When I was a child, my mom, who was then a nurse in the Rural Health unit of our town, was my tutor. Every afternoon after her work, we (me and my sister) will gather together in our study table for her to help us with our lessons and assignments. This was always the situation during our preschool and grade school years until we studied in Manila and had to do everything on our own.
This is also what I do with my kids ( 1 in prep and 1 in grade 4). But since oftentimes I'm in the medical school in most afternoons to teach and I arrive home in the evening, I don't tutor them everyday. I spend the whole day of Sunday with them helping them with their assignments, reading in advance, playing with them or preparing snacks during our breaks. It has been this way since Raymund, now in grade 4, started schooling.
As a school physician working in several schools, I noticed that tutoring the kids is not anymore the work of most moms. Maybe it's because most mothers work full-time nowadays that there is no more time left for them to tutor their kids. And this is now the job of teacher-tutors who are mostly teachers accepting tutorial jobs during their breaks or after school hours. In some cases, they are full-time tutors in tutorial institutions.
I see nothing wrong with this set-up though it is important for parents to choose very well the tutors that they give to their child. Every child has a different need. The tutor should be able to identify the child's particular need with regards to his studies and she must able to address it. It is not enough that the tutor just helps the child with his assignments leaving the area where the child is having difficulty unaddressed. A tutor can only perform her job well if she knows where to focus. With the right focus, long hours of study is not needed.Labels: schooling, tutorial |
