Tutoring for NHS

On April 8th I attended another tutoring session for middle school kids. This session was with kids with learning disabilities, and there was only one other NHS member attending with me. Mrs Mahaffy was present this time, and there were around 5 kids. I was excited going into this, as I knew that the presence of Mrs Mahaffy and the increased support needed by this group of children would give me far more opportunities to interact with them than during my last visit.

When I arrived I was assigned to work with the same boy I that I had on my first session, which was nice. I think it's really nice to develop a strong relationship with a particular student so that you're both comfortable and effective while working together, and I think I'm on the road to doing just that.

Tisae was working on his math test when I first arrived, and Mrs Mahaffy said that I should look over what he'd done and then help him with the remainder of his problems. He had completed the first part of the assignment well, and we moved on to work on variables. He had to solve equations such as: x + 100 = 30,000. Fortunately, this was something I actually knew how to do! I guided him through the process, telling him to isolate the variable and complete the same steps for both sides of the problem. He caught on pretty quickly, but had a bit of trouble with the creation of equations themselves. I also helped another girl with her test, and she struggled more with the concepts but gained clarity as we progressed through the paper.
I realised how challenging it is to describe something that you view as being so simplistic to someone who hasn't yet grasped it - it's difficult to put what you know into words and communicate effectively. I tried to help by asking him questions to guide him towards the concepts, but I think that I need to work on my teaching methods a little more. I feel like I may of told him too many answers straightforwardly.

After we had finished with the math test we moved on to a review of his science essay. He had written a very interesting piece on Olympic sports and the importance of exercise. When reading it I learnt a great deal about this area!
He had finished up but needed to go through it once more before he printed it. He read it out loud to me and then we went over each paragraph in depth together. There were very few errors in his writing, but there were a few grammatical, formatting and structural problems and possibilities of a rewording of sentences. After we were both happy with the essay we printed it out in the commons and headed back to the classroom, where we said goodbye.

This was a very nice session, I felt a lot closer to Tisae and think that I managed to guide him pretty well. I feel that tutoring the students with learning disabilities is more engaging and tests us more than with the other kids. I feel like I am actually needed when I go to these events, whilst during my last visit I could sense that my presence wasn't as necessary.
Tutoring is definitely helping my communication and collaboration skills, and allows me to test my leadership qualities and push myself in a variety of areas. I am very glad that NHS has started doing this - it allows us to help the community (as Mrs Mahaffy was clearly in need of some assistance) whilst developing as people at the same time.