Chapter 1
What is an ESL Student?
Getting to Know the ESL Student
As the tutor you need to become acquainted with your student. Knowing their life and where they came from will help you determine their needs and how to help them learn English.
This requires asking the right questions and listening, not only to their words but to the emotional content underlying their words.
How do they feel about living in the U.S.?
Even if they do not tell you, you can see that they are nervous or scared by their actions and body language. You can help them feel more confident about their language skills and more relaxed living in the U.S. over the course of tutoring them.
Look at the chart. (See the chart on page 21) This chart will guide you in getting to know your student and where they are in the continuum of experience living in the U.S.
Getting to Know Your Student
The answers to your questions can guide you in developing a lesson plan that is tailored to your student—that will satisfy their need for learning English.
For example, an international resident in this country who works at a manual labor job and wants to get a better job will require a different lesson than a college student from another country. The lessons can be tailored to each student so that they learn English that best suits their situation in life.
When getting to know an older student who has been working at a manual labor job in this country for 8 years, who wants to better his employment situation, you can ask him his goals for the future. He may say he would like to be a retail store manager. In that case, he needs to be able to learn enough English to fill out a job application, create a resume and interact with customers on the job.
In that situation, you can create lessons based on him being able to navigate his future activities using English. If he doesn’t have a high school diploma, he could study to take the GED test to receive a diploma. As the tutor, you can help him improve his vocabulary so he can study for the GED test.
If your student is from another country, such as Japan, and she wants to be able to participate in the classroom at the local university where she is a student, you can help her achieve those goals.
You can help her make conversations in her classrooms through role play with you during the lesson. You can help her learn vocabulary that is appropriate for her academic discipline.
Your student will need to learn how to jump into a classroom discussion. You can teach her how to use idioms and short hand speech so she can participate better in the classroom.
If your student is a businessman who wants to interact in a business environment, then you can help him learn business English. You can encourage him to engage in role play with you, as if you are interacting in a business situation.
He would need to learn vocabulary that is necessary in executing negotiations with other businessmen and women in his work environment.
He would need to write reports and email correspondence. All of these activities can be part of the lesson and homework for the student to complete at home.
Look at the chart and ask your student the questions on the left. The right column shows examples of possible answers. You can write their answers down and keep them in your file, so you can refer to them when planning their tutoring lesson.
Is your student new to this country? Did he or she arrive one week ago? Is his or her family in this country now? Are his family members back in his home country? Why is she living in the U.S. now? Is she a student? Is she a new immigrant? Is she working for an American company? Is she on a tourist visa? Is she married to an American?
When you know the answers to these questions, you will know how to help your student. For example, if he is a student at a local university, you know that he must be fairly intelligent and must have passed a rigorous TOFEL exam in order to be accepted into an American university.
If she came here working for a U.S. company and will only be here for 6 months on a limited stay, then you know your goals for helping her learn English will be intensive but short term.
If your student is a new immigrant then you know that he or she will be required to take the citizenship exam and will need to study speaking and listening as well as reading and writing to pass that exam. In addition, you will know that their English language goals are long term. They will need tutoring over a long period of time.
There are many kinds of ESL students. Here are some typical profiles.
Michael
Michael is a Korean high school student. (Michael is not his Korean name. He changed it when he moved here from Korea.) He has been living here with his mother for three years. He can speak English but not at a level he is comfortable with. He wants to know English slang. He wants to interact with other American students his own age. He wants to improve his grades. He knows that as he learns more words, he can do better in school. His mother wants him to go to an American university. He needs a tutor so he can get into a university.
Jose
Jose is a strawberry picker in a Northern California town. He has three children who are not in school. They help him pick strawberries. His wife sells berries at a road side stand. He is very poor since his father snuck into the U.S. illegally; and he never had the chance to get an education. He wants to improve his English so he can get a better job. He wants his children to go to school and have a better life. He needs to learn English so he can get a higher paying job. He wants a job driving truck. He cannot read and cannot fill out a job application.
