Deshler Online Tutoring

First, I need to know the student's age, grade level, and the course that they would like to be tutored in. It's especially useful for me to see a lesson plan or syllabus prepared by a professor, so I can make sure I am familiar with any materials or books that we will be working with. Next, I get to know the student and test out a few methods with them so I can identify their learning style. Once that's covered, I just need to prepare a tutoring plan and find a schedule that works for both of us! 

I currently attend the University of Virginia as an undergraduate, where I received a full tuition, academic scholarship. I double major in English and Philosophy. Prior to that, I attended the Washington International School, where I took every course at the IB level, including English, Spanish, History, Economics, Environmental Science, and Maths. I graduated with an International Baccalaureate diploma with a GPA in the 99th percentile. I scored a 35 out of 36 on my ACT exam, and am familiar with standardized test preparations. Finally, I have lots of work and internship experience at educational facilities with kids of all ages, including LearnServe and the Harvard Graduate School of Education. I am tri-lingual in English, Spanish and Portuguese in case any hispanic students are in need of a tutor to accomodate them! 

I price based on the length of lessons. The baseline is $40 for an hour long session, and an additional $20 for each additional half hour. Shorter lessons are negotiable based on the students needs! 

60 minute lesson: $40

90 minute lesson: $60

2 hour lesson: $80

Growing up, I always was inclined to help my younger cousins and children I was babysitting with their homework assignments. Once I got to college, I quickly found that my note-taking and study strategies I had developed in high school were very useful to my classmates and friends who joined me in study groups. I was asked to upload notes to the Student Disability Access Center at my school, for students who needed concise but clear explanations of course materials in lectures. From there, I began receiving many requests for tutoring services, and I enjoyed it so much I decided to continue tutoring as a side-project alongside pursuing my own education!

Formally, I have mostly worked with Undergraduate College students as well as local high school students. However, I have plenty of personal experience working with younger kids, especially those whom I babysit whose parents ask me to help with their homework during my stay. I myself was diagnosed with ADD and ADHD when I was very young, but have managed to find strategies not only to cope with these learning conditions in academics, but to actually use them to my advantage! I am more than happy to work with kids who have similar conditions and share and practice with them the strategies that worked for me. 

I am a very visual learner, so for my philosophy final exam in college last year, I created an illustrated short-story booklet to help me remember different philosophers and their arguments. Creating the booklet required me to review a semester's worth of material and synthesize it into a fun project where I put philosophers in conversation with one another. (This also served as my study guide!) Beyond achieving the highest score in my class on the exam, I showed the booklet to my professor, who proceeded to add my infographic services to a grant application he had already been writing. He got the grant, with an additional $500 for me to continue to create educational cartoons to add to his lecture! My study guide is currently being turned into an actual booklet that will now be distributed as a reading amongst the existing course materials for future students in the class. 

This totally depends on your age and your learning style! If you are in elementary or middle school, I can absolutely help with an entire range of subjects, from history and spanish to science and math. If you are a high school or college level student, I am much better equipped to help with the social sciences (Anthropology, Economics, History, Sociology) and languages (English, Comparative Literature, Spanish, Portuguese) than I am for more STEM oriented subjects. Additionally, if you are a student who craves critical thinking and applied learning, I am the tutor for you! If you prefer more methodological, and memorization based learning, I can help you, but you might want tutor with a more traditional approach.  

I think students should keep in mind that teachers are on your team! Teachers and tutors are passionate about serving your educational needs so that you can can become an intelligent, independent, analytical, informed individual!

If you are struggling with a particular course or subject, I reccomend asking the following questions:

1. What does my daily schedule look like? Improving at anything takes practice and time. If you are involved with tons of projects, extracurriculars, sports or jobs that don't allow you the time to improve yourself academically, see if there's any way you can narrow these down and focus your goals! It's better to be really excellent at a few things than to be giving 50% effort to tons of things.

2. If you have been spending plenty of time working on something and are still struggling, ask youself, Have I tried a different approach? The internet is full of resources that can help you identify your learning style. Maybe you are a hands-on learner, and are struggling to retain information from pages and pages of reading! Try experimenting with new techniques. 

3. Am I biting off more than I can chew? Maybe you've enrolled in very high level courses and are expecting to get A's in all of them. You certainly can achieve this! However, you need to make sure you start small and become familiar with the foundations of a discipline before hopping into the deep end of a complicated subject! 

4. On a more personal level, if you find yourself unmotivated, distractable, or anxious about your studies, you are not alone! Ask yourself, do I have a support system? Communicating your difficulties to parents, teachers, counselors and even friends can often seem intimidating or embarrassing, but you may be surprised at how ready and willing the people around you are to help you out! Most schools and institutions have systems in place to accomodate you, whether it be testing accomodations such as a separate room or extra time, or even regular class accomodations such as assignment extensions or recurring one-on-one meetings with a teacher! We are often immersed in an ideology that celebrates very individualistic, self-made success models. But I can promise that not one of your idols got to where they are without asking for help!