Private tutor

“ I have followed the profession of a private tutor for five years, and during this time have felt so keenly its disagreeable nature,—to be compelled to look upon imperfections which must ultimately entail the worst consequences, and yet be hindered in the endeavour to establish good habits in their stead,—that I had given it up altogether for a year and a half, and, as I thought, for ever. ”

“ It would be a shocking and insupportable degradation to send a sprig of fashion to school among common boys, where probably he might learn something really useful. No, no,—he must have a private tutor, who is previously instructed to teach him nothing more than what will enable him to pass muster, as not quite a fool. ”

“ At length it was thought desirable that these flowery pursuits should give way to more serious occupations, and he was committed to the charge of a private tutor, whom he calls “a passionate and morose man, better calculated for extinguishing a youth’s talents than for improving them.” ”

“ The Lecturers to choose yearly a Public Tutor, and to reprehend or displace him if there be reason. This Tutor without a new election to take none but those admitted in his year of office until their course of lectures be gone through. No Private Tutor to take two years together. All [248] sizars, poor scholars, and scholars of the House to be under Public Tutors, except Westminster scholars of Trinity College when the Tutor is of another school. ”

“ The whole system is based on individualism—on a free and easy relationship between Tutor and taught. It is conscientious individual effort under capable and sympathetic supervision that leads to success in the final examinations—‘the Schools’. The Tutor advises the student to attend certain lecture courses; he suggests certain books for private reading, the result of which is generally embodied in the form of an essay, or essays, to be read to the Tutor once or twice a week. ”

“ What are some of the limitations in the training of a child who gets his education from a private tutor rather than as a member of a class? Show that the most satisfactory size for a class depends in large measure on the subject of instruction. In certain subjects, such as typewriting and bookkeeping, instruction often becomes almost purely individual instruction. ”

“ Often several families will unite and employ a tutor; constructing, for the purpose, a school-house, in a central position among their plantations. But those who look forward to a high rank in American and European society for their children, employ private tutors in their own houses, even if they have but one child. ”

“ One private tutor assists all the wards in preparing their lessons in the evenings; but in my humble opinion, one teacher is quite inadequate for the purpose. He cannot possibly devote more than a quarter of an hour to each class and render any material assistance to them. As a necessary consequence, the progress and proficiency of the wards are generally not very satisfactory.
To remedy these evils, some arrangements seem to be absolutely necessary ”

“ Pros,{2} masters, fellows, and good dames,{3} Where pass'd my school-boy hours; 1 Private tutor, in the Eton school phrase, is another term for a Cad, a fellow who lurks about college, and assists in all sprees and sports by providing dogs, fishing tackle, guns, horses, bulls for baiting, a badger, or in promoting any other interdicted, or un-lawful pastime. A dozen or more of these well known characters may be seen loitering in front of the college every morning, making their arrangement with their pupils, the Oppidans, for a day's sport, to commence the moment school is over. ”

“ So far as school learning is concerned, he might go to college at once, and with the certainty of distinction provided he chose to exert himself. But if I may venture to offer an advice, I should say employ the next two years in letting him see a little more of real life and acquire a due sense of its practical objects. Send him to a private tutor who is not a pedant, but a man of letters or a man of the world, and if in the metropolis so much the better. In a word, my young friend is unlike other people ”

“ A new edition, with numerous Illustrations; price 1s., bound in cloth.
GEOGRAPHY AND HISTORY; Selected by a Lady for the Use of her own Children. Revised and augmented by Samuel Maunder. 21st edition, with Maps and Plates, 12mo, cloth, 4s. 6d.
THE FAMILY TUTOR AND SCHOOL COMPANION. The “Family Tutor,” as its name implies, is a Work of a highly instructive character, and realizes, as far as can be accomplished in print, the advantages of a Private Tutor to every reader; a Tutor whose teachings are lively, kind, and comprehensible: making the acquirement of knowledge a pleasure, not a task. ”

“ The usual practice adopted for the education of these young people, as we have shown, was either by sending them to a great household or, at a later date, by having a private tutor in the house. Evidence may also be adduced to show that youths of good social standing rarely proceeded to the universities at this time. ”

“ A greater practical difficulty is one which appears to be left untouched by the new regime. We allude to the growing plan of instruction by private tutors—a calling which has sprang up, in the strictest principles of demand and supply, to meet the eagerness for external aid which has been induced by the great competition for university honours. The existence and increasing importance of the class of private tutors has been decried as an evil; and it, no doubt, enhances considerably the expenses attendant on a college education. ”

“ The young men whom I knew at the time they went in for their final examination, were certainly well grounded in classics, and what they knew they knew thoroughly.
The personal relations existing between undergraduates and their tutors were very intimate. A tutor took a pride in his pupils, and often became their friend for life. The teaching was almost private teaching, and the idea of reading a written lecture to a class in college did not exist as yet. It was real teaching with questions and answers ”

“ These institutions do not differ essentially from those of a private nature in similar situations in other parts of the United States, where common schools are not established by law.
43. In the Southern states, wealthy families often employ private tutors. Sometimes two, three, or more families, and even a whole neighborhood, unite for the purpose of forming a school; and, to induce a teacher to commence or continue his labors among them, an adequate amount is made up beforehand by subscription. ”

“ As much as possible, then, education must return to the family. In many cases private tutors will be found to be indispensable. And of instructors excellently equipped as to scholarship, there will be the less lack, the better the work done by the gymnasia. ”

