Maths Tutor - Student or Teacher?

[WhichOneIsPosher]

DS age 14 has been struggling with maths for the past year, he's starting Nat 5 in August (we're in Scotland) and we've started to think about a Tutor for him.

I posted on my local area FB group and had replies from a few people, two if whom were recommending students who are currently at Uni doing maths degrees.

Has anyone used a uni student before, or am I best to go with a trained teacher etc? When I discussed this with his pupil support teacher last month they thought a tutor was a good idea but recommended in-person instead of an online one, but nothing about how qualified they should be.

Anyone have any suggestions?

Not sure about Scotland and what's in their exams but this website is good "Pass functional skills maths L1 then L2" it is more basic than GCSE but good for just that reason. It has a list of topics, written explanation, video , practice questions with answers hidden. It also has worksheets for each topic and answers separately. If you can't work out why you got the answers wrong there is full video showing how to work it out.
Level one would be 11-13 age approx. L2 would be 14-16 approx.
It could be that your son has gaps in his knowledge either through being off school, or maybe the teacher moving on when he hasn't grasped something. Once the gaps are plugged he might be able to make more sense of school work going forward.
Also it's free. If he did a bit everyday over the summer he might see a big improvement by the time he goes back to school?
Good luck!

My son goes to a grammar school and needed tuition, his tutor was a uni student who gave him online tuition with Maths/chemistry and physics....he found her very helpful for his GCSE exams and is quite confident he will pass 🙏

Personally I would go with a teacher with QTS , DBS checked and ICO registered- be careful with just using anyone- ie uni student, they might know the answers but not how to teach to get there. Also an actual teacher will know the curriculum and pick up any issues. A proper tutor- ie qualified- shoukd be ICO registered otherwise you're giving all your personal details including bank details to a random person off the street.

I agree entirely

Teaching maths is a very different thing to being able to do maths. If you can do maths, then it can be quite hard to understand the misconceptions that someone else has and work out how to approach something from another angle, to resolve those misconceptions. I wouldn't just go for a teacher, I'd go for a really experienced teacher. They will have taught a whole range of pupils and know all of the teaching methods that will help.

Thanks everyone. Does online vs in person make a difference? My DS has ADHD so not sure if that's why the teacher said to go in person instead

We chose in person.
GCSE results day will reveal whether that was a good choice, but we felt that in person would be most effective as you're actually in each others' presence and won't get distracted off screen.