Services

Goals of Tutoring

Math with Margin is centered on the goal of helping students strengthen their problem-solving and other metacognitive skills, which not only prepares them for success in future mathematics study, but also in any higher education they pursue and for life in general.  

With this in mind, I support students in their personal goals of achieving or maintaining high course grades, scoring well on exams or contests, testing out of courses, and anything else they wish to accomplish.  I consider the long-term goals of the student as I craft lessons for them, including whether they intend to enter a field that relies heavily on math or wish to focus on something else.  

The First Session

The first session for all students is focused on getting to know the student and their family and evaluating their current mathematical interests and skills and metacognitive habits.  This helps me to provide personalized instruction to the student according to their strengths, weaknesses, and individual goals.  There will be brief interviews of both the student and the caregiver(s), and the student will be given a few mathematical challenges and asked to choose one to explore.  The challenges are designed to be easy at the start and more difficult as you continue so that the student can feel proud of having partially solved the challenge and so that I can assess their current problem-solving and communication skills.  

Tutoring Modality

I offer both at-home and virtual tutoring.  Virtual tutoring allows me to reach both students who reside farther away and students who are staying temporarily in a different location.  

Due to the plethora of digital tools for mathematical visualization, computation, collaboration, and more, virtual tutoring done well can be very engaging and effective.  Some digital tools I use for tutoring include:

• Polypad (and other Mathigon tools)

• Desmos

• Geogebra

• Woo Whiteboard

• Wolfram Alpha

Some students, however, have more inherent struggles with virtual instruction and depend more on in-person engagement.  If this seems to be the case for a virtual student, I would want to discuss with the student and caregiver(s) to find the best solution (which may be to find a different, more local tutor).  

Session Frequency/Length

Many students have 60-min tutoring sessions once a week; some opt for multiple sessions per week, especially if they are preparing for a time-sensitive goal.  It is also possible to do sessions of a different length (30 min, 45 min, 90 min), depending on the needs and attention span of the student.

Workshops

Depending on student interest, I may occasionally run online group workshops on topics such as test prep; intersections of mathematics with the arts, sciences, and humanities; and computer programming.  There can even be workshops specifically for caregivers, or for both students and caregivers to participate!

Pricing

The cost of tutoring depends on the grade level of the student as well as the modality of tutoring:

Elementary school students:

At-home tutoring: $45/hour

Virtual tutoring: $40/hour

Secondary school students:

At-home tutoring: $50/hour

Virtual tutoring: $45/hour

Workshops: to be announced for each workshop

I offer a free 15-minute initial phone consultation with prospective students/families so that they can assess whether we are a good fit.