Miss Rebecca L Polley

My teaching and tutoring ethos centres around tailoring my lessons to suit individual learners. I aim to do this by working with the learner to identify areas in which they feel they require help and working towards realistic goals so that they feel they have achieved real progress. I am particularly passionate about the importance of contextualising concepts in chemistry. From experience, I have noticed that traditional teaching often lacks this, and a lot of students lose enthusiasm because they cannot see a connection between what they are learning, why it is important and how it relates to the `real world`. I believe that engagement with the subject material is crucial for students to attain a deeper understanding and long-term retention of the subject matter.

Additionally I believe strongly in highlighting the links between the three sciences, for instance, the connection between electrostatic forces (in physics) and the reactivity of elements and compounds (in chemistry) in order to establish an appreciation of how the sciences are interlinked.

I also place a large emphasis in my practice on exam technique and improving literacy in my students. For example, by improving students` understanding of command words in exam questions and the use of appropriate terminology in answering these questions. Consequently, I use exam questions commonly as an assessment method so that students can apply their knowledge and also get to grips with the process of answering exam questions and what examiners` are `looking for` in a model answer.