What studies you need to become a maths tutor
LikeThere are several routes to becoming a maths tutor, and none of them are easy. You can be a tutor of many subjects and in many different places, such as schools, colleges, universities, and tuition centres. However, what most determines a tutor's career is the subject they choose to teach. Therefore, if you want to tutor maths, you will have to study something related to maths or science.
What do you have to study to teach maths?
There is no course of study that qualifies you to give private maths tuition. To become a tutor, you just need to have the necessary knowledge and know how to pass it on. This can be achieved in many different ways and all of them are equally valid.
But this does not mean that you don't have to study in order to teach. On the contrary, it means that there isn´t just one particular thing you should study, but many different ways:
- Tuition centres: there are many tuition centres that offer courses in maths or courses that involve mathematical knowledge. If you have developed these skills, you can teach them.
- Basic science studies: both secondary school and the preparatory years for university give you a range of mathematical skills that you can use to give private tuition to a large number of students.
- University studies: it is not only a mathematics degree that can be useful for tutoring. Any science degree implies mathematical knowledge that will later be useful for teaching secondary school students or students at the same level as you.
- Self-taught: this is perfectly valid. There are many people who learn maths on their own or through various studies, and then go on to further their knowledge on their own. As long as that knowledge is correct and you know how to pass it on, it doesn't matter how you got there.
Any of the ways you have studied are valid, as long as you have done it correctly. To succeed in private tuition, you have to be enthusiastic and have a positive attitude. Furthermore, you need to know how to adapt to the needs of your students.
Maths, like other subjects relating to science, is one of those most dreaded by most students.
What are the requirements for teaching maths?
The only requirements you have to meet in order to become a maths tutor are to meet the needs of the student. We cannot guess what type of students you will have, but we can point out some the most valuable characteristics for tutoring maths:
- Ability to adapt: changing course when the situation or demand arises is the daily routine of any tutor, whatever the subject. But when you give revision classes, you may have to change what you had planned to take a different path that may work better than what you had previously thought.
- Communication: most cases of failing in school are due to a lack of communication between teachers and students. A private tutor has the obligation to reach points of understanding that school tutors are often unable to reach.
- Perseverance: the key to passing any subject is not giving up, no matter how many times you have failed. And just as a student can never give up, neither can the tutor who accompanies them.
- Empathy: anyone who asks for maths lessons has a problem they need to solve. In this case, it is likely that we are dealing with a frustrated person and that is why we must know how to put ourselves in their shoes.
- Patience: an impatient tutor is not a good tutor. You must always know how to keep calm, however difficult it may be on occasions.
Students searching for maths tutors
Maths is the subject with the highest number of failures at all stages of education. No matter how old students are, it is always their Achilles' heel. This is largely due to the way it is taught as there are times when school teachers can't cover everything and can't implement methods that a private tutor can. This is the main requirement to be a private maths tutor, to go where other tutors cannot.
