The School Tutor System

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It is common in Hong Kong secondary schools for older students to tutor younger students in schemes organized by the schools. Your school has such a scheme, but there is a shortage of tutors. You are the Head Boy/Girl of your school. Your principal has asked you to write a letter to all fifth formers persuading them to join the scheme as tutors.

In your letter, discuss the tutor system, mention its difficulties, but emphasize the benefits of the scheme for both the tutors and the younger students. Sign you letter “Chris Wong”.

Dear fifth formers,

Can you recall having tutorial lessons run by higher-form students when you enter our school? It has always been a tradition in our school for higher-form students to tutor younger students. However, fewer students are willing to be tutors nowadays, and it is saddening to see the scheme run short of tutors. I hope that all of you can actively participate in the scheme to help our fellow schoolmates.

In the scheme, higher-form students meet lower-form students every Friday after school. They will check their homework and answer their questions. In some cases, older students need to have tutorial lessons with the younger students during holidays, and teach them Mathematics, Chinese or Science. It normally takes one and a half hour every week. Students who participate in the scheme will get certificates from the school saying that they have been “young teachers”

The tutorial scheme has always been beneficial not only to younger students, but also the older students who offer them help.

To begin with, let’s talk about how we, higher-form students, can benefit from the scheme. First of all, it is a good revision to us. When we give lower form students tutorial lessons, we need to go over the materials we have learnt in our lower forms, from simple sentence structures to fundamental concepts in science subjects. Although it may seem silly having to learn things all over again in order to teach the younger students, it is actually a window of opportunity for us to solidify what we have learnt and build a stronger foundation for our studies.

Believe it or not, teaching lower form students can also help us improve our communication skills. Easy as it seems, it is actually quite challenging to organize some ideas and express them in simple words, even though it is only lower form materials. It is far more meaningful to know how to explain ideas to people without knowledge in the specific field then to quote tones of professional terms to show off yourself. By teaching lower-form students, we can brush up on our communication skills and learn to organize ideas.

Furthermore, we can contribute to the school and develop a sense of responsibility through the scheme. All these years, we have been sitting passively in the classrooms listening to our teachers’ preaching. This time, we have the chance to be teachers and teach the lower forms students what we have learnt. Besides, as we need to meet the younger students on a regular basis and do follow-up work, we can develop a sense of responsibility.

At the same time, we can also widen our social circle by meeting more lower-form students. They are more energetic and creative than we are. Also, they are bolder to question what they are learning. We even can gain inspiration from them.

On the other hand, the scheme is also advantageous to the younger students.

The most obvious benefit is how their academic performances can improve. As they have extra tutorial lessons, they have more chances to do revision or clarify some of the concepts. Higher-form students are capable of teaching them what they don’t understand because they have just gone through the same process. It is easier for higher-form students to know what they don’t understand and explain the concepts to them.

On top of this, younger students can experience a warm and helping environment at school. They will meet older students who are more mature, and are enthusiastic in helping them. This helps them integrate into the new environment and develop a sense of belonging to the school. 

The younger students can also learn a lot from higher-form students other than the knowledge that they may acquire. For instance, older students are generally more hard-working because they need to take the public examinations. So, the younger students can learn to cherish their time and work harder. Besides, they can learn to help each other. Higher-form students set excellent examples of offering help to their schoolmates. From the experience, younger students can also understand the importance of helping their peers or even the needy in society.

It is clear that the scheme is immensely beneficial to both the tutors and the students. However, I understand that many of you are worried about some possible drawbacks of participating in the scheme.

Some students are concerned that tutoring younger students may use too much of their time and affect their studies. The task may be exhausting and time-consuming. Should they spend too much time helping younger students, they may be the one who suffer academically.

Besides, some older students may think that they are not capable of teaching others. They are worried that they may teach younger students some wrong concepts, be unable to get along with them, or even mess them up!

However, we should be optimistic. Things will not turn out to be so bad! So long as we have good time management and confidence in ourselves, we will be able to overcome the difficulties!

For instance, we can spend less time playing computer or watching television. If we reallocate some of our time spent on entertainment and put it in our studies, our studies will not be affected.

At the same time, we should have confidence in ourselves. Younger students are not necessarily naughty kids who are difficult to handle. We should also be confident in ourselves about what we teach, If we have any doubts, we can look up some reference books or ask our teachers. Not only does the scheme help us solidify our knowledge, it also help us find confidence in ourselves!

Giving younger students is indubitably beneficial to us. It is also a meaningful thing to do as we can help our schoolmates. So I highly recommend the scheme to all of you.

Best wishes,

Christ Wong

Head Boy