Rebecca Zook - Math Tutoring Online

Looking back at how I responded so insensitively to my student who cried during our tutoring session, I’m stunned by my in-the-moment lack of compassion. Because… I cried myself to sleep over my algebra homework throughout most of eighth grade! It’s still vivid in my mind: sitting on my twin bed with my algebra book in my childhood bedroom, with its pink hearts and flowers wallpaper, struggling to finish my homework and crying with sheer frustration.

I loved math as much as any other subject until I hit 6th grade and was introduced to pre-algebra for the first time. Isolating for a variable, balancing an equation, the order of operations—none of this made any sense to me. I would go to my teacher for help, and he would patiently try to explain it to me, but it still didn’t make any sense. I made the same mistakes over and over and over without gaining any understanding or insight.

I have absolutely no memories of seventh grade math, but eighth grade math burns in my memory: sitting in class, trying to do the problems, approaching my teacher’s desk, asking him to explain it to me, dutifully nodding even though I still really didn’t understand, returning to my desk, and feeling overtaken by numb despair.

I’m not sure if his explanations didn’t make sense to me because he always explained everything the same way, or if he had a variety of explanations but none of them clicked with my learning style. He was a sweet, patient man, but his explanations did not help me to learn.

Now that I’m a math tutor, when I remember all those eighth grade nights, crying myself to sleep over my algebra book, I ask myself, why didn’t I think of getting a tutor? I never thought about asking anyone but my math teacher for help. I didn’t ask my friends, I didn’t ask my parents, I didn’t ask other teachers. It never even crossed my mind to try to switch to another teacher, or get another book. Why?

Maybe I wasn’t aware that these options were available. Or maybe I felt somewhere deep inside that, as a student who had a passion for learning and a capable reputation, asking for a tutor would be an admission of defeat. Or maybe it seemed “easier” to think of those nights of algebra tears as isolated incidents instead of taking on the “larger project” of trying to find a better solution for myself.

But paradoxically, I think this experience made me a better tutor. Many of the students who come to me might be completely frustrated and far behind. Maybe they don’t have anyone else they can turn to for help. Maybe they’ve never found a textbook that works with their brain. Maybe they are crying themselves to sleep over their algebra homework. Just like I did.

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When Persistence Isn’t Enough
The Downside of Always Telling Students To Try Harder
The Downside of Always Telling Students To Try Harder (2)
Algebra Tears

I don’t think I’ll ever forget the time one of my students broke down and cried during a tutoring session. I was working with a ninth grader who was struggling in her Algebra II class. She had a great teacher, but she’d gone to a “progressive” elementary school where she’d never learned to do long division—apparently the school’s philosophy was that students would just “figure it out.”

We were seated at an enormous wooden table in the beautiful Boston Public Library. Her math book was opened in front of us, and her enormous backpack rested on a nearby chair. I think we were working on completing the square, which challenges many students. We’d been working on it for several sessions, and my student became extremely frustrated.

Basically, she told me she didn’t want to go on, and didn’t want to do any more work. And then she started to cry. I started to panic. What was I supposed to do? How was I supposed to “act professional”? Should we take a break? Weren’t her parents paying me a lot of money to have her do math? I couldn’t just sit here and let her NOT do math!

In my panic, I started to ask her a series of idiotic questions, and the conversation went something like this:
“What will happen if you don’t finish this homework assignment?”
“I won’t understand the material.”
“And then when you take the test, what will happen?”
“I won’t do well.”
“And then what kind of grade will you get?”
“I’ll probably fail.”
“And then what will happen?”
“I’ll probably have to take the class again.”
Wow, talk about encouraging my student to visualize failure! Then I said something even more totally idiotic like, “If you don’t want to repeat Algebra 2, then we need to work on completing the square right now.”

Things continued in this vein until it was time to walk down to the lobby of the library where her parents picked her up.

Afterwards, I was so confused about what had happened. I was afraid that I had totally blown it and that this student would probably never want to talk to me again. And obviously I wasn’t a good tutor for her if she cried on me during tutoring.

I pre-emptively called her Mom and explained that the session hadn’t gone so well and that the student had cried. The Mom actually told me that that was a good sign—that her daughter would only cry in front of someone who she really trusted!

In my next meeting with the student, I apologized and told her I was sorry that I had stressed her out. Paradoxically, from that session onward, my student’s attitude toward math totally changed.

It was almost like the breakdown set the stage for a breakthrough. After weeks of struggling with the completing the square, she found an awesome new way to approaching it using a drawing of a square (more on that later). Even though none of my previous explanations had clicked, this approach made immediate intuitive sense to her. And we spent another great year and a half working on math together.

Looking back on how I handled her crying in tutoring, I feel like it was one of my lowest points as a tutor. Obviously it wouldn’t have been the end of the world if we took a break, or even if my student ended up repeating the class.

If I could live that moment again, I would have handled it totally differently—asked my student if she wanted a hug, packed up, and taken her to Starbucks. I’m amazed that our relationship wasn’t ruined by my insensitive response to her algebra tears. And I’m grateful to my student, for forgiving me for my ineptness, having the guts to keep going after that session, and teaching me a huge lesson about how to handle breakdowns.