Academic Coaching is a form of educational support that attempts to address difficulties in the “way” students approach their work, and focuses on developing the skills necessary for academic success.

Academic Coaching differs from tutoring in many ways, but the most important distinction is one of focus: Process vs. Content

Tutoring focuses on teaching or re-teaching content. It is based on the premise that problems in school result from comprehension issues and content gaps. In contrast, Academic Coaching tries to understand why students are experiencing difficulty with content in the first place. Are they organized? Are they taking adequate notes? Are they reading the text effectively? Do they study enough? Do they study in effective ways?

This skill development focus, coupled with a strong mentoring relationship with an academic coach, allows students to gain better skills, more confidence, and eventually, better performance across subject areas. Essentially, coaching gives students the chance to gain control over their academic surroundings.

Our students come to us with varying degrees of (dis)organization. For some students, the extent to which they are disorganized is obvious to all. These students fail to hand in assignments, constantly lose and misplace notes and paper, have messy binders and backpacks, come to class unprepared, and put themselves at the bottom of a rather difficult academic hill to climb. This is an example of physical disorganization.

Other students, in contract, lack organizational skills in ways that are quite subtle. These students may keep good track of their work, and have a ‘tidy’ academic appearance. From the outside, they appear wonderfully organized. However, many of these students are not very strategic when they do their work. They may not plan tasks well, prioritize, or break up larger assignments, which can leave them prone to being overwhelmed or stressed by the amount or complexity of their assignments. They might not be good at estimating results, or estimating the time something will take to complete. We consider this type of disorganization to be more ‘mental’ than physical.

At StudySpot, we define an organized student as someone who feels in control of his or her academic lives. Organized students know what they have to do to get a certain result and are rarely surprised by the results they obtain.

In the last in this series of articles, we look at the well-respected reading comprehension strategy SQ4R
For over almost 15 years, we’ve been using SQ4R with our students to help them with textbook reading comprehension. At StudySpot, the final three Rs are Record, Recite, and Review. (more…)

A well-respected and often recommended approach to reading text information is SQ4R.   In a recent post we looked at the first two stages of this strategy: Survey and Question.  In this blog, we’ll take a look at the first R – Reading.

The third stage of the SQ4R reading comprehension strategy is the ‘Reading’ stage.  Make no mistake about it, reading text material is tough stuff.   (more…)

Here is a presentation we held at St. Clements Catholic School for students and parents discussing the transition to high school. For a transcript please read here (more…)

Here is a presentation we held at St. Clements Catholic School for students and parents discussing the transition to high school. For a transcript please read here (more…)

Here is a presentation we held at St. Clements Catholic School for students and parents discussing the transition to high school. For a transcript please read here (more…)

In this series of articles we look at the well-respected reading comprehension strategy SQ4R

Of the many changes that take place when students progress through high school and into university, the notable increase in reading and research stands out.  Textbooks become more detailed, more comprehensive, and more advanced.  To handle these changes successfully, students must employ more sophisticated reading comprehension strategies. (more…)

Studying for exams should not be a two week endeavour during May or June.  The preparation for exams begins in September and continues the entire school year.  (more…)

In our last article introducing the concept of ‘gulp limits’, we stated our belief that students tend to feel comfortable within a certain mark range and tend to put in only enough effort and attention to stay there.  Obviously, it is a big advantage for students if they can bump up that comfort range to a higher level.  As it turns out, this is not particularly easy.  (more…)