How much do you spend on tuition?

[pocketpairs]

Most of the parents in DCs school have private tuition, either class based or 121, more so when they enter GCSE years. How much, if any, do you spend on tuition a month?

1 hour of maths per week £80, 1.5 hours of English every fortnight £55. So £430 a month. Year 11.

I only know of one person in my peer group who wasn't paying for tuition for GCSEs, their child was at private school and now Oxbridge.

Everyone else had at least one tutor in Y11, and most had multiple. This is London though, maybe less of a thing elsewhere. DD's teachers were all well aware we had tutors and there was good communication on what they felt would be best things to focus on.

For lots of children, having tuition is a way of knowing that an effective hour of revision has been achieved, and who doesn't do better with 1:1 at their own pace and able to focus on specific weaknesses. Lots don't do well with parents trying to help (not sure both DD and I would have survived me doing revision with her).

If you have an NT child with no SEN who understands the basics of the subject and is using YouTube to revise then that is brilliant.

If you have a child with ADHD who can sit through a video and not recall a single thing because they've been distracted by something they saw outside or lining up their pencils in colour order or whatever else they find to focus on, then having a tutor who actually requires answers and can keep them on track is very helpful.

You can also tailor things specifically to their weaknesses. No teacher in Y11 is going to spend an hour on basic punctuation. If your child is incapable of grasping SPaG due to dyslexia then it's a godsend.

£35 a week for maths, can’t get an English tutor but wish we had done!

For those turning their noses up at tutoring how about having a bit of empathy for those kids and their parents who are just trying to get through an education system that only recognises certain strengths. My DC is bright and loves humanities but finds maths incredibly difficult. She is penalised for this and should not be disqualified from doing A Levels in the topics she’s strong in.

Yes I agree with others, tutoring is often about confidence and support to get a better grade – whether that be a vital 4/5 grade (well done to your DD @KeepOnCleaning) or just to achieve a higher grade than they otherwise would.

Yes if your DC are able to follow everything in class and watch YouTube to help, great. But lots of DC cannot. And they may need (or anyway be helped by) one-to-one support, someone who can focus on their issues and barriers in a way that no teacher of a class of 25-30 can, someone to answer specific questions and just encourage and help them. Ideally they know the exam spec well too.

I often have a flood of tutees in Jan-April as students who are otherwise happy can really panic about their MFL speaking exam and it really helps them to practise some exam questions 1-1 and get some targeted feedback. That's almost impossible to do in school, especially in a GCSE class.

I think there are often too many videos on YouTube and you/your child will waste a lot time trying to pick the best one. Obviously, if it’s only the odd thing your child has missed or not understood fully in class then you tube is a great idea. But if your child has had consistently bad (or non existent) maths teachers/additional needs/lots of time off sick/etc, then a tutor personalised to their needs is going to be much more beneficial.

It’s great that your child can talk to their teachers and get help. All good teachers (notice I said good) do offer this support, but there are some children that don’t have good teachers, and there are some children that don’t like to ask for help.

Maybe they would have got straight 9s if they had had tuition

Not a penny. Ordinary state school, PPE at Oxford and a masters from York.

£40 /week English, £40 week science, £40 week maths, £65/week dyslexia specialist tutor. It adds up to a lot but substantially cheaper than private school!

Different tutors for different children depending what they need /want (the science tutor is for a child who just finds the school lessons too easy /slow paced and wants extra stretch)

The current state secondary school cohort missed out on big chunks of primary schooling due to COVID though. While the private schools kept teaching . We started using tutors at that point and just never stopped as the children all it. It's as much for the pleasure of learning in a 1:1 session for us as for any particular ambitions

Intrigued as to why you would comment on this post? Surely it's obvious the OP is wanting to hear what people who are using tutors are spending... not about those lucky enough to have schools and students at a level where they don't need support?

You don't get extra marks or a medal for not having tutoring...

Or for being smug.

However, MN exists in a strange parallel universe where everyone seems to think that their children must have tutoring. Even more bizarre are the parents who spend a fortune on private schools or have paid premiums to move to grammar school areas who still think their children need a tutor.

DD didn't complete her A levels due to covid, so went to uni with gaps in her knowledge. Less than 30% of pupils left school where we live with 5 GCSEs including maths & English. I wasn't aware of anyone using tutors, as it simply isn't common place where we live.

I simply answered the question, so the myth that you must have a tutor for academic success isn't perpetuated.

My daughter has 1:1 for Maths and English. £35 and £40 per hour. She has them alternative weeks.

We pay £50 for an hour a week for 11+ tutoring for DS in Y5. We've specifically chosen a tutor who focuses on reviewing all of the Y5 and 6 maths and English curriculum and also exam techniques. Whether or not DS passes the 11+, which round here is now tricky as although the questions aren't hard kids have to answer really fast, I feel this will set him up for ongoing education.
Could I do this at home with various websites? Yes definitely. Do I want to spend my time researching what we should do, then doing it? No. I'm fortunate to be able to afford to outsource and just support homework.

