Enrichment Teaching Archives

e-Tutoring and Remote Learning

July 1, 2015

Private remote learning, or e-Tutoring, helps each student meet their unique needs and realize their individual goals from anywhere.

Under the current and difficult circumstances due to COVID-19, e-Tutoring (or remote learning) provides an opportunity for students everywhere to connect with private teachers for 1:1 instruction and to maintain routine and structure while mitigating academic slide.

Consistency and predictably are incredibly important for supporting and calming our students during this pandemic. We are here to help round out these expectations and to provide necessary accountability, supervision, and explicit instruction. We also remain available to provide digital coaching and instructional coaching for any parents or educators seeking strategies and ideas related to managing homeschooling, including “classroom” management and behavioral strategies.

With online teaching and learning, we have much more flexibility to actively manage session time, which could be as short as 15 minutes, thus allowing for mini-lessons or more frequent check ins.

Our remote consultation continues to include mainstream, specialized, and therapeutic school planning and college counseling as well as virtual school programs for students in grades K through 12.

Using a variety of online collaborative tools — such as Zoom, Skype, FaceTime, Google apps, digital white boarding, and document cameras — we create, curate, and deliver private e-Tutoring and homeschooling programs for students living anywhere across the United States or internationally.

Whether the e-Tutoring need is academic coaching to support your’s school’s curriculum, targeted remediation, acceleration or enrichment, test preparation at any level, writing coaching, or executive function coaching, our educators create a personalized approach to support each student and family.

Regardless of the need or subject matter, we individualize the entire experience to highlight a student’s strengths, design an appropriate course of action, and improve academic performance. The intensity, flexibility, and customization of private e-Tutoring — or remote learning — provides students with a competitive advantage in bolstering their success.

Our leadership team will work in partnership with parents and/or schools to set an e-Tutoring learning plan and carry it out successfully.

Reasons for e-Tutoring

Boarding school student
English language learner
Enrichment teaching
Extended travel
Expatriate families
Flexible scheduling needs
Hospital stays
Independent study
International student
Medical needs
Relocation considerations
School closures
School phobia or anxiety
Social and emotional challenges

Please contact our office for more information.

Last edited Jan 24, 2024 @ 9:32 am

Why Coding?

June 22, 2015 Brad Hoffman

Coding instruction is a hot topic, and never has the role of computer programming in education been more discussed, questioned, dissected, and applauded. So what’s the big deal?

Watch this great video from Code.org, a non-profit dedicated to growing computer science education by making it available in more schools, and increasing participation by women and underrepresented students of color.

The opportunities that computer programming instruction in the form of coding can lead to are enormous, but, as discussed in this NY Times article, I Am Woman, Watch Me Hack,”…just 0.4 percent of all female college freshmen say they intend to major in computer science. In fact, the share of women in computer science has actually fallen over the years.”

Many young people, especially women, do not come into contact with engineers and programmers at a young age; and they don’t really understand what they do. Coding provides a point of entry for everyone to learn skills that will help them throughout their lives.

As more of our commerce and education takes place on computer screens, it has become increasingly important to learn coding. Working on a computer and starting to understand exactly what is involved in making a program work puts your child in a better position to thrive.

As a great introduction for kids, check out this awesome Hour of Code instruction video to get started on coding:

Happy Coding!

Written by: Editorial Team, My Learning Springboard, Inc.

Helping Your Child Cope with Test Anxiety

June 16, 2015 Brad Hoffman

There is a four letter word, often heard in school.

This word can elicit fear, even panic for some students.

That word? TEST.

Most people feel at least a little nervous before an exam. A low level of anxiety can actually be helpful, as it can provide motivation and energy during the test. The problem is when the anxiety becomes so intense that it interferes with concentration or performance. When this happens, the student may zone out or freeze up on the day of the test and have trouble answering questions he or she actually knows. For some individuals, tests can even bring about physical symptoms.

What is Test Anxiety?

