Why is online tutoring great for students?

Technology transforms industries when it crosses the AND threshold, when it goes from making something more convenient to making it more convenient AND better. This is the story of Airbnb, Uber and Netflix. It's a story that's beginning to unfold in the tutoring space, with online tutoring growing at an astonishing rate. The underlying infrastructure, hardware and software has finally reached the point where it's possible to have a rich online tutoring experience which goes beyond what is possible offline. You don't have to take our word for it: a 2015 study found that online tutoring significantly improved the performance of middle school students struggling with maths, with the majority of students finishing with positive perceptions of online tutoring. What are those AND factors when it comes to online tutoring?

The power of playback

That study didn't even make use of the greatest strength of online tutoring software: the ability to watch every session back for revision at anytime. With Bramble's Smart Playback, we take this to another level. Rather than making students watch a whole hour's session back, we automatically remove the inevitable um-ing, ah-ing and pausing to condense the session down to its best bits. A sixty minute session is distilled to twenty minutes of learning gold, making it far more digestible. Students can also scan through the session to find the exact part they're looking for. This revision capability is invaluable for students of exam age, especially across STEM subjects.

Access to the very best tutor

Online tutoring removes location barriers, giving students access to the very best tutors wherever they live. More importantly, it helps students find the tutor who is the right fit for them. Freed from the constraint of having to find a tutor who lives down the road, you'll be amazed at how much more the right tutor can get out of student. Not only that but they can maintain continuity too. Having established a great tutor-student relationship, you want the option to continue, even if either party moves away. With online tutoring, that's easy.

More focussed tutoring sessions

This one took even us by surprise. We've now heard from a number of tutors who say that their students focus and perform better online than they did offline. One tutor tells the story of a student they were teaching offline before a change in circumstance meant they had to move online. The student suddenly came to life: they were so much more engaged online than they had been offline. By giving students more agency, tutors are able to get more out of them.

More flexible tutoring sessions

Online tutoring doesn't have to be all or nothing. It can be a great supplement to offline tutoring. You can squeeze in half an hour of homework help in the week or some last minute revision before that big exam. It also means tutoring can be more consistent, you don't have to stop for bad weather, accidents or vacations (unless you want to, of course).