Andy

My job is to bridge the gap between what you cover in the classroom and how you use that to succeed. With 26 years’ teaching experience in a variety of types of secondary school, I feel confident that I should be able to provide you with all of the personalised support you need in History or Politics. In addition to my PGCE in Secondary History I hold a First Class Honours degree in Politics. Fancying a change of direction and priorities, I have now left the classroom and am pursuing a range of opportunities. Tutoring is one of these and enables me to enjoy the most fulfilling aspects of teaching, namely helping students and seeing you progress and thrive, as well as allowing me to continue to indulge my passion for History and Politics.

I have taught both to A Level for much of that time, most recently as a Head of History in an independent school and, for a large portion of my career, in a large Buckinghamshire grammar school. I was an AS Level Government and Politics examiner for Edexcel from 2007-2013 and have refreshed my exam skills in recent years with webinars from Edexcel A Level and CAIE iGCSE chief examiners/textbook authors. I enjoyed the opportunity to teach some KS3 English in my previous post and this helped me to reflect on, and develop writing strategies that I have applied to my History and Politics teaching.

I strongly believe that academic progress and confidence are fostered outside of, as well as in, the classroom and place huge value on educational visits as part of the curriculum, leading trips to locations from the Somme and Ypres battlefields and Imperial War Museum to Warwick Castle. This has provided me with the opportunity to potentially guide educational visits to the battlefields later this year, which is another area of employment I am keen to develop. An appreciation of context, geography and culture are important in fully understanding the past; this is the thinking behind studying an historical environment as part of GCSE.

Beyond being a History and Politics geek, I love a long walk, all sorts of books, music and theatre and rugby and cricket … just watching, due to age, knees and lack of hand-eye coordination!

Tutoring Experience

I have taught Edexcel, OCR and AQA A Level History. Particular specialisms include Russia and the USSR, Ireland and British political History, but I also have an interest in the Early Modern period sparked by my own A Level studies. I am confident in supporting source analysis and essay writing technique and coursework management.
• My most recent GCSE teaching has been the CAIE iGCSE specification, but I have also delivered Edexcel and OCR courses in the past.
• My A Level Politics teaching has been with various Edexcel courses, although I am very happy tutoring the AQA specification as well. Particular specialisms are British Government and Parties and Political Ideologies.
• Occasionally I privately tutored GCSE and A Level History and Politics students outside of my school commitments, covering different specifications or topics to those I was teaching at the time.
• I have experience of teaching KS3 English and can help you with this.
• I served as Assistant Head of Sixth Form in my two most recent schools, providing pastoral support and overseeing UCAS applications.
• Over the years, I have supervised EPQ students on a variety of topics, usually History, Politics or Humanities-related. It has been interesting watching original ideas go from an often-uncertain start to an independently researched and crafted piece of extended enrichment work.
• Throughout my teaching career, I have volunteered as a Duke of Edinburgh’s Award Leader and Assessor, coordinating the scheme in two schools.
• In July 2021, I completed the Complete SEND Diploma remotely with the New Skills Academy. It is particularly satisfying to see young people who find the curriculum or conventional school environment challenging achieve or exceed their potential and I undertook this Diploma to help widen my understanding the experience of SEND learners and to develop my strategies to support them.
• As part of my PGCE, I took a Certificate in Pre-Service Education: Teaching English as a Foreign Language. This enabled me to work in a TEFL summer school in the UK between qualifying and starting my teaching career.
• I am confident working with you in person or online. My last school moved to full remote teaching very quickly during the first Covid lockdown and previously I worked for an early adopter of Google Classroom.

Tutoring Approach

My lessons are always completely student-focused, aiming to empower learners and give you the confidence and resilience to formulate opinions, develop explanations and lines of argument and ultimately achieve.

I begin by discussing your individual requirements and goals, be they particular aspects of exam technique, specific themes or topics or more general study skills, such as note-taking or revision strategies. These are then the basis of all of my planning and lessons are continually adapted as you progress or to find different approaches that will work for you.

History teachers are always flexible: there are a huge range of time periods and topics out there, so we are experts at mastering all that we need to and applying our understanding of exam requirements to these.

Each lesson will include some focus on exam materials, be it planning a practice question, reviewing work you have completed either as part of, or in addition to, your normal school or college tasks, or focusing on a particular feature of exam questions, such as writing a conclusion or interpreting cartoon sources.

Any additional notes or marking are at no extra charge.