Test anxiety is a type of performance anxiety. In performance anxiety, one feels pressure to do well. Examples of performance anxiety include waiting to go onstage in a play, going to a job interview or making a class presentation. Test anxiety, like other performance anxiety can induce:

“butterflies”
shakiness
sweating
rapid heart beat
nausea
headaches

What Causes Test Anxiety?

Like other forms of anxiety, test anxiety is an effect of anticipating a stressful outcome. When one is under great stress, the body releases the hormone adrenaline (an adaptive mechanism which prepares us for danger. This is known as the fight of flight response). The release of adrenaline causes many of the physical symptoms described above. Focusing on negative outcomes can also contribute to test anxiety. One can become flooded with thoughts like:

What if I mess up?
What if the test is too hard?
What if I forget what I studied?
What if people notice how nervous I am?

There are essentially four main sources of test anxiety:

How will others view me?
How will the test outcome affect my own self-image?
How will the test affect my future?
Am I prepared for the test?
Tips to Help Students Cope With Test Anxiety

1. Be Prepared

The more confident your child is going into an exam, the less severe the test anxiety is likely to be. Encourage your child to familiarize himself or herself with the test format (what kinds of questions, how much time is allotted, etc). Organize the notes from the class. Make flashcards and create mnemonics to help with memorizing key concepts and terms. Set a schedule to help determine how much time is needed to study. Cramming the night before a test can intensify anxiety and is often ineffective. Getting a good night’s sleep and a hearty meal are important aspects of test preparation!

2. Think Positively

Be aware of negative thinking both before and during the test. Challenge the negative thoughts with positive statements. For example, if your child is thinking “There is no way I will do well on this test,” he or she could counter with “I studied hard. I know the information. I am going to try my best and will do as well as I can.” Positive thinking can go a long way.

3. Take Some Pressure Off

I often tell children with whom I work that it is physically impossible for them to “do better than their best.” What I mean by this is that students often feel like they have to achieve the impossible. It is as if they have to move a mountain or run a 2 minute mile. This can feel overwhelming and can cause children to freeze or even give up. Children who experience test anxiety need realistic expectations, while being encouraged to put in their best effort. Without minimizing the importance of the test to your child, you can also provide comfort in the fact that the test likely not make or break the rest of their lives. Focusing on the process (ie the effort) rather than the outcome can help put things in perspective for you and your child.

4. Practice Relaxation Exercises

Develop relaxation strategies to help your child feel calmer before and during the test. Breathing slowly and deeply through the nostrils and exhaling through the mouth helps to slow heart rate and normalize breathing. I recommend having your child practice this regularly when they are in a relaxed state, so they will have it ready as a tool come test time. Tensing and relaxing the muscles from the top of the body down is another way to ease tension. Some students like to squeeze a stress ball or other small object. Remind your child of the strategies prior to the exam. Some students find it helpful to write about their feelings prior to an exam. Actually, several studies have shown that writing for 8 minutes before a test can put students who worry on par with those who do not (Ramirez, G. & Beilock, S.L. (2011). Writing About Testing Worries Boosts Exam Performance in the Classroom. Science, 331 (6014), 211-213).

5. Strategies During the Test . . .

If the material seems unfamiliar or you struggle at the start, find a question you can handle and then start there to build confidence.
Take breaks to recharge.
Take a few deep breaths.
Take a drink of water.
Close your eyes for a moment and envision a calming scene.
Try to think positively: Remind yourself that you prepared and are doing your best.
Think of a reward you will give yourself after the test: a treat, a movie or something else to look forward to when you are done.

Like any other skill, learning to manage test anxiety takes practice and patience. It is important for you the parent, to address the problem as early as possible, because it is likely to get worse over time without intervention. Rather than avoiding the unpleasant thoughts and feelings associated with test-taking, your child will benefit from working with you to develop the tools and support systems that will help them in the long term.

Ari Fox, LCSW-R is a child, adolescent and young adult psychotherapist in New York City. His practice, Cope With School NYC, helps individuals with a wide range of issues and specializes in school functioning.