Mariko
Mariko is from Japan. She just moved here from Tokyo. She is 24 years old and attends the University of Hawaii. She is very smart and knows English grammar well. Her speaking is very poor. Nobody seems to understand her in her university classes. Her homework is excellent and her papers are written very well. However, she cannot participate in class so her grades are getting lower. She is worried. She needs to improve her English conversation ability.
Chapter 2
Making Money Tutoring: Define Your Goals
Is this your first time tutoring? If this is your first tutoring business venture, then you need to read this chapter. Because in order to succeed, you need to have a plan; and before you make a plan you must define your goals.
By understanding the information in this book and taking action, you can achieve success.
But first you must do one thing: clarify or define your goals. After you define your goals, you can make a plan.
Define Your Goals.
Success can be defined as achieving your goals. In order to measure success, you must have clear and precise goals.
So my question to you is:
What are your goals?
Do you want to:
* Spend more time with your family?
* Make an extra $200 to $600 per week?
* Experience what it's like to make money and help international people?
* Help students feel good?
* Be truly appreciated for your service?
* Go full time with your tutoring business?
*Tutor part-time while taking college courses.
What do you want to achieve by having your own tutoring business?
Only you can decide. Once you decide on your goals, your mind will be clear about how to use your time.
You can expect that your tutoring will make a tremendous difference in both parents and students lives, but what is more critical is that tutoring has importance in your life.
Do you really want to tutor?
Do you enjoy working with people?
Do you like helping people learn?
Defining Your Goals as a Tutor How much time do you have to devote to tutoring?
If you have children of your own, what hours of the day can you tutor?
How much money do you want to make?
Do you want to have students in your home?
What facilities exist in your community where you can meet students?
Do you want to tutor in person or online?
What age children do you like most?
Do you like working with adults?
Are there specific ages of children that you feel more comfortable with?
Are you more comfortable teaching adults?
How will you handle a student who is not motivated to study?
How will you interact with parents, if you tutor children?
Will you drive to a student’s home? If so, will you charge more?
Will your lessons be the typical one hour?
Will you combine lessons into small groups, by arranging students to meet together? How many students will you see at one time?
How will you handle a student not showing up for their appointment?
After you answer these questions, your answers can guide your overall tutoring business plan. Your plan will be comprised of your answers to these questions. Your plan will detail how you will run your tutoring business; it will be in line with your specific goals.
Here are some examples of people who have tutored international students.
Are you like Roberta?
Roberta
Roberta is a mother of three who are all in school. She only has 12 hours a week to dedicate to tutoring, from 3pm until 6pm, M-F because she wants to be at home with her family after 6pm on the weekdays and on the weekends. Her plan was only to accept students who could see her between 3 and 6pm M-F. Therefore, when she listed her tutoring services with a referral provider, she stated 3pm-6pm M-F.
In addition, she wanted to earn about $1,900 a month. She decided to only accept long term students who needed to come several times a week. She charged $40.00 per hour for each hour of tutoring. Roberta was quite busy between 3pm and 6pm but she earned more than a typical day’s wages during those three hours.
Andrew
Andrew attends the University of Hawaii. He tutors international students he met at UH. He has a lot of students. He can only see them on Tuesdays and Thursdays because his classes are on Monday, Wednesday and Fridays. The students meet him at the library and find an empty room. He tutors groups of four at one time. Each student pays $25.00 per hour. He sees them four times a week. Andrew has three groups on Tuesday and Thursday. That means he earns $300.00 for one day, for two hours of work. He earns $600.00 per week. Andrew uses the money he earns to pay for his apartment, utilities and groceries. He has left over money for going out too. Andrew is majoring in business but he is seriously considering moving to Japan to teach ESL fulltime. He really likes it.
Everyone has different goals depending upon their life situation.
Your goals and business plan will be made clear to parents on your contact sheet where you describe your policies and prices.
Hand it out to parents and or adult students at the first meeting.
Contact Sheet Contents
Your tutoring business name (ex., Kim’s Tutoring)
Hours available: 2:30 pm to 7pm M-F, Sat 10am to 3pm Sun. Not available
What is an ESL Student?
