Writing

Taught properly, almost anyone can learn to write well.

Writing well – clearly, succinctly, and powerfully – opens doors, promotes self-confidence, and can be a whole lot of fun. If taught properly, almost anyone can learn to write well. Too many student’s can’t because they were taught poorly or not at all. Probably the biggest reason for that is that most teachers themselves are poor writers. And if they can’t write, how are they going to show you?

The writing process starts well before you put words on the page. I work with my clients from start to finish on the following:

• Review of previous work for strengths, weaknesses, patterns, style
• English grammar/usage review as needed
• Brainstorming topics and approaches
• Research strategies
• Reading well to write well
• Organizational skills and techniques
• Developing convincing arguments
• Becoming your own best editor
• Cultivating critical thinking and finding your voice (and confidence!)

Test Prepare

Nothing bothers me more than hearing a high school junior describe herself as smart but a bad standardized test taker. That reflects a widespread misconception, and my job is to show students how to overcome it. Through patient preparation, native intelligence, and ordinary common sense, anyone can significantly improve their scores.

Another common misconception is that what the SAT/ACT/GRE exams test has nothing to do with the “real world”. While I share the test-specific tips, tricks, and shortcuts you need, my focus is on teaching fundamental language and analytic skills: how to read both carefully and quickly, building a strong vocabulary, understanding the rules of evidence and applied logic, how to supply arguments with evidence, how to write clearly, quickly, and effectively. These skills are essential to mastering the verbal sections, but you need them even more for life.

While I organize sessions around each student’s needs, here’s the general process:

• Detailed assessment to pinpoint strengths and weaknesses
• Full-length practice tests
• Detailed score reports to track progress
• Individualized strategies tailored to each student’s strengths, weaknesses, and anxieties
• Specific strategies for each type of test question
• Advice on overall strategy, time management, when and how many times to take the SAT, ACT, or GRE

In my experience, assuming students work hard and follows my guidance, they can roughly expect 100–300 point gains on the SAT English test and 3–8 points on the ACT (and commensurate improvements on the GRE).  Better scores mean more opportunities and choices: for college or grad school admissions, scholarships, and beyond.

ESL

Having lived abroad for seven years myself – mainly in Europe and Asia – I have a good deal of experience learning foreign languages and navigating new cultures. That experience has also given me deep insight into the many challenges facing students who are learning English as a second language.

While overseas, I nearly always had a part-time job tutoring English, typically focused on grammar, vocabulary, comprehension, and accent reduction (one of my students was the former Speaker of the Japanese Parliament!) Now back in New York, I work with a range of ESL clients who are mostly mid-career professionals.

After covering the basics, ESL classes often become frustrating because the students have widely different abilities and needs. It’s extremely difficult to teach effectively a class where, for instance, some students are strong in writing and weak in grammar and others are the opposite. The one-on-one approach I offer is tailored to each student and offers, I believe, the single most effective and efficient route to rapid improvement.

My teaching approach varies with students’ strengths, weaknesses, and needs, but always includes the following:

• Advanced grammar, including parallel construction, complex sentences, subjunctive and imperfect tenses, participles and gerunds, pronouns, irregular verbs
• Usage (e.g., phrasal verbs, idioms, articles and prepositions, slang and colloquialisms)
• Reading comprehension
• Clean, efficient writing
• Spoken English/accent reduction

Use of real-world materials – business documents, presentation assignments, report drafts, and the like – to make learning even more relevant and rewarding

 

My Approach

I specialize in one-to-one learning to help students improve their intellectual abilities, self confidence, and individual creativity and style.

I also specialize in writing, mainly non-fiction, and all aspects of the English language: comprehension, style, English as a second language, and the many peculiarities of English grammar. English is my lifelong passion; teaching it perfectly complements my other day job as a writer.

My students come from many different backgrounds, including high school and college students working to boost their test scores and ace their term papers, business professionals sharpening their writing and presentation skills, foreign diplomats polishing their English, and writers looking to expand their range and hone their craft. (One of my favorite recent clients is the author of two prize-winning novels!) After careful review of their abilities, I track my clients’ progress closely, regularly assign homework, and expect my students to work hard. I fully commit to each of my students and spend considerable time preparing sessions that target each student’s specific needs.

My teaching method is five-fold:

• Know the subject matter cold, along with the many tactics and techniques for teaching it
• Listen closely to my clients to determine their strengths, weaknesses, needs, and concerns, and create a completely personalized plan to help them
• Work as much as possible with students’ own materials and passions – from their coursework, workplace, or outside the classroom – to increase relevance, motivation, and real-world payoff
• Use a Socratic-inspired teaching style, focused on asking and encouraging questions, promoting critical thinking, and instilling close, active listening and reading habits
• Above all, foster independence and self confidence so that my students take what they learn and apply it broadly after our sessions end

About Me

I am a life-long teacher who is passionate about one-on-one learning and the transformative power of education. I have devoted my entire career to education—as an Ivy League professor, executive at an international educational non-profit, consultant, and tutor.

As a tutor, I specialize in all aspects of the English language, particularly writing, standardized test preparation, grammar, and comprehension. I have worked as a teacher and tutor for over 20 years. I am also a professional writer and editor, and am currently writing a book on the housing crisis in global cities including New York, San Francisco, London, and Hong Kong.

Today, I share a 19th-century brownstone in Brooklyn with my wife Natalie Bookchin, an artist and professor at Rutgers University, and our cat, Tee Tee. Outside the classroom, some of my favorite pastimes include cooking, especially East and Southeast Asian cuisines, long-distance cycling, reading of all sorts, and soaking up the cultural life of New York City.

Qualifications

I hold an M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley, where I studied political economy, political theory, and East Asia. I received my B.A., summa cum laude, from Colby College in Maine. I was a professor of Government at Cornell University (where I also spent three years on the admissions committee) and the University of California, also serving as a visiting professor at Tokyo University in Japan and Yonsei University in Seoul, South Korea.

I have received many awards and fellowships over my career, from the Fulbright Foundation, Social Science Research Council, Harvard University, the Japan Foundation, the Korea Foundation, the James Irvine Foundation, and other sources. As an undergraduate, I was a Harry S Truman Scholar and also won a Thomas J. Watson Travelling Fellowship.

Risk-Free Satisfaction Guarantee

If the trial lesson doesn’t meet your expectations, we’ll gladly help you connect with another top-rated, highly qualified tutor—or issue a FULL refund.

Refund for Lesson Packages

You may cancel a lesson package with at least 24 hours' written notice before the next lesson. Completed lessons will be billed at the standard hourly rate, and the remaining balance will be refunded minus a 5% processing fee. The fee is waived if you keep the balance as credit on your TimeAfterSchool account for other lessons.

Cancellation and Rescheduling Policy

• Standard Policy: Provide at least 24 hours' notice before the scheduled start time to cancel or reschedule a lesson free of charge. Cancellations or reschedules with less than 24 hours’ notice will incur the full lesson fee.
• Grace Period for Packages: For each packages of 10 or more lessons, you are allowed one late cancellation or rescheduling (with less than 24 hours' notice) without penalty to accommodate unexpected situations. Any additional late cancellations or changes beyond this one-time exception will be charged in full.

Adult Supervision

All tutoring sessions for students under 18 years old must be supervised by a responsible adult.