you master both the material as well as yourself.