I was catching up recently with a colleague educator, Brodie, who is one of those educators I just "click" with—we’re very much on the same wavelength when it comes to how we support our students. We got onto the topic of why some students—even those who work incredibly hard—don’t always see their effort reflected in their grades.

As a study skills specialist, Brodie brought up a pattern that is so common in the education world, yet is rarely talked about. She pointed out that while a great tutor can make the content click during the session, the real "make or break" moments happen in the 167 hours between those lessons. (Yep, one week minus one hour for tuition is 167 hours. I had to check right away 😄 — how about you?) It’s one thing to understand a concept when you're being guided, but it's an entirely different skill to maintain that momentum when you're sitting at a desk alone. In her post below, Brodie breaks down why that "between-session" gap exists and how to bridge it so that students feel just as capable on their own as they do when they have a tutor by their side.

Before you read on, I also want to point out the Study Skills Scorecard she’s shared at the end of the post. It’s a brilliant (and totally free) way for a student to spot their own "blind spots" in how they revise. There isn't even an email sign-up required; you can just click and use it.

So, here is Brodie’s take on why the secret to better grades often lies in what happens after the tutor logs off:

Tutoring can be one of the best investments a parent makes in their child's education. A good tutor can explain difficult concepts, fill knowledge gaps, build confidence, and provide the kind of individual support that simply isn't possible in a busy classroom.

However, as many parents and students have come to find out, despite all of these benefits... tutoring doesn't automatically guarantee better grades.

That might sound like a strange thing for a tutor to say, but it's a pattern I've noticed through countless conversations with parents over the years. Sometimes they're contacting me after their teenager didn't achieve the grade they needed and is preparing to resit an exam. Other times, they're seeking extra support shortly before exams because, despite receiving tutoring, their child still lacks confidence in their revision.

What often becomes clear is that the issue isn’t a lack of intelligence, effort, or even the tutor doing a bad job. It’s that the student doesn’t have a clear strategy for studying independently between lessons.

What This Can Look Like

Many students thrive during their tutoring sessions. They ask questions, participate actively, and leave the lesson feeling far more confident than when they started. Parents often see this confidence and understandably assume that things are moving in the right direction.

But the challenge begins once the lesson is over.

After the tutor logs off or packs up for the week, the student is left on their own for the next six or seven days. During that time, they're expected to continue studying independently, revise what they've learned, and make progress towards their exams.

And this is where problems can start to show.

They know they should be revising, but they're not entirely sure what to focus on. They sit down with the intention of studying, but spend most of the time reading notes or highlighting information without really knowing whether it's helping. They might understand a topic perfectly when it's explained to them, yet struggle to recall or apply that same information when they're working alone.

By the time the next tutoring session arrives, they're often relying on the tutor once again to guide them through the material, and the cycle repeats.

So What’s Missing For These Students?

In many cases, especially those experiencing this type of cycle, they’re missing the skills to effectively learn, retain, and revise that knowledge independently.

Understanding content and independently revising content are two completely different skills. One happens when somebody is guiding you through the learning process. The other happens when you're sitting at your desk alone, deciding what to study, how to study it, and whether the methods you're using are actually effective.

Unfortunately, while students spend years being taught subjects, very few are ever explicitly taught how to study those subjects well.

As a result, many students approach revision with no real system. They don't know which revision methods work best for them, they struggle to plan their workload, and they often lack the structure needed to remain consistent between lessons. Instead, they often default to doing what everyone else seems to be doing — reading notes, highlighting textbooks and making flashcards.

This is why some parents can spend large amounts of money on tutoring without the student seeing the progress they expected. Tutoring provides support during the lesson itself, but if the student doesn't know how to continue that learning independently throughout the week, much of that momentum can be lost before the next session arrives.

This doesn't mean tutoring isn't worth it, far from it. In fact, the right tutor can make a huge difference. However, if study skills and independent learning are such an important part of the equation, it raises an important question: how can parents tell whether a tutor will support their child beyond the lesson itself?

