Michelle

Academic History

Queen Mary University, London. MA English Literature.

University College, London. BA History of Art.

Westminster School, A-Levels, English, French, German.

About Me

An experienced English tutor, I am passionate and enthusiastic about teaching every aspect of English language and literature to children and teenagers / young adults. I take a holistic approach, working with students to improve both their literacy skills and to gain confidence.

I have a proven ability to help my students to learn. With nearly fifteen years of experience (500+ hours of one-to-one tutoring), I have worked with over 100 students (aged 5 – 16yrs), helping them to significantly improve their literacy, reading, writing, spelling, vocabulary knowledge, verbal reasoning and comprehension.

My teaching style is enthusiastic, joyful, positive, encouraging, nurturing, patient, gentle and firm. I am particularly good at helping pupils to develop better concentration, focus and confidence when learning. I also help them to stay calm and keep their minds clear whilst preparing for exams. I work hard to ensure that lessons are consistently fun and enjoyable.

Recent Tuition

Younger Students

I aim to inspire younger students to enjoy reading, writing and learning. I engage with them by discussing the books they are reading and the stories they are writing, asking them questions about the characters and what they like about the story. Sensitive to the fact that every child is unique, I adapt my teaching approach to the way they like to learn. I encourage them to feel enthusiastic about books and writing, and not to be afraid of making a mistake. By allowing them to know that it is okay not to be perfect first-time round, I keep the emphasis on making the student feel good about themselves and their level of reading, even if / when they make mistakes.

I always emphasise the positive, because students often feel frustration and anger when they are finding it difficult to learn to read and write. They worry about being stupid, not good enough, and their classmates picking on them for being behind in their learning. My methodology is to break down lessons into short five or ten minute segments, and to make each short segment fun, joyful and engaging.

Exam Preparation

English Language

I help students to focus on delivering their best written work possible in an exam environment. I help them to iron out / eliminate simple exam errors. This includes making sure they read the questions carefully and answer what is actually being asked. I help them to review their essays and answers by going over their fresh written work, to ensure they correct any spelling mistakes, etc. I use previous exam papers to help them practise for their exams. By asking them questions I help them to prepare their answers attentively and with greater clarity.

As well as working with mainstream students, I have extensive experience of tutoring those with challenges in the way they learn. These include ADHD, dyslexia, autism, difficulty concentrating and similar issues.  I adapt my approach to each individual so that they benefit positively and effectively from one-to-one tuition.

Please find a snapshot of my tuition experience below:

Reception, Literacy

This bright young boy of five is in Reception. He was struggling to read and understand phonics. As he was slipping behind his schoolwork because he couldn’t read, he was being teased and feeling quite sad and defeated. Initially, he just didn’t want to read all and he kept pushing the books away. My approach was to make it fun and to remove the stress out of reading for him. We started by choosing a picture book that he would find easy (one that was well below the level that his class were reading). I initially had to help him to read several words per page as he was stumbling and finding even the most basic words difficult. Every week we would practise writing just a few words from the book onto lined, brightly coloured paper. We also practised saying a few sounds (phonics) together for which I used visual flash cards. My approach is gentle, enthusiastic, positive and supportive. Over time, he began to feel more confident with his reading and spelling.  He felt sufficiently secure and happy that he wanted to upgrade to a more advanced book each term. By the time we had finished working together over a three-term period, this student was reading much more fluently than at the start, and was at the same books that his classmates were reading. He was enjoying phonics, reading, spelling and learning.

Year 1, Literacy

This bright young girl (aged six) had some problems surrounding her literacy and had been diagnosed with dyslexia. When we first started working together, her handwriting was illegible and she was struggling to read simple picture books. She found the words were jumping all over the page and she was getting angry and frustrated at her inability to decipher the words in these picture books. Early on, as spelling and writing was so difficult for her, I went back to basics and each week we would practise the alphabet and some simple spellings on a whiteboard. She also practised a list of spelling tests per week from the school curriculum. We used a transparent blue cellophane page placed over the book pages she was reading to enable her to read the words more clearly. I focused on helping her to slow down with her reading so that she’d make fewer mistakes and feel less frustrated. Seven months on she is now reading with much more fluency, and her writing is significantly neater and more legible. When tested, she is also writing words correctly onto the whiteboard and into her spelling book with minimal support.

Year 2, English Language, Literature and Literacy

This bright 7 year old girl had little enthusiasm or interest in reading and seemed quite bored when I first began to give her tutorial help. It was challenging to get her to read out loud and she had difficulty reading and spelling many of the words in the books she chose. I worked hard to instil in her a sense of joy and fun in reading and learning new words. To make the book come alive, I paused regularly to ask her questions about what was happening in the stories and what the more challenging words meant. I also asked her opinion about the various characters in them. By the end of our time working together, once a week over nearly three terms, she looked forward to reading out loud and practising spelling and she was excited about choosing a new book as soon as she had finished the previous one. With my help she improved her reading by two grades.

