Tips on Group Tutoring
Some tutors find that group tutoring offers a lot of advantages over one-on-one tutoring. Here are some suggestions to help group sessions be successful.
- Arrange seating and notes in a way that encourages interaction and visibility.
- Provide direction, not dictatorship.
- Guide the conversation, but remember to limit how much you talk.
- Encourage participation.
- Control dominant students.
- Consciously, but slowly, draw shy tutees into the flow of conversation.
- Stress confidentiality.
- Summarize the ideas presented in sessions.
- Encourage interaction by having students answer each other's questions.
- Take a vote instead of giving a blanket yes or no response. Ask open-ended questions.
- Rephrase questions if they do not yield comments. Don't always clarify with an explanation.
- Use good eye contact.
- The more you experience tutoring, the easier it will become to facilitate group tutoring effectively.