teaching tips

On Monday, Tuesday, and sometimes Wednesday nights, I tutor a few kids for school. I started tutoring as a way to keep teaching a little bit. I just thought I would pass on a few ideas that I use. Maybe some of these ideas will help someone else!

My aunt (who has been a teacher for 30+ years) gave me this idea. Throughout the tutoring session, when Andrew misses a word (only from the extra-curricular books that we read), I jot the word down. Then after the lesson, I write each missed word on a small notecard. We review these cards at the beginning and end of each lesson.

I think it would become discouraging to have a huge stack of cards over the course of several weeks. So after he reads the word on the card correctly, I highlight one side of the card. After all four sides are highlighted, that card is tossed! I had thought about keeping the cards and reviewing them every once in a while but that's not good motivation. I figured that if a word comes up again that he is continually struggling with, a new card will always be started.

I came up with this idea on the spur of the moment tonight. While I was taking the class "Teaching Reading" in college, we were required to memorize "the charts". If you are familiar with the A Beka phonics program, you probably know what I mean. We also had to do exercises where we had to "circle the rules" in words on a page. I thought that might help Andrew. I don't want him memorizing the rules just to memorize. There's a reason we memorize "c" in "city". It's not the "city" part that I'm concerned about but rather the "c" part.

I didn't think that he would circle so hard in pencil because I was planning on re-using these cards. Tonight, I wrote a word on the front and on the back (bottom card in picture) will be the answer or rule for that particular card. In the future, I plan to laminate the cards so I can re-use them. When he comes to an unfamiliar word, I think this little exercise will help him with sounding that word out.