I Teach Because I Love To

My profile is not as academically impressive as some other tutors. This is because I have nearly all of my knowledge from 20 years working in a volunteer capacity for an international organisation.  During this time I lived for 3 years in Brazil and 3 years in France, lucky enough to live in homes where I had to speak Portuguese or French all the time.

Our aim was to create teamwork that actually worked so contact with people was vital. I set about learning languages with this in mind.  I soon found that I had a passion to speak correctly and learn idioms and perhaps even make jokes in the other language.  I then found I was doing a lot of spontaneous simultaneous translating and rose to the challenge of getting behind the words to the meaning and expressing it in natural terms in English. 

Lately I have felt I owe it to my pupils to do a recent A-level in French so as to understand in detail how to gain extra marks and get the highest grade possible.  I sat AS this summer and will sit A2 next summer. I have to admit they seem a lot easier than when I sat them when I was at school.  This summer I also prepared a 15-yr-old for GCSE Portuguese.

I am enjoying the literature part of the exam preparation and can lend out the relevant works of Moliere, Camus, or others.  If you’d like your own copy, Amazon sell reasonably priced 2nd hand copies which I’ve found are in good condition.

I have found most pupils require a lot of repetition so, depending on the level, I incorporate games e.g. a quick game of monopoly, all in French or Portuguese, does wonders for someone finding it hard to grasp numbers.