Teaching Critical Thinking Through Science

June 15, 2015 Brad Hoffman

The goal of science education is much more than teaching students specific science content, it’s teaching students how to think with an emphasis on hypothesizing, planning, testing, reasoning from data, and drawing conclusions. Many of us are familiar with the scientific method, but science teaching, particularly at the elementary level, should focus on process skills. Process skills are the behaviors we want students to develop as young scientists. Regardless of the particular content or science kits used in schools (i.e. SCIS, Foss, STC), all students should have hands-on experience with scientific investigations that provide myriad opportunities to develop these process skills. Students who have regular access to real science work and investigations sharpen their critical thinking and develop both creative and analytical problem solving skills. Kids also LOVE “doing” science, and this subject matter becomes a major motivator for student engagement.

The National Association for Research in Science Teaching (NARST) highlights basic science process skills as well as integrated science process skills.

Basic science process skills include:

Observing – using the senses to gather information about an object or event. Example: Describing a pencil as yellow.
Inferring – making an “educated guess” about an object or event based on previously gathered data or information. Example: Saying that the person who used a pencil made a lot of mistakes because the eraser was well worn.
Measuring – using both standard and nonstandard measures or estimates to describe the dimensions of an object or event. Example: Using a meter stick to measure the length of a table in centimeters.
Communicating – using words or graphic symbols to describe an action, object or event. Example: Describing the change in height of a plant over time in writing or through a graph.
Classifying – grouping or ordering objects or events into categories based on properties or criteria. Example: Placing all rocks having certain grain size or hardness into one group.
Predicting – stating the outcome of a future event based on a pattern of evidence. Example: Predicting the height of a plant in two weeks time based on a graph of its growth during the previous four weeks.

Integrated Science Process Skills include:

Controlling variables – being able to identify variables that can affect an experimental outcome, keeping most constant while manipulating only the independent variable. Example: Realizing through past experiences that amount of light and water need to be controlled when testing to see how the addition of organic matter affects the growth of beans.
Defining operationally – stating how to measure a variable in an experiment. Example: Stating that bean growth will be measured in centimeters per week.
Formulating hypotheses – stating the expected outcome of an experiment. Example: The greater the amount of organic matter added to the soil, the greater the bean growth.
Interpreting data – organizing data and drawing conclusions from it. Example: Recording data from the experiment on bean growth in a data table and forming a conclusion which relates trends in the data to variables.
Experimenting – being able to conduct an experiment, including asking an appropriate question, stating a hypothesis, identifying and controlling variables, operationally defining those variables, designing a “fair” experiment, conducting the experiment, and interpreting the results of the experiment. Example: The entire process of conducting the experiment on the affect of organic matter on the growth of bean plants.
Formulating models – creating a mental or physical model of a process or event. Examples: The model of how the processes of evaporation and condensation interrelate in the water cycle.

By Brad Hoffman, M.S.Ed.
Board Certified Educational Planner and Learning Specialist
My Learning Springboard, Inc.

Learning Concierge ®

June 1, 2015

Growing With Families Over Time

It has always been our mission to grow with families over time and to flexibly respond to the various needs of family members along their educational journeys. Our Learning Concierge ® service is intended to make getting started as simple as possible for families. We’re here to help with any of your educational needs.

Because we grow with families over time, we bring a unique perspective to integrated and effective educational problem solving and decision making. Over the course of a school year, we help families to navigate myriad decisions and scenarios, including but not limited to:

Getting to know students over time and sharing in their many successes motivates us everyday. That we can grow with students from preschool to lower school to middle school to upper school to college is truly differentiating, and having expertise within each of these divisions and schooling chapters informs our planning work with families regardless of when they come forward. Brad and Faya have truly redefined educational consulting.

A Boutique Multidisciplinary Educational Consulting Firm

When we conceptualized My Learning Springboard in 2009, we envisioned a boutique multidisciplinary educational consulting firm unlike anything of its kind in NYC or beyond. We imagined a truly holistic, integrated practice that would partner closely with families, schools, and professional colleagues in ways we only wish that every industry would embrace for more effective problem solving among stakeholders. “It takes a village” is a commonly understood phrase, and we walk the walk everyday.

