Experience
I was teaching History H1 & H2 at TPJC and now tutoring fulltime to JC and Sec students for History.
My students were from other JCs and Secondary schools. All improved under my tutelage for O and A levels.
Familiar with latest syllabus and exam questions. I teach students in a way that addresses their fundamentals of argumentation. So it doesn’t quite matter if they were in Sec 3/4/JC.
I find it more time efficient to help a student who is failing to score C's than students who already score C to score A.
The reason is simple, to score a C consistently means that the student already has the basics of argument and the content mastery. What they frequently lack is the finesse, and the ability and courage to push an argument to its logical conclusion, or to put it simply, to tell the reader the final implications of their argument
For instance, when queried on whether the USSR caused the Cold War, most people can tell that the USSR was probably at fault, for their aggression, which sparked off American discomfort. But most students will assume that it is therefore obvious that discomfort led to American reaction. While that is true, most people will fail to show that American reactions in turn led to a vicious cycle of tensions which caused the Cold War. They think it is too obvious to mention, when, after writing it down, they realize that it was such an important thing to mention. This requires finesse and a keen mind. And this often, for most students, require practice. There is no two ways about it.
Students who score U, S, E, etc, tend to either be lazy, or refuse to clarify when they have doubts, and suffer as a result as they are unable to catch up, since their doubts accumulate. That is a studying habit problem, and cannot be solved by me. Unless the attitude changes, i cannot do anything about it.
However, SOME students scoring U, S, E actually suffer from a lack of awareness of what they write, and awareness on HOW to study efficiently. This i can help, not just by prescribing something to do, but also to tell you how to tweak what and how you study by observing the way one behaves and works. It is this group of people that would benefit the most from me.
But nothing can substitute hard work. After all the correcting is done, and the self-awareness is instilled, hard work and constant willingness to clarify one's doubts is the cornerstone of a successful mastery of the Humanities.
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