Joe - English tutor - London
Joe - English tutor - London

One of our best tutors. Quality profile, experience in their field, verified qualifications and a great response time. Joe will be happy to arrange your first English lesson.

Joe

One of our best tutors. Quality profile, experience in their field, verified qualifications and a great response time. Joe will be happy to arrange your first English lesson.

  • Rate £390,914
  • Response 1h
  • Students

    Number of students Joe has accompanied since arriving at Superprof

    50+

    Number of students Joe has accompanied since arriving at Superprof

Joe - English tutor - London
  • 5 (25 reviews)

£390,914/hr

Contact
  • English
  • Creative writing
  • English Literature
  • School Entrance Exams

'The man parents call to get their kids into Eton' - THE TIMES

  • English
  • Creative writing
  • English Literature
  • School Entrance Exams

Lesson location

Ambassador

One of our best tutors. Quality profile, experience in their field, verified qualifications and a great response time. Joe will be happy to arrange your first English lesson.

About Joe

I'm a tutor specialising in 13+ scholarship/ CE exams, and 11+ pretests/ interviews. Although I have prepared students for admissions to dozens of boys' and girls' schools, the majority of my students are applying to one of the four top boys' schools - Westminster, St Paul's, Winchester and Eton. Eight students of mine have won scholarships to Winchester, Westminster, Harrow and Eton in the past eight years. They're hugely competitive schools, but I have a success rate of around double the usual one, partly because (unlike most tutors) I actually went to one of these four schools, so I know exactly what they're looking for in a candidate - in two words, it's intellectual curiosity. I prepare students for English, Latin and History papers; I also teach essay writing and creative writing and poetry appreciation and interview technique. I have coached boys into Winchester, Westminster, Eton, St Paul’s, Harrow, Tonbridge, Wellington and Charterhouse, among other schools. I teach interview technique, verbal and nonverbal reasoning, Maths, English composition and comprehension. I’m just as interested in what they’re reading and what they like to do outside class. Reading books and pursuing hobbies are grist to the mill of interview preparation – what does he get excited about, what’s he read recently? – because they give him something to talk about where he’s on familiar territory and can speak with knowledge and confidence. Homework I love setting homework and I'll mark anything one of my students writes if it's typed or scanned and then emailed to me. As I said above, it also makes Skype tutorials much more effective if we can discuss an exam question he or she is already familiar with. All four of my successful scholarship candidates spent at least two hours working alone (but under my direction), for every one hour of tutoring they had. And it's a much more cost-effective way of using me, too. University : - University of Oxford - English Language and Literature [2.1] School : Winchester College GCSEs - Physics [A] - Maths [A] - Latin [A*] - Greek (Ancient) [A*] - French [A] - English Language [B] - Chemistry [A] - Biology [A] A Levels - Latin [A] - History [C] - English Literature [A] Other Qualifications : CELTA in teaching English as a foreign language from International House, Piccadilly.

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About the lesson

  • Primary
  • secondary
  • Seconde
  • +9

    • levels :

    Primary

    secondary

    Seconde

    Première

    Terminale

    BTS

    Professional training

    Facultate (Licență)

    Masters

    Diplomgrad

    Doctorate

    MBA

  • English

All languages in which the lesson is available :

English

I am relaxed and laid back in my manner although I ask my students a lot of difficult questions. I’ve been tutoring a long time so I’m quick to identify problems, and ways to solve them. Likewise I take care to look at what they’re already doing right and praise good work fulsomely. I get on well with my students because I treat them with the same respect as I would an adult. The top schools are looking for pupils who are both interested and interesting, and I try to show them that those things are one and the same. I’m just as interested in what they’re reading and what they like to do outside class. Reading books and pursuing hobbies are grist to the mill of interview preparation – what does he get excited about, what’s he read recently? – because they will give him something to talk about where he’s on familiar territory and can speak with knowledge and confidence.

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Rates

Rate

  • £390,914

Pack prices

  • 5h: £1,954,570
  • 10h: £3,909,139

online

  • £390,914/h

Joe's Video

Find out more about Joe

Find out more about Joe

  • When did you develop an interest in your chosen field and in private tutoring?

    It was actually a toss-up between English and Classics at university, and I really enjoy teaching the General scholarship papers too. As far as tutoring is concerned, my Oxford tutor Dr Catto suggested I might enjoy it. He was right!

  • Tell us more about the subject you teach, the topics you like to discuss with students (and possibly those you like a little less).

    I mostly teach English, and that means a lot of things - comprehension and appreciation of poetry (especially), short stories, novels and plays, from Shakespeare onwards. The other two main things I do are helping people with writing stories (wildly fun) and writing essays on this or any other subject. And interview technique too, which is really just writing a very short essay in your head.

  • Did you have any role models; a teacher that inspired you?

    A huge number - I namechecked 32 of them in my book (The Super Tutor by Joe Norman)! I was lucky to spend five years at Winchester College, where a lot of the dons had taught at Oxford and Cambridge. Among them was Mr Anderson (now at Oxford), who despite being head of Classics always taught the bottom (beginners') set in Latin. He taught grammar like it was the music of the spheres.

  • What do you think are the qualities required to be a good tutor?

    You've got to know your subject; you've got to enjoy your subject; and you've - I only realised this recently - got to have something about you that's authentic and worth emulating. All the teachers I really admired, and worked hard for, there was something about them that I wanted to imitate. You've got to make it look fun being you - otherwise, why would anyone follow in your footsteps?

  • Provide a valuable anecdote related to your subject or your days at school.

    My English teacher Mr Nevin used to mark our essays and stories out of 40. I always got high thirties, one time a 39. I thought I was pretty near the top of the set, until one day I saw the mark on my neighbour's paper. 43. One essay he gave a 60. I think Mr Nevin was making two points. First, there's no upper limit to how good a piece of creative work can be. Second, grades are a little bit stupid. Really good people aren't motivated by them.

  • What were the difficulties or challenges you faced or still facing in your subject?

    I was (and still am) a pretty slow reader. It was especially tough at university where you were expected to read three novels a week, plus secondary literature, and write an essay. The solution for me was to dive deeply into poetry: much briefer, and denser in meaning, and rewarding of close, careful reading.

  • Do you have a particular passion? Is it teaching in general or an element of the subject or something completely different?

    I'm really interested in popularising and demystifying the scholarship exams for the top public schools like Eton, Winchester and Westminster. That was how I went to one of these schools from an ordinary background, and I want other children to have that experience. It's the subject of my second book!

  • What makes you a Superprof (besides answering these interview questions :-P) ?

    Given that there's no recognised metric for this status, being a Superprof or a Supertutor is rather like being President for Life: at first self-appointed, hopefully afterwards by public acclamation. More seriously, I think it has to be based on results to be meaningful. But those results don't have to be exam results. I like to think of my students in their dotage (I'm long gone at this point) remembering a poem we read together or a question we sparred over. Education is a long game. Its payoffs are rarely immediate.
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Ambassador

One of our best tutors. Quality profile, experience in their field, verified qualifications and a great response time. Joe will be happy to arrange your first English lesson.

levels

Primary

secondary

Seconde

Première

Terminale

BTS

Professional training

Facultate (Licență)

Masters

Diplomgrad

Doctorate

MBA

All languages in which the lesson is available

English

Review

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