Education is a powerful tool through which to nurture growth, unleash potential, form perspectives, and achieve dreams. Hong Kong has an excellent education system, but the government estimates that 50-75% of students flock to tutorial centres for extra classes after school. What are they looking for?

Top marks! In our highly competitive education system, parents and students know the importance of high grades. School teachers can cover the curriculum needed to achieve this, but at the end of the school day, many students are overwhelmed by the amount of information they’ve learned and need help to ensure they understand it. This is where small-group tutorial classes like those at i-Learner come in. They give each student individual attention and help make the best of limited study time.

Contact between tutors and parents is another significant way in which tutorial centres are able to help students succeed. School teachers are busy and can be hard to reach, and though they are able to communicate through termly reports, this isn’t always enough to give parents the knowledge they need. With small-group tutorial classes, teachers get to know their students very well, and they can speak to parents about week-to-week growth. This helps parents get a better understanding of their child and guide their long-term progression.

Small classes not only increase the contact with parents but with students themselves. While quiet or unmotivated students can hide in the back of a large school class, there’s no avoiding a tutor’s questions in a group of two or three. Even strong students benefit from the increased attention as tutors can ensure their confident answers aren’t missing any details or jumping to conclusions.

It’s important that this individual attention doesn’t focus only on exams. If students become overly reliant on tutors for exam preparation, they can lose the ability to learn independently. Furthermore, they forget the excitement of learning and lose confidence in their own opinions and ideas. It’s important, therefore, that tutorial classes take students beyond what they learn in school. Tutors must always be stretching students to apply what they know to new topics and to think critically and creatively.

Individualised education is an excellent way to build on a solid foundation built at school. Not only do students achieve top grades, but they are stretched in new and interesting ways, keeping their passion for education alive and setting them on the path to long-term success.