Pupil putting all the responsibility on me to gain good grades

[Whendothingsstarttoimprove]

Can anyone offer me any perspective/help with this?

I do part time tutoring and help a 12 year old girl with her maths. She very poor and really struggles. She’s told me that her teacher at school is a good teacher, but even though she asks for help a lot, he tends to ignore her hand up and go to others. She always asks to stay after the lesson for help, but told me she still doesn’t understand it.
When we go through things slowly together, she does end up understanding, but it feels like I’m teaching every concept from scratch.
She has tests at the end of each term and there are often up to twelve topics to cover within a few weeks -5-6 hours.
She did manage to get a C last time, but in the most recent test, she got an E. Comments she’s made feel like she’s expecting to get an A and it’s all my responsibility to get her to that, is this fair? When she showed me the E, she seemed angry at me
I can see without my help, she basically wouldn’t understand anything and these few lessons do make a big difference, however it’s very hard to teach her completely from scratch.
Should all the responsibility be on me?
With the other subjects we focus on, she now gets A’s & B’s in her tests.

‘She very poor’!? Coming from a tutor in what way

I think it’s an issue when people are paying for education (similar thing happens at universities) where people feel like they are paying for a grade rather and are consumers rather than paying for an opportunity to study and are learners.

This may be off, but is she missing how to learn teaching? At that age my children knew what worked for them they also did exam techniques.

If she is capable of grasping the concept with you it sounds like she is missing the self motivation and study techniques. Would it be possible to speak to her mother and sketch out a plan.

I'd think this too!
Suppose it depends how easily you can get another pupil / how much you really need the income.

Could have a trial period first so you can see if it works.

@Hmm1234 What do you mean?

Of course it shouldn't. Speak to the parents.

I think you should stick to younger kids

@ThunderQween Why?

Sorry, which one is the child here?

There'll be less pressure. Less pre-teen angst and anger to deal with

Agree with this.

I assumed reading the OP that you were an older teen doing your first tutoring job, not a fully qualified teacher.

You are making a rod for your own back by even engaging with the idea that it is your fault if the child doesn’t succeed. It is not. All you can do is try to help her understand the concepts she struggles with. How long do you have her for? An hour a week? It is a very short time in which to cover everything she finds challenging. Make it clear to her and her parents that you are there to help but can’t guarantee good results - that is up to the child ( and to school of course as they should be making sure the whole curriculum is covered) I have been a private tutor for over 20 years and I would never allow this sort of entitled behaviour from my pupils.

@Kjpt140v Sorry?

You are a grown up so deal with it. She is a child that is disappointed, angry and possibly embarrassed by her result. She's hitting out as many children do, and you happen to be the victim on this occasion. You are a teacher for goodness sake, you should expect these sort of scenarios. You are getting paid plenty for this I expect, so stop playing the victim (child), and deal with it, or tell the parents you can no longer continue teaching her.

She clearly isn't learning what she NEEDS from the tuition in her opinion. This doesn't reflect on your ability as a tutor but more on what she actually needs tuition on. It sounds like you need to just look at WHY she's making silly mistakes rather than teaching the maths from scratch.