This month, we wanted to showcase the invaluable work of our online volunteers, who have been teaching students one to one every week from October 2020 during the pandemic and lockdown and continuing to do so after. We wanted to ask them, how they felt about helping students online and volunteering for ICSS, below are just a few quotes from some of our amazing online volunteer tutors!
“Being able to give a fraction of my time on a weekly basis to develop a key skill required and essential to every child’s use and development in everyday life is so monumental and rewarding –”
(Dee – Volunteer reading assistant and Coach, KS2)
“Tutoring online has been easier than expected- you sometimes have to work a little harder perhaps at keeping the attention of the student during lessons, but at the same time, using online whiteboards bring a lot of flexibility which makes it easier to vary the style of the lesson and keep the student engaged!”
(Saliha- Volunteer tutor, Maths, KS2)
“Volunteering for ICSS has been an absolute joy. The flexibility of volunteering for ICSS online meant that I didn’t have to trek all the way from Edinburgh to London to volunteer, which obviously wouldn’t have been possible. I’m so happy that ICSS made the move to include online volunteers, as this allowed me to take part. I really enjoyed teaching for ICSS, largely because I always felt supported, valued, and believed in by ICSS to be the best tutor I could be.
Additionally, seeing my tutee grow from finding poetry a mystery to confidently picking apart poems like no tomorrow warmed my heart and made me feel proud of the impact you can have as a volunteer for ICSS.”
“Volunteering with ICSS has been a enjoyable and rewarding experience. I’ve had the pleasure of working with a bright and eager student, who has a positive attitude toward our lessons and developing their understanding of science. I look forward to our weekly sessions, which with the help of the great team behind ICSS, run smoothly around my other commitments.”
(Sam Cremins – ICSS Volunteer tutor, Chemistry, KS2)
It’s an extremely rewarding experience supporting a student, knowing that you are helping with their education and skills. From my own experience, it can be very tough for teenagers to put their hand up in a class of 30+ pupils to admit “I don’t understand” and these sessions give them the opportunity to go at their pace, and feel comfortable expressing if they are finding a topic challenging so we can overcome that barrier together. I used to help at CWSS so where we used to have several tables of children with their homework, textbooks and other volunteers to refer to, I now prepare material ahead of the 1:1 session – so I’ve also improved my coaching and listening skills as well as technical ones like OneNote which has been fantastic for sharing and annotating content online with the student, though I still miss the ease of teaching with pen and paper!
(Louise- Volunteer tutor, Maths, KS4)