Lander

Lander is a 2:1 Master of Science (Physics) Honours graduate at Nottingham Trent University. He has been working as an online physics tutor for the last 5 years since the start of the 4th year of his master's degree. Since then, Lander has trained as a teacher through a PGCE (postgraduate certificate of education) course at Sheffield Hallam University and subsequently obtained QTS (qualified teacher status) working at Sirius Academy North in Hull and Heritage Highschool in Derbyshire. Having nearly four years of experience in classroom teaching Physics, Mathematics, and resistant materials he considers pedagogical research as vital in developing our tutoring practice and enabling our tutees to achieve their best outcomes and university choices.

During 2018, Lander conducted his master's research on the Earth's ionosphere. He programmed and conducted a multivariate statistical analysis of how plasma formed in the Earth’s upper ionosphere using data from the European Incoherent Scatter Scientific Association Telescopes (EISCAT) located across northern Scandinavia in Svalbard, Kiruna, and Sodankylä. Plasma being electrically charged, interferes with electromagnetic waves used for all manner of telecommunications and GPS. He hopes that this research will aid in understanding the formation and movement of plasma through the ionosphere to establish and maintain more accurate and precise communication and GPS with applications from aerospace to search and rescue.

Outside of work Lander enjoys board games, warhammer 40k, and DnD.

Tutoring Experience

6 Years of 1:1 online tutoring experience.
2023 A-level graduate class had an average grade increase of 3 grades (latest joiner to achieve 3+ grades was January prior to exams).
2:1 Masters of Science degree with honours in Physics and PGCE in science education.
4 years of classroom experience including 3 years of working with students with moderate and severe learning difficulties.

Tutoring Approach

Education is all about knowing the student. I take every opportunity to have my students explain and rationalise their thought process letting me see exactly where they are struggling while also developing their critcal thinking and reflection (metacognition) skills.

The reality is that no two students are the same. If there was a one size fits all approach to teaching, you'd not be looking for a Tutor. Because of this I aim to find the teaching approach that best suits my students. Some need a soundingboard to develop their own understand by trying to rationalise their own ideas, while other students benefit from structured and planned one to one teaching just as if they were alone in a classroom. The aim of my first couple of sessions is to nail down exactly how my new student best learns and then tailor our sessions to their specific and indivdual needs.

For students that need an extra push outside of tutorials I set homework to deepen and develop the knowledge that they are gaining in our sessions. These homeworks can be self assessed, or sometimes they will be returned to me for assessment, both methods have their own pros and cons and so are applicable ot different students.