Year 3, English Language, Literature and Literacy

This student was eight years old and he had fallen substantially behind in his reading and writing. When I first began tutoring him he was reading children’s books for ages four to five. He had little confidence when reading out loud and stumbled on relatively easy words. Over the course of two and a half terms I worked with him once a week to restore his confidence and enjoyment of reading. With a gentle, positive and nurturing approach I encouraged him to lose his fear about tackling more challenging vocabulary. By the end of our work together he had advanced by two reading grades, was reading happily with confidence and able to understand more complex words and their meaning.

GCSE English Language and Literature

This very intelligent student was having trouble engaging with the AQA English Literature GCSE curriculum. He put off reading the key texts for this exam because he found them boring. We worked on one text at a time, and focused on asking him what he felt about each character of the novel, play or poem. Once I had successfully engaged with him to become more enthusiastic about reading the various books on the curriculum, I advised him to pick out key short quotes from each text, write them down into a notebook, and revise them in short bursts of ten minutes each. We then spent several tutoring sessions looking at previous AQA papers for both English Literature and Language. I impressed upon him the importance of making sure that he had carefully read and understood the exam questions, and that he focused on actually answering the question being asked. As a result of my tutoring, both this student’s English Literature and Language exam results were 7 as opposed to the 5 he was predicted to achieve.

GCSE English Language and Literature

This lovely, intelligent student sometimes has great difficulty concentrating. Although there has not been a clear diagnosis of ADHD, her parents are concerned that this may be the case. She had difficulty with some of the basics of grammar, punctuation and spelling.  She also found the curriculum for English GCSE Literature somewhat challenging, and I could sense that the texts she needed to study were not easy for her; hence she wasn’t enjoying this subject and lacked confidence. Given her difficulties in concentrating, I made sure that each tutoring session was split into manageable chunks, and I was guided by her to take a few small one-minute breaks when she needed them. We did regular work on past exam questions and I provided targeted feedback to help her improve. I also helped her draw up a list of ‘easy-to-remember’ quotes for each of her main texts. This student was predicted a 4 for her English Literature and scored 6. For English Language she was heading for a 3 and scored 5. Her parents were very happy with her results and she was very happy too.

Hobbies and Interests

Writing books, reading, visiting museums and art galleries.

Client Testimonials

“Michelle has been providing weekly tuition to our daughter for the past eight months. From the very first session Michelle displayed a real understanding of the way younger children learn. She constantly adapted her approach to fit into our daughter’s particular needs and always made each session interesting and rewarding. She was always sensitive to our daughter’s changing concentration levels and thus her ability to absorb the information before her. She used a wide variety of techniques which kept each session different but aimed at delivering the fundamental concepts our daughter needed to grasp. Under Michelle’s tutelage, our daughter has made noticeable progress in her maths, reading, comprehension and verbal reasoning.”

Parents of Year 1 student

“Michelle was a private tutor to my 10-year-old son who needed help with his English. Her approach was friendly but professional; and in my son’s own words ‘kind, patient, and knowledgeable’. I often face frustration and tears when I help my son with his homework. However, there was none of that with Michelle. She masterfully took him though comprehension, creative writing, and vocabulary building with her delightful positivity. She also helped to boost our son’s confidence by reminding him how smart he was, which resulted in his school report with ‘Excellent’ on all subjects for the first time ever. I am grateful for Michelle’s work to make my son feel so proud. I am happy to recommend Michelle for anyone who is looking for an excellent tutor who can caringly support their child’s academic development.”

Parent of Year 6 student

“Michelle has been a wonder with my year 8 son. In the sixth months that they have been working together he has improved immensely, becoming far more confident in his writing, and writing at greater length with more clarity and punctuation. He is also more thoughtful when planning his sentences. He has gone up two grades in English, and his improved writing skills are benefitting most of his other subjects. Michelle has also helped him to prepare for the 13+ ISEB exams, giving him lots of guidance and helpful tips on how to tackle the various questions that might arise in an exam situation. This really helped him to feel more confident and well prepared for his exams. My son enjoys his lessons with Michelle, who is very encouraging, patient and positive.”

Parent of 13+ student

“When Michelle started tutoring our daughter, her reading was two years behind her age group because of optical issues she had had, and she avoided reading entirely because she was embarrassed about her abilities.  Michelle has been working weekly with our child and in less than a year and a half, she has gone up three reading levels, so she is now reading at her age group and her spelling has significantly improved. More importantly, our daughter’s confidence in reading has improved immensely. Michelle manages her very short attention span very adeptly and has always been able to overcome any initial reluctance with her kindness and enthusiasm.  Michelle clearly has a genuine interest in helping children improve their literacy skills and in fostering a love of reading.  A huge thank you from two very grateful parents!”

Parent of Year 5 student