Nathan’s been tutoring an eighth grade algebra student. He’s doing it for several reasons. First, he was asked. And highly recommended by a former teacher. Those kind of compliments feel good.

Second, he’s making $15/hour. See my earlier blog.

Third, he totally understands the content.

Fourth, he’s a natural. He’s been hanging out with me teaching small math groups during my summer math camps. He’s had a lot of hands-on training. But more than that…he’s naturally good at it. He knows the right kind of questions that get kids to think, he knows when to push, and he knows when he needs to find another way to explain the concept.

But he’s been worried recently. The mom of the eighth grader is very supportive of Nathan, understands he’s just a student himself, but is also very concerned about her own son. She’s relying on Nathan to help her struggling son.

This has not gone unnoticed by Nathan who takes his role seriously. More than the money, he wants his tutee to understand the concepts and perform well on his tests.

About a month ago, Nathan came to me and said that, after seeing one of the algebra tests, he noticed that his tutee lacked organization. So he spent the entire tutoring session teaching him how to organize work on paper. And that’s what I mean about Nathan being a natural. The content isn’t going to make a difference until the organization is handled. So he switched gears…the mark of a true teacher.

He then explained to me that he couldn’t understand why his tutee was flunking his tests when he appeared to understand the content during the tutoring sessions. Ah, but teaching is more than that, I told him. It’s also about building kids up so that they believe in themselves. It’s believing in them so they begin to believe, too. That was his real job.

Last week, he came home from tutoring beaming. “He got his first ‘A’ on a math test. His mom was so excited! I knew he understood the information. But the confidence thing…I had never thought of teaching that way.”

What a great example of the power of belief. And the impact one individual can have. It remains to be seen how well his tutee does the rest of the year, but my guess is, he’s going to be just fine. And Nathan, well he got to observe first hand the impact a teacher can have. And this will help him no matter what direction his life takes.