Nicole S

My Passion & How I Inspire

Having had just finished my degree at the London School of Economics I can understand and empathise with the complexities, stresses and challenges of navigating the education system. The underlying key to success in all essay subjects, all the way from 11+ to Undergrad and beyond is knowing how to structure your ideas in order to produce a body of work that effectively tackles the question. There is a set technique to writing a fantastic essay and once I was taught this, in year 8, it made everything a whole lot easier, as it was the basis of such a large part of my education. It was like being given a map that revealed the best route to get to where you needed to go, as opposed to being told to randomly explore when being asked to answer any exam question. The earlier you learn this the better, as it is the same technique that is used to write critically at every stage of academia. When we got our first essays back, in my first year of university, we were given a class on essay writing, with the same principles being taught as that that were explained to me when I was in year 8. I was surprised that so many of the class had gotten so far to be learning these basic rules for the first time at undergrad level, when it would have been of so much value to have learnt it before.

In terms of public examinations the most important piece of advice is the necessity of working to the mark-scheme set by your exam board. In order to excel you need to target your knowledge to the assessment objectives issued in the course guidance. In this respect, an essay should take the format of a formula, clearly offering the examiner exactly what he’s looking to award marks for. After reviewing your mark-scheme and assessing your requirements I offer a personalised, individualistic guide of how to do this: as a well structured essay that hits all the assessment objectives in the mark scheme forms the winning combination for an A* grade.

All in all, my approach to private tuition is to share the keys that I have learnt are necessary to achieve success in education, in a fun, engaging and focused medium.