We use a tutor the way that many parents help their own children. To help with time management, planning, be a sounding board for ideas and to help them think through problems where they're having difficulty.

More than happy to pay a tutor, because I found out with my oldest child that I get too easily frustrated. Teachers must be saints. The tutor is to protect my relationship with my child and not want to bang my head against the floor when my old way of doing math conflicts with the new way.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Tutoring is just work, with another person present. No reputable tutor, student, or family, would hire a tutor to do the work FOR the student.

Seems to me the difference is whether your kid is helped by doing their homework alongside someone else or is happy to do it on their own. Congrats, I guess, if your kid does learns well enough on their own. But also not sure why it’s cheating to study and work alongside someone else. Just like if it was the child’s parent or a study group.

Obviously a lot of abuse, gray areas, and slippery slopes people can raise on this topic, which are fair. But the basic idea of doing your studies with another person - why is it objectionable?

lol how much you pay for "alongside someone else" and do nothing else? I hope not a lot.

The most detrimental effect is that kids don't get to work through challenging problems on their own. If they got stuck on a difficult question or difficult essay, the tutor (or the parents) explains it to the kid. Their brain don't get to struggle through this (sometimes painful) process.

Of course, if you are just paying for a body double, I think that's totally fine. Nothing to worry about.

Yeah, typically, the tutor explains the concept better than the teacher did to give the kid a solid understanding of the concepts, then assigns 10 equally or more difficult problems to drive home the idea. Not really seeing the downside. My kid’s (excellent) math tutor took note of the concepts that
my kid struggled with most, then quizzed them on those next time.

The notion that struggling to master poorly presented material (have you seen HS math books?) somehow makes you better at math doesn’t match my experience as someone working in STEM. IME, what makes you better at math is really deeply understanding the concepts and how they apply to problems. Then solving the problem becomes just applying an algorithm.

Anonymous wrote:My kids are at a high-performing public school and do not use tutors. Many of their friends do, but we cannot afford to have one. My kids did well in school (mostly A’s). We did use SAT prep for one child and he was able to increase his score significantly, but it did not result in admission to any high-performing college because we did not have all the other things that come with that (no club sports, national awards or non-profits, etc.) SAT prep is no longer affordable for us now. My second child did not do prep, had a lower SAT score, but still got into college with the same amount in merit aid as my first born.

Oh, and they are in college now and doing really well. Resilience definitely helps.

My kids are at a high-performing public school and do not use tutors. Many of their friends do, but we cannot afford to have one. My kids did well in school (mostly A’s). We did use SAT prep for one child and he was able to increase his score significantly, but it did not result in admission to any high-performing college because we did not have all the other things that come with that (no club sports, national awards or non-profits, etc.) SAT prep is no longer affordable for us now. My second child did not do prep, had a lower SAT score, but still got into college with the same amount in merit aid as my first born.

Anonymous wrote:Not sure if you are being snarky about the body double or not, but you can take a visit to the SN board to see that it can be useful for certain learners.

No. I am not being snarky about body double for certain learners.

That PP obviously was speaking broadly.

Not sure if you are being snarky about the body double or not, but you can take a visit to the SN board to see that it can be useful for certain learners.

Anonymous wrote:Tutoring is just work, with another person present. No reputable tutor, student, or family, would hire a tutor to do the work FOR the student.

Seems to me the difference is whether your kid is helped by doing their homework alongside someone else or is happy to do it on their own. Congrats, I guess, if your kid does learns well enough on their own. But also not sure why it’s cheating to study and work alongside someone else. Just like if it was the child’s parent or a study group.

Obviously a lot of abuse, gray areas, and slippery slopes people can raise on this topic, which are fair. But the basic idea of doing your studies with another person - why is it objectionable?

lol how much you pay for "alongside someone else" and do nothing else? I hope not a lot.

The most detrimental effect is that kids don't get to work through challenging problems on their own. If they got stuck on a difficult question or difficult essay, the tutor (or the parents) explains it to the kid. Their brain don't get to struggle through this (sometimes painful) process.

Of course, if you are just paying for a body double, I think that's totally fine. Nothing to worry about.

[quote=Anonymous]Tutoring is just work, with another person present. No reputable tutor, student, or family, would hire a tutor to do the work FOR the student.

Seems to me the difference is whether your kid is helped by doing their homework alongside someone else or is happy to do it on their own. Congrats, I guess, if your kid does learns well enough on their own. But also not sure why it’s cheating to study and work alongside someone else. Just like if it was the child’s parent or a study group.

Obviously a lot of abuse, gray areas, and slippery slopes people can raise on this topic, which are fair. But the basic idea of doing your studies with another person - why is it objectionable?[/quote]

DD attends a large, competitive, public HS and she is the only one among her friend group not using a tutor. Many of these tutors appear to be doing the actual work. This is especially true for difficult writing assignments.