History tutor for GCSE in London

[MsAverage]

I was just wondering where people are finding tutors? Is there any webserver, or is it only word of mouth?

Could anybody recommend a History tutor for GCSE in NE/Central London?

DD is in Y10, and we made a huge mistake not choosing History for GSCE (the school provided limited options, and History was clashing with DD's adored Art). Now we are trying to arrange a private sitting, but I am absolutely hopeless in History on my own, and will not be able to help DC.

If your dd is following the trend of doing ridiculous numbers of GCSEs does she really need to be doing another? Why is it such a mistake? If she wants to do A level history she ought to be able to do so without having done it at GCSE level.

The mistake was to allow her to do art at all instead of history - she ends up with only one essay-style subject (English) and no humanities at all. The deal was she would sit history additionally. At that point I thought history was similar to the knowledge-based subject I remembered from my school days: facts, names, dates, processes. What can change over two decades in the things happened centuries ago? Imagine my horror when I opened the requirements.

Anything on the answer side? Where are tutors (not necessarily History, just in general) being found?

Word of mouth is better than any other method as absolutely anyone can set up as a tutor with whatever qualifications so the web is unreliable. ANother method is to ring a local school and leave details to pass onto the history teachers in case anyone is thinking of tutoring. That way at least you'll get a qualified teacher who will be up to speed with current requirements. I started tutoring a girl whose mum was in school in her capacity as an EAL tutor and she just wandered into my classroom and asked about tutoring.

Yes, as a history teacher I would recommend you do exactly that - it's very much a skills-based GCSE!

Thanks a lot!

Knitknack, can I ask you which examination board would you choose? Or there is no much difference between them?

Again, I think I'd leave that up to whoever you get to tutor her. If you CAN get a local history teacher to take on the job then they'll want to use whoever they are currently using... Different exam boards do different subjects, or combinations of subjects - in fact different schools do different combinations of subjects even if they use the same exam board!

Did her school really allow her to not take a humanities subject at ALL?!

If it were me I would look around the different exam boards and see which course is the most interesting and your DD would most want to study.

I just don't understand why you want your dd to do history on top of her school GCSE workload. Is it something she has chosen to do? Is it a subject she is particularly interested in? (If so why not just pick it up again at A level). Why do you feel she has to do more than one 'essay-based' subject? Have you spoken to her school about this?

My kids go to a grammar school where it's not compulsory to do a humanities subject to GCSE.

Knitknack, the school acted quite pushy on foreign languages, but not humanities. As far as I understand, the idea of English Baccalaureate was buried a year ago, so nobody was much fussy about all-round choices.

The english baccalaureate is still alive and well - see here:

www.education.gov.uk/schools/teachingandlearning/qualifications/englishbac/a0075975/theenglishbaccalaureate

yes, there IS a real push on MFL at the moment to make up for the disastrous results of making it non-compulsory... oh dear... and yes, the EBac is very much alive and well and will very shortly start having an effect on league tables that will probably result in schools making a humanity at GCSE compulsory also...

What does your daughter think of all this? A previous poster is correct in saying she won't NECESSARILY need History GCSE to do A Level (although it will obviously be a disadvantage, it is, as stated previously, very much skills based)

DS is taking History GCSE and 25% of the marks are for controlled assessment I presume this would be difficult to organise for a private entry.

knitknack a humanity at GCSE was compulsory for DS (year 10).

We kind of sorted control assessment with the school, but in such way that no teaching will be provided. Which I find fair.

For A-levels DD thinks maths, maths, maths and adored art. Again, I would rather take history instead of art, but this is beyond my powers. She enjoys reading on history, but hates writing essays. She also agrees that ability to write is important and needs to be developed.

Does anyone have experience of GCSE tutoring companies in south east London. I am looking to get my child extra input in english, the sciences and french? Ideally I'd like her to go to a tutoring school on either a Saturday or Sunday.

We dropped the MFL in favour of doing both history and geography and she's going to learn her MFL at home. It is very rare for pupils to have both humanities apparently - I think they are both essential unless your child knows what they want to do. If she wants to be a lawyer she needs history, but an architect will need geography. But you only need a MFL if you are going to be a translator or some such and it can be learned as necessary if it's needed for a future in another country.

She will have the Ebacc if she needs it, but under her own steam.