Private instructor who will actually correct my mistakes

6 comments

1. I have a tutor on Languatalk who’s really good. The way we structure our lessons is we talk for about 15-20 minutes. She makes notes on the things I’ve said and we review them together to make corrections and say things more naturally. We do this process usually twice a lesson over the course of the hour.

   This is her account if you want to know more https://languatalk.com/tutors/7175 , only thing I ask is if you book a free trial lesson say Ibrahim sent you

2. As a tutor, tell them EXPLICITLY what you want to do.

   “I want to improve my speaking ability and I’m looking for corrections and more natural ways of rephrasing my mistakes. For example, if I’m talking about making tea for a guest and I say 「お茶が作ります」I want to know if that’s correct and what I can do to improve it.”

   The above example would provide fodder for either a review of basic particles (which may or may not be worth a going-over depending on your situation) and learning a more natural phrase/a nuance in the language – お茶をいれます (put on a pot of tea) vs. お茶を作ります (producing the product “tea”)

   Maybe focus on having a 20 minute conversation (or longer) with you and the tutor recording it, then going over it point by point for the next few lessons.

3. This is Hiroya Sensei, on iTalki. He’s fantastic, easy to talk to, and always suggests more natural ways of saying things.

   https://www.italki.com/en/teacher/5537170

4. >I’ve tried private lessons but I can’t find a teacher who will 1) correct my grammar or 2) offer better, more natural ways of saying things.

   Where are you finding your tutors online? Are you using a college student doing it in their free time for money or a certified Japanese teacher who will tailor the lesson to what you want. You can find teachers on Italki who will do whatever lesson you want. You can send them something you wrote before hand and have them check it and explain it or tell them you want them to correct all of your mistakes and tell you how to express things more naturally. They have trial lessons for a discounted price so just look for someone who offers free conversation and is a certified Japanese teacher.

   >I can listen to native level podcasts and understand 80-90% of the material

   How are you measuring this? People always throw around random stats on this sub. I can read a novel and understand 95+% of the words or I can watch the news and understand 98% of what is said. Have you ever tried to measure it or had a Japanese person also listen and then try to explain it to them to see if this is actually the case? Most people over estimate their abilities, especially in language learning. Also native level podcast is extremely vague. Is it a podcast about physics for people who study physics or have an interest or is it a daily life talk show with simple Japanese that is low level.

5. Nantucketlanguageschool.com I walk all my students through everything.

6. I mean I’m a tutor. I pride myself on going out of my way to do what you’re looking for.