“ Accordingly I took the liberty to submit a memorandum on the 4th April last, noticing in detail the defects in question, and suggesting such remedies as appeared to me best calculated to correct them. The only change, that has since been introduced, consists in the appointment of an additional private tutor. ”

“ Mrs Alworth's great fondness for her grandson and strong prejudices against schools, from a belief that boys acquire there more vice than learning, had determined on a private education. She therefore provided a tutor for him before he was seven years old; a man of learning and sense, with a great deal of religion and good humour and who was very attentive to the employment for which he had been chosen. ”

“ The public tutors appointed in each college [are] on the scale of one to each dozen or score of students."—Life and Manners, Boston, 1851, p. 252.
Bristed, writing of Cambridge, says: "When, therefore, a boy, or, as we should call him, a young man, leaves his school, public or private, at the age of eighteen or nineteen, and 'goes up' to the University, he necessarily goes up to some particular college, and the first academical authority he makes acquaintance with in the regular order of things is the College Tutor. ”

“ I replied by informing him that I was not exactly going to school— (I was nearly fifteen, and the word “school” sounded derogatory to my dignity) —but that, having been up to the present time educated at home by my father, I was now on my way to complete my studies under the care of a private tutor, who only received six pupils, a very different thing from a school, as I took the liberty of insinuating.
“Umph! different thing? You will cost more, learn less, and fancy yourself a man when you are a boy ”

“ Note lastly, on this subject of private tuition, that Mulcaster in xxv his Elementarie, 1582, complains greatly of rich people aping the custom of princes in having private tutors for their boys, and withdrawing them from public schools where the spirit of emulation against other boys would make them work. The course he recommends is, that rich people should send their sons, with their tutors, to the public schools, and so get the advantage of both kinds of tuition. ”

“ The undergraduates were poor scholars or fee-paying members of the college. Some of the fee-paying members or gentlemen-commoners or fellow-commoners were the sons of the nobility and gentry and even shared the fellows' table. The undergraduate students were required to have a particular tutors, who were responsible for their moral behavior as well as their academic studies. It was through the tutors that modern studies fit for the education of a Renaissance gentleman became the norm. Those students not seeking a degree could devise his own course of study with his tutor's permission. ”

“ And more so, if this servant has any direction of the child's education; and still much more so, if it be his tutor, though Mr. Locke says, there is no doubt, if there be a tutor, that it should be done by him.
For, dear Sir, is there no doubt, that the tutor should lay himself open to the aversion of the child, whose manners he is to form? Is not the best method a tutor can take, in order to enforce the lessons he would inculcate, to try to attract the love and attention of his pupil by the most winning ways he can possibly think of? ”

“ In the light of these adverse criticisms it is interesting to note the statutorial view as to the ideal tutor. According to Amhurst, who quoted statute (d) , it was ordained that “no person shall be a tutor who has not taken a degree in some faculty, and is not (in the judgment in the head of the college or hall to which he belongs) a man of approv’d learning, probity and sincere religion.” But can these requirements be called sufficient if the hundreds of tutors against whom their pupils flung accusations of slackness, drunkenness, and other hobbies, all satisfied them? ”

“ During the days of courtship he had looked forward with pleasure to playing the tutor to his fair mistress: but a tutor can do nothing without authority, either open or concealed—a tutor must sacrifice his own pursuits and immediate pleasures, to study and adapt himself to the disposition of his pupil. As has been said of those who would acquire power in the state—they must in some degree follow, if they would lead, and it is by adapting themselves to the humour of those they would command, that they establish the law of their own will, or of an apparent necessity. ”

“ Now, in the seclusion in which I live, and for the very limited amount of money my husband has consented to expend for this purpose, how can I hope to find such a tutor as your friend describes? Besides, how can I induce Frederick to accept a tutor in his present irritated state of mind? Besides, the more conscious a tutor is of his value, his devotion, and his dignity, the less inclined he will be to submit to my son's violence. ”

“ You consider somewhat before you send your boy to school, what kind of a man the master is;--whatsoever kind of a man he is, you at least give him full authority over your son, and show some respect to him yourself;--if he comes to dine with you, you do not put him at a side table: you know also that, at college, your child's immediate tutor will be under the direction of some still higher tutor,--for whom you have absolute reverence. ”

“ It is, that strong, latent and distinguished character and acquirement receive in domestic education, that predominant and fashioning direction, which they retain through life. The peculiar impress of a parent, a family-friend, a single tutor, is often as distinctly marked upon the whole after life of the scholar, that becomes truly distinguished, as though he had been wax in the hands of a moulder. The numerous tutors of opulent families, and of public institutions, seldom impart the same advantage. Their different views and modes of discipline countervail, and neutralize each other. ”

“ In regard to this early education, the chief difficulty is, that only far-seeing men can understand it, and that a child so carefully educated seems to an ordinary observer only a young scapegrace.
A tutor usually considers his own interests rather than those of his pupil. He devotes himself to proving that he loses no time and earns his salary. ”

“ Do not deceive yourself; it is not even a master you have hired for him, it is a flunkey, who will soon train such another as himself.
There is much discussion as to the characteristics of a good tutor. My first requirement, and it implies a good many more, is that he should not take up his task for reward. There are callings so great that they cannot be undertaken for money without showing our unfitness for them; such callings are those of the soldier and the teacher. ”