Student tutors, a better approach to learning English

Twice a week – after the rest of the school have gone home – a group of students will gather in our English room, learning to read.

Look once and this is no more than an ordinary reading class. But look again. There are only students in this room; only students with no teacher in sight. You see, these students are their own teachers.

A year ago, a fellow teacher and I mulled on ways to help our students who were struggling to read and write in English.

For one, we knew that we could only get them on the right track with extra support after school hours and – more importantly – personalised attention. And then we considered getting volunteers from nearby universities to help us teach but that idea came to nothing.

Then we hit upon another idea; let's use our own students as tutors. It's not a novel concept; students more proficient in the English language will be selected to help students who are not.

And so began our journey.

We set out to convince at least 10 student tutors to help us teach.

"Who else better to help the community but you," was what we said to these students.

Even though they were all in the same school and in the same neighbourhood, there are students who are far more disadvantaged than them.

Many do not have the same opportunities to learn how to read. Many are not aware of the power of being literate.

We tried to make it as clear to them as possible; "It's all up to you now."

More than 10 student tutors signed up to teach.

During our first week of class, we realised that both our tutors and the students in the programme were very enthusiastic to learn. In fact, the students preferred the students to teach them rather than us teachers.

By the end of two months, our students showed incredible progress. The tutors' efforts and personalised attention given to the students, helped them to advance in their reading and achieve what no other English teacher could have possibly done just standing in front of the class.

When I started the programme again this year, I could see the amount of growth it brings; not just for our students who were learning to read but our student tutors. Empowering these students to lead honed their confidence and helped them develop leadership skills no lessons can imbue.

After reading sessions, we will have a short moment of reflection with our student tutors to discuss their success with the students as well as their challenges.

In the past year, I've seen my student tutors try out different styles of teaching to help their tutees read. They create their own exercises and spelling tests and are often very proud when their tutees show results.

I realised that we often focus on educating the mind but we forget about educating the heart.

I tell my student tutors how helping a child to read is putting them on a different life trajectory. I tell them of the enormous effect their actions will have on this child who is learning to read.

Our tutees are also younger than our tutors and many look up to them as their role models. Even on days when they are exhausted, all my tutors would show up to teach because they wouldn't want to abandon their students.

In this way, they learn commitment. When their student cannot read, they would think of methods to help them. From this, they learn grit.

Community service should always extend beyond writing a 350-word essay about it. It should be more than taking them on a trip to the orphanage.

Community service in school should mean that we are empowering our students to be change agents.

Community service is telling our students that it is up to them to make a difference in the community.

Many of our students, especially those who perform better in their studies, tend to be caught up with academic achievement and wanting to collect as many certificates as possible.

We train them to think outside the box and connect the dots but we forget to teach them to give back. We forget to tell them to use the education given to them to change the lives of others.

You just watch. These students are going to do something great one day. And I'll be happy to say that they did it all on their own. – September 10, 2015.

* This is the personal opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insider.