Study help: How to find the best online language tutor

[This post was originally published on March 4, 2015. It was updated on April 4, 2016 with new online tutoring information for 2016.]

If you are looking for an online tutor to help you tackle a new language, it’s important that you find someone who you connect with and who encourages you to learn. How do you do that? And how do you know whether you’ve found a good online tutor?

Read below for our tips on how to find the online tutor that’s right for you.

Online tutoring means the world is your oyster

Where you were previously limited by geography, online tutoring lets you find study help from anywhere in the world. This means that you no longer need to look for local language tutor help, but you can find the best online tutors for you, including licensed language teachers and expert online language tutors.

But how can you find these tutors?

Browse Skooli online tutors by subject

Skooli is designed to help you to find a tutor online as easily as possible. Start with browsing by subject — here you can choose a language you’d like to study, or you can choose language studies as a subject. Then, browse through the tutors who are online, or send them a session request for a time that works for you.

Look for tutors that have complete profiles

Skooli online tutors know that students will be browsing to find the best tutor for them. With this in mind, the ones that really care about connecting with students and providing great study help will have taken the time to complete their profile to tell potential students a little more about themselves.

In this case, take some time to browse through the online tutors who teach the language you’d like to study, and find tutors who tell you about their experience.

Finding the right online language teacher

Now that you’ve narrowed your search by subject (or in this case, language), and found a few teachers with complete profiles, you might be wondering how to pick between them.

One thing to consider is whether you prefer a certified teacher or a native speaker. What’s the difference? Certified teachers have a teaching license in their state or country and likely have in-class teaching experience. Native speakers may just be online tutors that have plenty of tutoring experience but little or no in-class experience. Does this matter to you? In many cases, native speakers are great online language teachers because they encourage conversation, which is probably a great place to start.

Another thing to consider is a language teacher’s English language abilities. For some students, this won’t matter, and actually, studying entirely in the language you hope to learn has been proven to be a way more effective way to learn anyway.

When you search through the Skooli tutors, other things to consider include:

• Do they have any ratings?
• What have other students had to say about their sessions with the tutor?

Write a great introductory message to your tutor

You should take the opportunity to write a personal message to desired tutors in order to let them know how you hope to get study help.

Book your first session…more than once!

One thing you could try to really get to know whether you’ve found the right tutor for you is to book a first session with more than one tutor. If you’ve found two that look equally promising, why not schedule a first session with both of them and see which one you’d like to continue on with?

With online language learning, some qualities you may want to look for in your first session are patience, a creative teacher who looks for interesting conversation topics and encourages discussion, and a teacher that evaluates and adapts their lesson plans based on your skill level.

Getting to know a teacher and feeling completely comfortable can take a few sessions, but once you’ve met with your tutor a few times, you should start to feel a lot better about your language level and your study goals. Whatever makes a good teacher for you will be subjective, but look to make sure you are enjoying your tutor’s teaching style.

If you’re ready to get study help and start looking for an online language tutor, browse Skooli for the perfect teacher for you!