Highers and tutoring

[happinessisfoundingin]

My DD is in s5 and doing 5 highers and says 2 of her teachers have encouraged students to get tutors.
Says all her friends have at least one.
She's an above average student but not the studious type , more the cram the night before type.
She's at an ok state school. Do you think tutoring helps? She already says the work is so hard.
We can afford it (just) but will be a stretch. My thinking is the tutor might make her realise how much work it to be done instead of burying her head in the sand. If teachers are hinting at getting private tutors are they thinking it's going to be hard to get this year up to scratch with last years fiasco. She has no study skills, I've tried to teach her some but she's stubborn and ignores me. Winging it has worked up till now but I know this year the work is more challenging and she's doing difficult subjects!
Anything for the parents that invested in private tuition was it worth the expense?
I imagine an actual teacher would be better than cheaper uni students etc.
She's already asking me to sit down with her and go through her physics course. It will be way beyond me now to be honest.

Yes, but they are paid for it, and it doesn't matter if it's the pupils' actual teacher, as long as it's a subject specialist. I regularly have kids not from my class come to the H sessions. I only do one a fortnight and my colleague does the other week.

It can also be of huge benefit tackling an issue from a different point of view- teachers all have different ways of expressing things/ working out a problem. DS2 really found a new physics teacher explained things in the right way for him. He's now delighted he has him for H this year.

State school ALL have the funds to do these classes- it just depends if Senior Leaders in the schools choose to use their money in this way. We've used funds every year for seniors to go out for the day to learn study skills from a professional set up. They really enjoy the new environment/ not teachers and report back that it's very useful.

We also run Easter school every year- residential, intense weekend. Teachers volunteer to go for one session (no pressure) and are paid. The kids love it. My DS 's school run Easter classes in school- DS2 attended 8 out of 10 holiday days. Half day intense sessions. He liked it as with friends/ informal/ snacks etc.

There are many, many ways of making extra study work. But, yes, priority is homework and reading class notes. Many kids (Inc my DS2) don't realise that if you have no homework you should still be working every night at N5 and H level.

@Puffalicious I think we are speaking at cross purposes - the study support run in my school (and any I've worked in) has most definitely not been paid, Easter revision classes have been paid yes, but the many, many sessions staff put on for Nat/higher/adv higher are in their free time and are for free.
I have known schools to run paid homework clubs aimed at the younger students however.
I'm not sure how much any ring fenced funds are for this but they aren't used in the way you describe in the schools I've taught in or the ones my dp teaches in. It's all voluntary.

It's paid in our school but quite frankly, by the time I do the prep, photocopying, etc and arrange alternative pick ups for my own kids, just to have no-one turn up, or to spend an hour telling kids to pay attention and put their phones away, it's really not worth the £16.

We've tried various ways to make supported study more attractive to pupils but to very little effect.

How unusual. EVERY school I've taught in- plus heard of- it's paid. Where are you? I'm Glasgow and I've never heard of a Glasgow/ West Coast school where it's voluntary. That's bloody shocking!

That's a real shame. Ours have always been well attended. Perhaps it's because I'm in an area of very low SIMD and the kids have no chance of having a tutor.

A very popular scheme we have provides snacks at the end of school for 10 minutes in the library before supported study begins. The cheapest is just big bowls of cereal- we have a little cart with boxes of Aldi cereal and milk and they seem to love it. It's provided by a local charity we do lots of work with.

DS2 also likes the breakfast session at 8am in his school as they get to make a cuppa and toast! The simple things.

But the food is so important - difficult to learn well if you cant concentrate because you're hungry

@happinessisfoundingin my son was getting 'c's at the beginning of S5 in Physics and with the support of a tutor was then getting As in Terms 2 and 3. He just found it useful to have someone to personally explain the bits he hadn't fully understood in class. The tutor taught him online and according to my son was very good. Please send a message if you'd like the contact details.

when do the new past paper books and how to pass get published?

Just go to the SQA website for past papers. For many subjects there were big changes around 2019 so don't go back far, just use the last couple of years - www.sqa.org.uk/pastpapers/findpastpaper.htm
You can find revision books on Amazon - again, get the ones with the most recent date.