Vancouver

Michelle

(13 reviews)

Eugene

« Perfect! She is teaching my daughter English 11. She is a high-level teacher,... More »

Eugene

« Perfect! She is teaching my daughter English 11. She is a high-level teacher, extremely knowledgeable in any English teaching. As well, she is a friendly and patient teacher who is caring for kids. Smart, kind and bright plus punctual and professional! I highly recommend her as a tutor! »

$50^/h

1^st lesson is free!

Superprof Private lessons Academic english lessons literature lessons english lessons writing lessons

Profile and diploma verified

Response Time 4h

Lessons offered by Michelle

Individual

The lessons will be held

By webcam

Taught subjects

Academic English
Literature
English
Writing

Levels

All Levels

Get an A on every English essay by learning the methodology of literary criticism with me.

Methodology

My teaching philosophy is to help my students understand the genre of academic writing in literary criticism and teach the foundations of what makes an A paper. I prefer hands-on teaching and will take my students through the essay writing process from start to finish.

Often times, the high school curriculum will teach students about novels and poem without teaching students "how" (see interview) to write effective criticism. When students reach university, professors expect students to understand this already, so methodology is rarely taught at an introductory level in university. As a result, most students never understand how to find the best argument for English essays. My instruction seeks to address this knowledge gap and has proven effective for students of all levels, from secondary to undergraduate.

Background

I am a graduate student of English literature. I have worked as a TA for undergraduate literature courses. I have been helping students from middle school to university consistently achieve perfect marks on their English essays for over 3 years. I currently hold a BA honours degree in English language and literatures from UBC. During my BA, I received the Trek Excellence scholarship at UBC (top 5% of class) and have consistently remained on Dean's List. My undergraduate GPA was 87%/3.96 on 4.0 scale (LSAC conversion).

I graduated valedictorian of my high school class, was president of the student council, and received 5's on both AP English and Literature exams. I know the discipline of literary criticism well and seek to share that knowledge with my students.

I can speak Mandarin and am comfortable helping students of all levels.

Rates

Rate for online lessons : $ 50/h

Rate for 5 hours of lessons : $250

Rate for 10 hours of lessons : $450

Details

Rate can vary based on the nature of instruction. We can discuss details during our first meeting.

Lessons offered by Michelle

Individual

The lessons will be held

webcam

Taught subjects

Academic English
Literature
English
Writing

Levels

All Levels

The 13 reviews on Michelle

5/5

All our ratings are collected by us and are given in confidence, they correspond to a real experience.

Eugene

Perfect! She is teaching my daughter English 11. She is a high-level teacher, extremely knowledgeable in any English teaching. As well, she is a friendly and patient teacher who is caring for kids. Smart, kind and bright plus punctual and professional! I highly recommend her as a tutor!

Michelle's response

Hannah is a pleasure to work with

Morris

Perfect! I contacted Michelle for help with a first-year English essay. Since I'm a Science major, writing essays is out of my comfort zone, therefore she guided me through the entire process of close-reading, outlining, and writing. Michelle was diligent, punctual, extremely patient, and thoroughly answered many of my questions throughout my 6 (and a half) sessions with her. Overall, we were both very happy with the essay that was produced and I highly recommend her!

11 recommendations

Gina

Michelle is a trustworthy,helpful and well educated English tutor. She is passionate about teaching. It’s great to have her as my English tutor.

Nat

Michelle is considerate teacher
and she knows how to communicate with teenagers. My son was very shy and didn’t talk much at the beginning during the tutorial. Michelle is being very patient with him and help him out little by little. I am so glad we found Michelle as my son’s tutor. She helps a lot.

Ruby

Michelle is punctual, attentive, a great listener, flexible in her approach, has the ability to explain concepts in easily transferable terms, and an overall valuable member of the Superprof team. We are so thankful to have found her!

Ella

As one of her best friends, I have always admired Michelle for her patience and professionalism when it comes to work, which make her the perfect tutor one could ever ask for. In addiction to these qualities that make one a good tutor, Michelle is incredibly smart and will be able to help you explore new ideas on any subject matter. If you are looking for an intelligent and approachable tutor, look no further and reach out to Michelle!

