What is your teaching philosophy?

I believe in completely understanding material, including understanding the foundation basing that material with no holes left unplugged, no matter how far back in school we need to revisit. Gaining back the lost art of number sensibility and meaning of numbers is an important part to putting a student back on track. We will not just assume topics work but understand why they work to create long term memories in understanding and using the topic of the day.

What might you do in a typical first session with a student?

In the first session, we will start with a few questions on the student's current topic; from there we will move back to the basics needed to understand the topic to assess what holes in basic mathematics need revisiting to learn the topic effectively. Whether it would be relearning how count, add, subtract, or fractions. We will then show how and when these basics will affect the topic of the day.

How can you help a student become an independent learner?

Independent learning starts at the foundation and works its way up. We will start with material where students are capable of answering inquires independently, starting with counting and addition if needed, and then continually work our way back up to the material at hand.

If a student has difficulty learning a skill or concept, what would you do?

When a student has difficulty with a skill or concept, it usually is due to a hole, gap in knowledge or forgetting material from a math class from previous years; we will backtrack in the material and recall what the class expects a student to remember.