I became a member of the National Honor Society (NHS) in 2022 and its Tutoring Coordinator in 2024. As part of the NHS, my goal was to support other students academically through tutoring in Mathematics. I also ensured that teachers who had students who needed help had the opportunity to connect with other club members to receive the support they required. I worked with students from elementary through high school, as well as international students who struggled with English and Mathematics. My main focus was on students who are easily distracted and need help to understand materials outside of class through homework. I worked with several Vietnamese International students on English and Math, as they are new to the language, by assisting them with clarification on assignments as well as explaining new vocabulary alongside grammar. I also helped students come up with different study methods that worked best for them throughout the years. Besides tutoring, my duty was also to frequently report the students’ progress to their teachers as well as parents, providing insights into academic strengths, areas that needed improvement, and suggestions for future sessions. As a coordinator, I assisted with connecting teachers to other tutors, ensuring that tutees can receive the exact support they needed.
Throughout my years with the National Honor Society, I got to learn a lot from my tutees as well as my mentor. I got exposed to many different techniques of studying provided by teachers and parents, so as a tutor, I needed to adapt to each student’s unique way of learning to support and motivate them on their academic journey. For instance, some students prefer learning multiplication through visually seeing it as repeated additions, while other students understand the material clearly by real-life examples. Since every student had different ways of learning, consistent problem-solving and critical thinking were crucial skills, as I needed to show my tutees different approaches to the problem while transforming complex concepts into accessible language, such as topics about long division and word problems. Working with international students required more communication and adaptability, as I had to explain the material in different languages, making it understandable to the students. I also clarified and explained many cultural slang or idioms that may confuse non-native English speakers, so that they can understand them in context and how to apply them to school work as well as real-life situations.