Today was my first experience tutoring a student.  It’s funny, thinking back to being that age when the word "tutor" was funny (cause it sounded like "tooter").

Anyways, it went really well.  I was nervous at first, because I couldn’t find the kid, but his mom called me and I found him before it was too late.

Once I found him we dove right in to his review sheet.  Despite spending the past few days reviewing the material and shaking the dust off, I was a bit shaky to start with.  But once we started working through everything, it all clicked back into place and I was a math-machine again.  It worked out well, because I made him have to work for the answers, while I guided him on it.  By the end, he seemed to have a good grasp on the current material and I’m pretty sure at least one of the things we covered really clicked for him.  Having him admit that it was easier than he thought made me feel pretty good about it.

He has a quiz tomorrow, so hopefully he does well.  It’s tough not knowing exactly what he’s learned, and sometimes I felt I was talking about stuff he hadn’t learned yet as if it was something he knew.

By the end, I was pretty sure he had the material, and encouraged him to do a few more problems and equated the work to practicing for music or sports.  I also encouraged him to pay more attention in class, after he readily admitted that he should.

But I guess I won’t really know how effective this was until he gets his quiz back to begin with, and then how he continues to perform.  I’ll be meeting with him 2 nights per week, so hopefully I can help him understand it all and get his grade up.

It was nice for me to blow some of the dust off of my education and relive some of the math that I (don’t laugh) enjoyed.  Though it crunched my schedule a bit…