Dear student, Salam Alaykum.

Hope you are well.

Below are a few reminders that may be of help to you in preparation for your lessons. Usually your tutor name will be displayed in the chat area. You should ideally be doing lessons from a stable location and not a moving car, as this may lead to signal issues, dropped calls, or motion sickness. 

Some locations may have weaker signals than others so please be patient with reconnecting issues. In some worst case scenarios the lesson may need to be cancelled and rescheduled. 

Before lesson starts check you have you the following:

1. A notebook 
2. Writing materials 
3. Your textbook
4. You should have completed, and sent homework by the deadline
5. Your questions for the tutor
6. Text your tutor (an attendance message, at least 5 minutes prior to start, in What’s App, Teams chat etc).

1. Writing materials: pen/pencil, ready for use, before you start your lesson, so you do not have to waste time looking for it once the lesson has started. You may also often need to use an Arabic keyboard, during lessons, so this would be useful, if you are familiar with how to use one.

2. An exercise book: to write your lesson notes, tips and homework in? Keep your exercise book and any work that you have done safely, as you may be asked about it by the tutor. Lost exercise books are lost work, and lost tips. You will not be able to recall a whole exercise book worth of lost work. The tutor is not obliged to go over several months worth of work, from your exercise book, which may have been damaged, misplaced, or lost.

• Your exercise book should be for the sole use of your Arabic work only, and not an exercise book that you use for other school work or unrelated notes. Exercise books fill up quickly so do have a few spare notebooks ready to use in advance, just in case.
• Page headings should be by topic such as ‘nouns page’, ‘verbs page’, ‘prepositions’ etc or other wording that suits and helps you. This would be better than writing all types of words and information mixed in with others on every page, and easier to find. 
• Date your work, and/or reference it by lesson number.

3. Your textbook: do you have your textbook ready? This may apply to some students and not all.  

4. Homework: have you completed and sent the homework prior to the day of the lesson? Do you have a physical copy of the homework in front of you so you can reference it quickly? Please remember to send homework, well in advance, for the tutor to mark it. Homework sent on the day of your lesson will not get as much detailed attention, if any, compared to homework sent two, or more days in advance. 

• Default homework usually means that whether or not the tutor remembers to give you homework it still remains your responsibility to do some form of homework or revision. It is also better to evidence this homework by sending what you have done, to the tutor. This could be written work or a list of words that you are memorizing or any outstanding homework. Default homework applies whether or not you miss the lesson, so yes even if you or the tutor are absent you should be doing default homework.

• Reference homework so as it does not get mistaken or mixed with someone else’s homework. You should have your name and date on it. Don’t forget each homework has a deadline for submission, usually by 6pm the day before your next lesson is due. This may sometimes differ depending on instructions given by individual tutors. 
• Google Classroom. Depending on the tutor and type of lesson; you may be required to use Google Classroom as part of your lessons with the tutor. Your tutor shall let you know how to use it if you have not done so previously. Names and sections may change in future due to updates by Google Classroom. Always navigate Google Classroom, by yourself, so that you are familiar with where to find the different sections. 

Currently the main sections that you should be using in Google classroom are:

Under enrolled:

• To do – shows work assigned, missing, and done.
• The classroom – shows homework.
• The stream – shows postings by the tutor.

5. Questions: do you have your questions ready for the tutor? This could be regarding the lessons, homework, Arabic in general, the textbook, exams or resources.

6. Text your tutor: in WhatsApp, Teams etc to let your tutor know that you are present, ready and waiting by sending a quick text message. This could be between five and fifteen minutes before the lesson is due to start. 

• Avoid calling the tutor as she/he may be finishing off another lesson. The tutor shall call you. A text message to say you are present, and ready will suffice. Your message will also act as an attendance record, in the event of any misunderstandings requiring timestamp proof. 

Any further questions or comments do let your tutor know. Thank you for your time. 

Good luck with learning.

Kind regards

Maroof Institute