What Parents Should Ask Before Hiring a Tutor

When parents are searching for a tutor, it's natural to focus on qualifications, experience, subject knowledge, and past results. These things absolutely matter, but there are also some less obvious questions that can tell you a lot about the support your child will receive.

For example, you might ask:

How do you guide a student's revision between sessions?
A tutoring session might only last an hour each week, but what happens during the other 167 hours can often have an even greater impact on exam performance.

What resources does my child have access to outside of lessons?
Do they have revision worksheets, recorded lessons, quizzes, study plans, revision trackers, or additional support materials they can use independently?

Do you give homework, and what does that homework look like?
Some tutors primarily set questions and quizzes. While these can be useful, they're designed to test what a student can already recall. The challenge is that many students are being asked to retrieve information that they haven't fully learned yet.

That's why I prefer to set revision-focused homework. Rather than immediately jumping to questions, students are given clear revision tasks that help them process, organise, and learn the content first. In other words, we focus on getting the information into long-term memory before expecting students to pull it back out again. Once that learning has taken place, retrieval practice becomes far more effective.

Do you help students improve their study skills as well as their subject knowledge?
For many students, the biggest obstacle isn't understanding the content. It's knowing how to organise themselves, revise effectively, stay consistent, and retain information over the long term.

These questions don't necessarily determine whether a tutor is good or bad, but they can help you understand how much support your child will receive outside of the lesson itself.

What If You Already Have a Tutor?

If your child already has a tutor they're happy with, this doesn't mean you need to start looking elsewhere.

In fact, many tutors are more than willing to help students build better study habits if they're asked.

You could ask whether they would be willing to help create a revision plan leading up to exams, provide accountability between sessions, recommend useful resources for difficult topics, or suggest specific revision methods that suit your child's learning style.

You might also ask whether homework could be structured around revision rather than simply completing questions. When students know exactly what they should be revising and how they should be revising it, they're often much more likely to stay consistent throughout the week.

Small changes like these can significantly increase the value students get from their tutoring.

What Students Can Do Themselves

The good news is that students can actually do a lot to help themselves. Many of the barriers holding students back are hidden blind spots within their own study habits. Some students are using revision methods that simply aren't effective. Others struggle with planning, consistency, motivation, organisation, or knowing how they learn best.

The first step is identifying where those weaknesses actually are.

That's why I created my free Study Skills Scorecard. It helps students evaluate different areas of their study habits and identify potential weak spots that may be limiting their progress. Once they know what's holding them back, they can begin making targeted improvements that enhance both their independent studying and the value they get from tutoring.

📝Download FREE Study Skills Score Card

What I've Seen In My Own Students

So yeah, from my experience, the students who have made the fastest progress haven't necessarily been the students receiving the most tutoring.

They've been the students who followed the revision systems and study strategies we worked on together, allowing them to keep making progress between sessions instead of hitting pause until the next lesson. What's been really exciting to see is that the benefits of developing these skills often didn't stop with Biology. Once students discovered revision methods that actually worked for them, learned how to plan their studying, and felt more confident working independently, they naturally started using those same approaches in their other subjects too. Parents started to tell me that improvements were showing up in Chemistry, Physics, English, and other subjects as well. It turns out that when you learn how to learn, the impact can spread much further than just the subject you're being tutored in.

That's why I place such a strong emphasis on what happens between sessions. My students don't just receive lessons; they receive tools that help them continue learning when I'm not there. And, they leave each session knowing exactly what they should be doing before the next one arrives.

That clarity removes a huge amount of uncertainty and helps students build confidence in their ability to study independently.

Want to Learn More?

If you'd like to understand more about the skills that help revision finally stick, I'd love to invite you to my free webinar on June 26th at 6pm.

During the session, I'll break studying down into the five foundational pillars that underpin successful learning and revision. We'll look at the factors that often separate students who make steady progress from those who feel like they're working hard without seeing results.

Because sometimes the answer isn't more tutoring (or even any at all!). Sometimes it's giving students the tools, systems, and study skills they need to make their revision count.

I hope this has been helpful and insightful for many of you parents or students.

Thanks for reading!

Brodie Mackie
Study Skills Educator
Ignited Academia