Getting to Know the ESL Student
As the tutor you need to become acquainted with your student. Knowing their life and where they came from will help you determine their needs and how to help them learn English.
This requires asking the right questions and listening, not only to their words but to the emotional content underlying their words.
How do they feel about living in the U.S.?
Even if they do not tell you, you can see that they are nervous or scared by their actions and body language. You can help them feel more confident about their language skills and more relaxed living in the U.S. over the course of tutoring them.
Look at the chart. (See the chart on page 21) This chart will guide you in getting to know your student and where they are in the continuum of experience living in the U.S.
Getting to Know Your Student
The answers to your questions can guide you in developing a lesson plan that is tailored to your student—that will satisfy their need for learning English.
For example, an international resident in this country who works at a manual labor job and wants to get a better job will require a different lesson than a college student from another country. The lessons can be tailored to each student so that they learn English that best suits their situation in life.
When getting to know an older student who has been working at a manual labor job in this country for 8 years, who wants to better his employment situation, you can ask him his goals for the future. He may say he would like to be a retail store manager. In that case, he needs to be able to learn enough English to fill out a job application, create a resume and interact with customers on the job.
In that situation, you can create lessons based on him being able to navigate his future activities using English. If he doesn’t have a high school diploma, he could study to take the GED test to receive a diploma. As the tutor, you can help him improve his vocabulary so he can study for the GED test.
If your student is from another country, such as Japan, and she wants to be able to participate in the classroom at the local university where she is a student, you can help her achieve those goals.
You can help her make conversations in her classrooms through role play with you during the lesson. You can help her learn vocabulary that is appropriate for her academic discipline.
Your student will need to learn how to jump into a classroom discussion. You can teach her how to use idioms and short hand speech so she can participate better in the classroom.
If your student is a businessman who wants to interact in a business environment, then you can help him learn business English. You can encourage him to engage in role play with you, as if you are interacting in a business situation.
He would need to learn vocabulary that is necessary in executing negotiations with other businessmen and women in his work environment.
He would need to write reports and email correspondence. All of these activities can be part of the lesson and homework for the student to complete at home.
Look at the chart and ask your student the questions on the left. The right column shows examples of possible answers. You can write their answers down and keep them in your file, so you can refer to them when planning their tutoring lesson.
Is your student new to this country? Did he or she arrive one week ago? Is his or her family in this country now? Are his family members back in his home country? Why is she living in the U.S. now? Is she a student? Is she a new immigrant? Is she working for an American company? Is she on a tourist visa? Is she married to an American?
When you know the answers to these questions, you will know how to help your student. For example, if he is a student at a local university, you know that he must be fairly intelligent and must have passed a rigorous TOFEL exam in order to be accepted into an American university.
If she came here working for a U.S. company and will only be here for 6 months on a limited stay, then you know your goals for helping her learn English will be intensive but short term.
If your student is a new immigrant then you know that he or she will be required to take the citizenship exam and will need to study speaking and listening as well as reading and writing to pass that exam. In addition, you will know that their English language goals are long term. They will need tutoring over a long period of time.
There are many kinds of ESL students. Here are some typical profiles.
Michael
Michael is a Korean high school student. (Michael is not his Korean name. He changed it when he moved here from Korea.) He has been living here with his mother for three years. He can speak English but not at a level he is comfortable with. He wants to know English slang. He wants to interact with other American students his own age. He wants to improve his grades. He knows that as he learns more words, he can do better in school. His mother wants him to go to an American university. He needs a tutor so he can get into a university.
Jose
Jose is a strawberry picker in a Northern California town. He has three children who are not in school. They help him pick strawberries. His wife sells berries at a road side stand. He is very poor since his father snuck into the U.S. illegally; and he never had the chance to get an education. He wants to improve his English so he can get a better job. He wants his children to go to school and have a better life. He needs to learn English so he can get a higher paying job. He wants a job driving truck. He cannot read and cannot fill out a job application.