Rui

老师很好哦，讲的很详细，英语课帮助了我很多。

Lily

My six grader loves Michelle so much, after her first week writing lesson with Michelle, she told me, “I am so happy I know how to put the thoughts in my mind onto my essay now, it will be a hight quality work this time".
Michelle is a patient, cheerful and reliable tutor, she always well organise and prepare the lesson. She explained everything she taught with clarity and made sure my daughter could understand all, she showed her how to do editing work and let her see how the difference was. She also lead my daughter practice critical thinking for the book they read together. She always text me to let me know the progress and her recommendation.
My daughter has three lessons with Michelle every week now, but she never complained about homework or if it was too much.
I am so appreciate she helped my daughter find the interest of writing and helped build up her confidence on writing.

Rebecca

Michelle helped me get an A for both my first year English final paper and my Asian studies research paper. She helped me come up with ideas I didn’t even know I had. I wish all English professors were as attentive and helpful as she is. She is very patient and worked through the entire process with me. Definitely recommend!

Ian

You will come to know Michelle for how insightful she is. And not just toward the subject matter she's teaching, but to you, the student. Michelle can somehow always tell when her explanations are working or not, and if not, she is able to swiftly adopt different approaches until the problem starts to make sense. Give her the most challenging problems you have, and she will patiently work with you to find that "aha!" moment.

Sophia

非常专业的一位老师，教学水平高，能力强，知识渊博，有耐心，敬业，超级推荐！

Demi

I’ve known Michelle for 10 years now and we went to school together. I’ve always looked up to, and sought inspiration from her passion for creativity, patience to growth, and curiosity for knowledge all these years. As a good friend and fellow student, Michelle had helped me structure, proofread, edit, and rewrite my highschool English papers, college admission essays, and now even research proposals. Her craft in writing and her compassion for her students will make her a great tutor for English and will inspire her students to love English as a subject.

View more recommendations

Michelle's interview

QUESTION 01 | 05

1) When and why did you develop an interest in your chosen field?

Michelle — I mainly teach English, history (social studies), and math (up to AP calc). I have loved literature and history since I learned to read (in the first grade?) and my affinity towards math developed while studying proofs in the eighth grade.

QUESTION 02 | 05

2) What makes you passionate about your subject?

Michelle — Studying literature in university transformed the way I see the world and the principles I live by. In this way, it's not as much of a choice as it is a necessity for me. As for math, I love it because it's fun. Understanding the rules and formulas are just like learning the rules of any other game-once you've mastered a set of rules, the rest becomes play.

QUESTION 03 | 05

3) What do you like about tutoring? What makes you a "Superprof"?

Michelle — For humanities subjects, I first got into tutoring while I was doing my BA in literature. I learned that there were certain "truths" about literary criticism that were somehow kept secret in high school, resulting in a very difficult transition to writing in university, limiting the student's ability to adjust to a more critical way of thinking about literature. I was lucky because I received valuable guidance from many teachers and predecessors, but many of my peers in university were in the dark the whole time.

I once heard a university professor say "high school teaches you the what, university teaches you the how, and graduate studies teaches you the why." I've taken it as a personal mission to help fill the gap between the what and the how, since methodology is rarely explicitly taught in school. Years of experience working with primary, secondary school and lower-level university students have proven to me that this gap is very real, and that filling it is very effective.

I started tutoring primary and secondary students in math and other sciences while I was in high school. I find that being an effective maths and science tutor not only requires solid knowledge of the subject matter on my part, but perhaps even more importantly, an ability to identify the gaps in the students understanding of the subject matter (e.g. where and what, in their thought processes, went wrong) and to be able to explain the subject matter clearly. This is something I have focused on, and continue to improve, in my own teaching.

QUESTION 04 | 05

4) Do you have any role models; a teacher that inspired you? Please explain.

Michelle — Yes, there have been many. I was very lucky to have attended an international school in Beijing, so all of my teachers were just really cool expats from all over the world. My history teacher was a DJ by night and my English teacher was a Hollywood actor (we eventually snooped out his part in How I Met Your Mother and teased him about it in class. He then brought us cookies the next day). I still keep in touch with a lot of them today.

There have also been a few university professors who have profoundly influenced my own thinking and pedagogy.

QUESTION 05 | 05

5) What are your keys to success?

Michelle — Haha, like in school or in life?

Having a good attitude and being diligent and consistent is key to success in school. No matter the level of intelligence, there's simply no way around just doing the work-I've tried.

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