Gilbert L.
I have just completed 3 years of Law (Jurisprudence) undergraduate course in Christ Church, Oxford (graduated with First Class degree) - I have studied in both Indonesia and Singapore (the latter for O and A Levels, and my favourite subjects include History and Economics). I will be starting on my solicitor qualification course in London this coming September 2018, and in 2019 I will start on my two-year training contract with a US-based law firm's London office.
Economics, History and Law - all three subjects require one to have a solid grasp of the basic principles if he/she wants to be able to navigate through the complicated regions, and that is what I aim to help the students do: 1) Understand, 2) Remember (Instead of memorise), 3) Apply/Extend. I aim to simplify concepts and distill them to basic, comprehensible principles that are easy to understand and remember. Equipped with these big-picture pointers, the tutees would be able to apply and use them to solve more complicated problems. I believe this is the way we learn best, as opposed to cold-hard memorising of complicated formulas or concepts. I also prefer to have 2-3 lessons/week each lasting not more than 1.5 hours rather than one very long lesson. This is because I believe that the student should be doing most of the studying on his/her own (or do set practices/readings which I would give prior to the lesson or from school), and should utilise the paid hours to consult me on areas they aren't able to understand. Having said that, I will always tailor my approach to each student as different people study in different ways.
Back in Singapore, I have given tuition for Biology O Level. With the help of the concepts above, the student was able to raise her grade from a Fail to a high B in 5 weeks' time (2-3 times per week). This was largely due to an unhelpful approach in studying, and once that was addressed, she was able to independently approach problems and only need guidance in the very complicated ones. I was also a Peer Tutor for Mathematics and Economics in A Level (Singapore) in school, whose task is to assist other friends with materials we are learning together in order to ensure no one is left behind as the lectures and tutorials continue. Finally, after graduating from my Pre-U and coming to Oxford, I have had various requests from my ex-teachers to help with personal statements and interview practices/admission queries for my juniors who are applying to Oxbridge (Law). I have done plenty of these preparations, with a good number of successes of getting into top UK law schools such as Oxbridge, Durham, LSE and UCL.
I enjoy playing team sports such as volleyball (captained my college team in Oxford in 2017) and basketball (played for the college team in 2017 and defeated Trinity College of Cambridge in our annual Trinity Exchange). I also do regular fitness training and trained with the boxing team of Oxford for approximately two years. Finally, I do photography as a hobby and you can check out my amateur portfolio at @glim.pse on Instagram!
