T is for Tutoring

I now have 4 students I tutor. 

One girl, Lindsay, is in the 8th grade and I work with her on math once per week.  I have been working with her for several weeks at this point and our comfort level with each other is good.

One little boy, Jake, is in 3rd grade, and I work with him on everything.  I meet with him once per week also.

Another kid I tutor is named DJ, and I expected to hate him.  He is failing every single subject in the 6th grade, and this is his second year in the 6th grade.  He has a cast on his arm/hand, from punching a classmate.  He HAS to pass the GA math CRCT in order to go on to 7th grade, so we work on math together.  He is an angel!  He is very polite, sociable, and a hard worker.  He needs very little guidance; really he just needs someone to sit down with him in a quiet room and make him do the work.  He appears to be very smart, he is a hard worker, and regularly stays on task for me.  The parents are good with consequences for his poor grades....he has everything taken away from him - friends, TV, internet, going anywhere, etc.  I asked his parents if DJ has any way to earn privileges back, and they said no.  They simply wait until the next report card, and expect all his grades to be up from Fs.  I encouraged them to reward the little successes and progress DJ makes along the way, hoping that positive recognition will inspire more positive recognition.  They agreed that that is a good idea, and a concept they've never tried before.  I love giving parenting advice when I'm not even a parent!!!! =)

The last student I tutor is named Colton, and he is in 8th grade.  Yesterday, he reminded me why teaching 8th grade math is so frustrating.  First of all, he can't sit still.  He is supposedly on meds for ADHD but only started taking them a couple weeks ago.  He gets mad when I ask him if he actually took his meds that day.  We are sitting there and he is drawing on a laptop with a pencil.  When I ask him if he feels he should be doing that, his reply is "Yeah, it's not mine.  It's my brothers."  When I ask him if he draws on the desk at school, he gets mad and says "No!  I'm not a little kid!"  REALLY?  Because you're drawing on your brother's lap top as we speak!  As we proceed throughout the hour, he repeatedly says "This is stupid"  "Why are we doing this?"  "I already know all this stuff" "Is this review?" over and over and over.  At one point, he turns to me and says "Why don't we just get on You Tube and listen to music?"  Are you kidding me?  I am not your friend, and I am not here to hang out with you for play time!  Then he tells me that if he doesn't bring his grades up, he has to go back to military school.  Apparently his parents shipped him off to military school over the summer.  But all the kids there do drugs, and they wanted him to do drugs too, but he doesn't "do that shit".  I let that one slide....

I have the pleasure of meeting with Colton and DJ twice a week!  This tutoring company, Club Z Tutoring, keeps trying to give me more students.  NO THANK YOU - I'm perfectly (mostly) content with the clients I already have!  If they were all amazing kids, that would be one thing, but you just never know what you're going to get.