The difference in my children’s education between DS1 and DD1 is massive and they’re only 5 years apart. DS1 went to an average school that prioritised children with pupil premium. DS1 did pretty well despite covid hitting in year 10. It was rare for teachers to leave, the school wasn’t perfect but it catered well for most pupils. The HT even put both their children through the school, their youngest was in the same tutor group as my DS. The HT retired when their child finished (no sixth form) and the school went downhill rapidly. My DD1 started a CofE school that was harder to get into (priority for CofE), than DS1’s school and it had a better reputation and better exam results. Honestly, I think it’s worse than the school DS1 attended when he was there, but, now it still is better than the school DS1 went to. Not sure I’ve expressed it very well. But ultimately DD1’s school was always the better school. It’s just that ‘better’ has gone downhill. My DD1 is getting a worse education than my DS did 5 years previously at a different school that was average. So yeah, luckily I can afford to supplement her education with tuition.

And it’s great that you didn’t need to spend a penny on private tuition for your child. That’s the way it should be! But, most school’s have massively changed since then.

You've expressed it perfectly and yes, you are lucky to be able to afford to pay for a tutor. If you can afford it, that's great.

However, that's an unaffordable luxury for so many. Tutoring isn't the norm and parents aren't letting their children down or ruining their future if they don't have the money to spend £150 a month or similar.

Obviously parents aren’t letting their children down.

The state is.

And in some places it is normal (the new normal) for children to have tutors. DD1 (top set for everything-not bragging-just for context) says that most of her class mates have tutors for at least one subject, and this is in a school that is quite well regarded in the local area. DS2 says he has no idea (mid sets for everything - for context- he has a maths tutor) if anyone else has tutors. At the same school as DD1.

DS1 (top sets - just for context) who is 5 years older than DD1, said that no one had tutors when he was in secondary school. Though it might just be that boys share less than girls. But I also know that he had the same teachers for pretty much the whole way through secondary school, and if they did change it wasn’t because they left, it was because they were teaching a different class. Whereas DD1 & DS2 school has teachers that are just leaving the profession! Plus lots of rubbish supply, and teachers that stay are supposed to be permanent but are rubbish and don’t stay for long.

The state is failing children, and parents that can afford to, are paying for it, with either their own time or money to pay tutors.

And it’s shit for the children whose parents can’t pay for tutors or have enough time in the day to help.

An ugly thing to say about children. Truly abhorrent, and I'd say conceited.

In any case, I got straight As at GCSE and I'm often quite stupid, so I can say with some confidence that it is quite wrong to conflate intelligence with GCSE grades.

Agree with this. My son’s primary school were so lovely wrt checking on the dc’s wellbeing over the lockdown period and keeping them engaged but didn’t seem to do much actual work in terms of maths and science over lockdown. Luckily he’s a bright boy and a hard worker so has managed to remain on higher papers but as a result had significant gaps in his knowledge whereas dc from other schools who kept up the academics seemed to fare a bit better. All in local state schools so a matter of luck rather than privilege. I have paid for tuition to support him since I realised the extent of this at probably the end of year 7. I find that it has helped a lot and kept him in the sets he needed to prevent dropping down to the next paper but also recognise I’m fortunate to be able to afford to do this for him. Other parents may have better maths skills than me (!) to be able to do this at home rather than outsource of course.

One of the girls at DD's school was nicknamed the flashcard whizz because she could retain facts for exams, but she is completely devoid of common sense, and didn't know that France and Brazil are in two different continents.

Yeah you do have to be very careful bandying words like 'stupid' around. Exams test one particular kind of intelligence. I have had children in my classes who were greater depth and had tutors, yet who struggled to model maths problems that were set out unconventionally, couldn't cut accurately with scissors, couldn't problem solve to build a 3D model, and dissolved into tears at the first sign of any correction. Or dyslexic children who struggled to write but who were fantastic artists/ musicians/ actors.

Tutors often seem to focus on teaching methods to find an answer to a specific format Q, whereas understanding processes and why you get a particular answer is much more important for real growth and application.

No it’s £25 per hour where we are. Surrey / London borders.

Tbh if this is in person then the tutor must have to hire a space to do the tuition if there are as many as 8-10 YP. I guess that could cost as much as £50 an hour (I mean I really don't know, that's a total guesstimate). Even so, for 10 students that's £200 for the hour, pretty good rate (and yes I know that tutoring involves more than just the hour’s work, there is the prep and marking as well – which would ofc be more if there are 10 students.

I’ve never quite known where to start with getting a tutor! I guess it’s all online? My eldest is year 11 and very motivated so we haven’t ever got him tutors. His school isn’t the best and seem to struggle to retain science teachers and he’s had some dreadful ones. He’s basically taught himself the whole curriculum from Free Science Lessons on YouTube, and says he was one of only a handful to pass the recent mocks. My younger child is less motivated (though just as bright) and I suspect tutors may help to fill in the gaps for him.