Spandan

Rate $47
Response 21h
Students
Number of students Spandan has accompanied since arriving at Superprof
2
Number of students Spandan has accompanied since arriving at Superprof

$47/h

Cambridge University PhD student offering English lessons, essay help, and sentence surgery through online and face-to-face tutorials

English
Literature
Modernist literature
Poetry
Linguistics

Lesson location

- online

About Spandan

I am a PhD student studying English Literature at the University of Cambridge. I am currently supervising a third year undergraduate student in English at the University of Cambridge. I have a top-scoring undergraduate degree and an MA with distinction from the English faculty at University College London, as well as experience as an English tutor and journal editor.

About the lesson

I approach my lessons with an eagerness to see a measurable improvement in the quality of my student's writing as soon as possible, but also with a patient attitude and sense of humour. I take a three-pronged approach, providing detailed and line-by-line feedback on essays, hand-crafted revision materials, and face-to-face teaching. I have long thought that all it takes is a really well-timed and well-put informal analogy or explanation to open up pathways in a student's brain that will allow them to understand what has long seemed obscure to them. Having a knack for simplifying all the more advanced techniques I've picked up throughout years of university-level study in English, I feel as if I have all kinds of secret weapons to hand over to my students. I find that the quickest way to improve a student's writing is to furnish their pre-existing stock of technical terms (words like 'hyperbole' and 'personification') with more exotic terms (like 'parataxis' or 'periphrasis’). Merely using such words, which really take no time at all to learn and apprehend, can instantly make a good impression on an examiner by signifying to them that the student has bothered to go the extra mile. I see them as being almost like cheat codes. This terminological toolkit is something you will not find anywhere else, since it has been personally curated by me and sourced from diverse critical traditions. Most tutors only try to strengthen their students' grasp of the terminology they are already expected to use - I attempt to upgrade their technical vocabularies to university-level.

I am careful, however, to discourage simply name-dropping these terms. I supplement this approach by reforming sentence structure at the root, such that better arguments naturally follow. I try to show students that at the point where a sub-standard sentence usually ends, having provided only description or exposition, a top-level sentence will only just be beginning, having the loftier purpose of providing analysis in mind. My training in linguistics has acquainted me well enough with the underlying mechanics of language that I can generally tell how a student’s sentence might be improved at a glance. At undergraduate level, I was a top scorer in a module testing the close reading of unseen texts, meaning that I can always find something to say about any given stretch of text. I try to impart this skill to students, not only to prepare them for their own ‘unseen passage’ assessments, but also so that they can apply that analytical eye to their own writing and intuitively know what kind of ‘sentence surgery’ might be required to improve it. I also help tighten up students’ arguments by eliminating filler sentences, and attempt to improve their modulation of register so that they can avoid the impression of merely ticking boxes in their essays.

Cambridge University PhD student offering English lessons, essay help, and sentence surgery through online and face-to-face tutorials

Lesson location

About Spandan

About the lesson

Rates

Rate

Pack rates

online

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Alex Hartman

Imran

Anabel

Vanora

Michelle

Delia (Del)

Cambridge University PhD student offering English lessons, essay help, and sentence surgery through online and face-to-face tutorials

Lesson location

About Spandan

About the lesson

Rates

Rate

Pack rates

online

Other tutors in English

Ryan

Sherry

Poe

Michelle

Ritika

Connor

Alaa

Yudith

Mai

Jessica

Leena

Lorraine

Sara

Nicole

Alex Hartman

Imran

Anabel

Vanora

Michelle

Delia (Del)

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