This week you need a biology tutor. Next week you need a Latin tutor. This term you need a writing coach. Next term you need a math specialist. Your youngest child is a struggling reader. Your oldest child wants to pursue independent study surrounding computer science. Last year was an amazing school experience, but this year is shaping up differently. Maybe you want to pursue a school exploration. Years ago we worked on the kindergarten admissions process together, and now it’s time to launch a college process.

You have 2 or 3 or 4 children and each needs a different school environment. One attends all boys, one attends all girls, one needs a specialized setting, and the youngest is in nursery school. Each student approaches work differently, and their ages require different expertise. From advanced subject areas to scaffolded and targeted remediation, we have you covered!

As a Learning Concierge ® service, our faculty includes professors, upper school teachers, lower school teachers, middle school teachers, learning specialists, special educators, subject matter experts, and early childhood educators available for in-person and/or remote instruction. We skew toward highly experienced, highly qualified teachers with advanced degrees and 5+ years of teaching experience. Many teachers have been with us for 10+ years, and this continuity speaks to our highly effective collaborative approach.

Our close working relationships with related service professionals across every field is a huge benefit to our families, too, and we’re able to VIP introductions and fast-track appointments with neuropsychologists, therapists, psychiatrists, special education attorneys, occupational therapists, speech therapists, and a variety of other professionals.

An Unexpected Turn

Sometimes the journey takes an unexpected turn, and that’s one way that we’re able to flex our unique expertise as Learning Concierges. Though families often set out to be in one school environment from grades K-12, it often plays out differently for any number of reasons. Perhaps a student who started in a single-sex school is ready to try coed, or a student who started in a religious setting is ready to try a secular school experience, or a student who started in a mainstream setting presents with a need for a transition to a specialized or therapeutic school setting. Or maybe you’re faced with an involuntary search because of disciplinary action.

It’s our creativity, tenacity, attention to detail, shared values, cross training, and collective expertise – among other qualities – that sets us apart.

Your Learning Concierge ® Team

We don’t know any Educational Consultants with expertise to move in all of these directions or a myriad of others. That Brad and Faya are the only Board Certified Educational Planners in NYC at the K-12 level, both Learning Specialists, both College Counselors, and both triple designated by the most stringent association groups – AICEP and IECA – for mainstream, specialized, and therapeutic school planning is highly unusual. From strategic planning to crisis management, Brad and Faya bring tremendous efficacy, empathy, and patience to their partnerships with families and schools. Their 16 school years in private practice and long-term relationships with families and colleagues is a testament to their success, work ethic, and dedication to lifelong learning.

Brad and Faya are your Learning Concierge ® team, and working with My Learning Springboard provides an unparalleled experience for school planning, private tutoring, and test preparation. Every recommendation is specifically tailored to your family’s needs and your student’s profile. Everything is a choice. Everything is organized at will. Everything is modular.

Instruction and consulting efforts are curated to specifically meet your particular needs and parameters, and your privacy is of the utmost importance. We’re intentionally boutique so that every family has the opportunity to work directly with the Co-Founders, and any teaching effort has the benefit of a small teaching team to support planning and implementation. Collaboration with school professionals or other related service professionals with whom your family is working is always an option.

Admissions Consulting (PreK-12) and School Planning:

College Counseling:

Tutoring and Executive Function Coaching:

Test Preparation:

Scheduling A Planning Meeting

Whatever your educational need or wonder may be, please don’t hesitate to contact us. An initial school planning meeting is usually the best way to get started. These meetings can be 30, 45, or 60 minutes by Zoom, by phone, or in person per a family’s preference. A single planning meeting allows us to talk more substantively about your family’s specific needs, priorities, and goals so that we can determine possible next steps. We’re committed to developing unique solutions for unique learners!

We look forward to hearing from you!

Warm regards,
Brad Hoffman and Faya Hoffman,
Co-Founders and Learning Concierges, My Learning Springboard

« Previous Page
1
…
3
4
5
6
7
…
22
Next Page »