Rough night tutoring

[icarus]

Tutoring last night was rough. I had new students and students who'd been with other tutors suddenly switched to me, so my structure for the sessions couldn't be used.

Then my last session... oy vey. An AP US History teacher was behind, so his student needed to be taught US history, from scratch, from WWII to Reagan. At the same time, I had my ESOL student who's trying to take advanced AP Language English, at the same time, I was trying teach the SAT essay to a third student, and we have a new grader who's harsh-yet-vague in his comments, holding high school students to a college standard. That isn't how you help young writers, and I couldn't get across how these comments were Not At All Helpful.

The session was a disaster, I was upset, and I had to admit -- I couldn't do it. I haven't felt this incompetent in a long time.

Comments

[isis]

Aw, I don't think you should blame yourself when you get this kind of perfect storm of stuff out of your wheelhouse. Next time you'll handle it better.

[icarus]

I'm the most experienced tutor there, and my usual method with AP US History is to get the students to retell the history, listen to what they're missing, then gap-fill.

A student sitting there with nothing, when I have to juggle two other students, well, it's not outside my wheelhouse at all -- I just finished my MA in teaching and am certified to teach US History -- but it's not what I usually do in tutoring. If I'd had two SAT students, it would've been doable, but two students doing rhetorical analysis essays and one doing the multiple choice on AP Lang? It's a rough combo and didn't go well.

[timespirt]

You didn't create the problem, you were just thrown into it. So not your fault hon.

"HUGS"