Mariko
Mariko is from Japan. She just moved here from Tokyo. She is 24 years old and attends the University of Hawaii. She is very smart and knows English grammar well. Her speaking is very poor. Nobody seems to understand her in her university classes. Her homework is excellent and her papers are written very well. However, she cannot participate in class so her grades are getting lower. She is worried. She needs to improve her English conversation ability.
Chapter 2
Making Money Tutoring: Define Your Goals
Is this your first time tutoring? If this is your first tutoring business venture, then you need to read this chapter. Because in order to succeed, you need to have a plan; and before you make a plan you must define your goals.
By understanding the information in this book and taking action, you can achieve success.
But first you must do one thing: clarify or define your goals. After you define your goals, you can make a plan.
Define Your Goals.
Success can be defined as achieving your goals. In order to measure success, you must have clear and precise goals.
So my question to you is:
What are your goals?
Do you want to:
* Spend more time with your family?
* Make an extra $200 to $600 per week?
* Experience what it's like to make money and help international people?
* Help students feel good?
* Be truly appreciated for your service?
* Go full time with your tutoring business?
*Tutor part-time while taking college courses.
What do you want to achieve by having your own tutoring business?
Only you can decide. Once you decide on your goals, your mind will be clear about how to use your time.
You can expect that your tutoring will make a tremendous difference in both parents and students lives, but what is more critical is that tutoring has importance in your life.
Do you really want to tutor?
Do you enjoy working with people?
Do you like helping people learn?
Defining Your Goals as a Tutor How much time do you have to devote to tutoring?
If you have children of your own, what hours of the day can you tutor?
How much money do you want to make?
Do you want to have students in your home?
What facilities exist in your community where you can meet students?
Do you want to tutor in person or online?
What age children do you like most?
Do you like working with adults?
Are there specific ages of children that you feel more comfortable with?
Are you more comfortable teaching adults?
How will you handle a student who is not motivated to study?
How will you interact with parents, if you tutor children?
Will you drive to a student’s home? If so, will you charge more?
Will your lessons be the typical one hour?
Will you combine lessons into small groups, by arranging students to meet together? How many students will you see at one time?
How will you handle a student not showing up for their appointment?
After you answer these questions, your answers can guide your overall tutoring business plan. Your plan will be comprised of your answers to these questions. Your plan will detail how you will run your tutoring business; it will be in line with your specific goals.
Here are some examples of people who have tutored international students.
Are you like Roberta?
Roberta
Roberta is a mother of three who are all in school. She only has 12 hours a week to dedicate to tutoring, from 3pm until 6pm, M-F because she wants to be at home with her family after 6pm on the weekdays and on the weekends. Her plan was only to accept students who could see her between 3 and 6pm M-F. Therefore, when she listed her tutoring services with a referral provider, she stated 3pm-6pm M-F.
In addition, she wanted to earn about $1,900 a month. She decided to only accept long term students who needed to come several times a week. She charged $40.00 per hour for each hour of tutoring. Roberta was quite busy between 3pm and 6pm but she earned more than a typical day’s wages during those three hours.
Andrew
Andrew attends the University of Hawaii. He tutors international students he met at UH. He has a lot of students. He can only see them on Tuesdays and Thursdays because his classes are on Monday, Wednesday and Fridays. The students meet him at the library and find an empty room. He tutors groups of four at one time. Each student pays $25.00 per hour. He sees them four times a week. Andrew has three groups on Tuesday and Thursday. That means he earns $300.00 for one day, for two hours of work. He earns $600.00 per week. Andrew uses the money he earns to pay for his apartment, utilities and groceries. He has left over money for going out too. Andrew is majoring in business but he is seriously considering moving to Japan to teach ESL fulltime. He really likes it.
Everyone has different goals depending upon their life situation.
Your goals and business plan will be made clear to parents on your contact sheet where you describe your policies and prices.
Hand it out to parents and or adult students at the first meeting.
Contact Sheet Contents
Your tutoring business name (ex., Kim’s Tutoring)
Hours available: 2:30 pm to 7pm M-F, Sat 10am to 3pm Sun. Not available
