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It can be difficult to watch your child struggle with a foreign language class, but you don’t need to watch your students suffer alone.
Online tutoring professionals can help your student master a foreign language. Our guide to online tutoring options can make finding the right service easy.
What to Look for in an Online Tutor
You can find thousands of online tutors offering instruction in everything from English as a 2nd language to Spanish to Korean. With so many options, how can you be sure that you’re spending your money on the right tutor for your student?
- The key to finding the perfect tutor is taking time to know your options and understand what skills a tutor should possess.
- Ask about qualifications. Your tutor should have a strong understanding of the foreign language they teach. Your tutor should also have experience instructing students at your child’s skill and grade level.
- Ask about continuing education. High-level tutoring sources also require that their tutors undergo continuing education to stay up to date on the subjects they teach.
- Next ask about pricing and affordability. Know your budget before you begin interviewing tutors so you have a better idea of how much you can feasibly afford to spend per hour.
Some other factors you might want to consider when you compare tutors may include:
- Package deals
- Small group vs. one-on-one tutoring
- Tutor availability/tutoring hours
The Best Language Online Tutoring Services
Now that you know what to look for when you compare online tutors, let’s take a look at a few of our favorite online tutoring services for foreign language lessons.
1. Best for Tutor Expertise: Chegg Tutors
Price: video lessons start at $30 per session
Every parent wants to be 100% sure tutoring sessions are led by experts in their language of choice. But with so many online tutoring options, how can you be sure that your child’s tutor is actually as experienced as they claim?
Chegg Tutors offers students access to only high-quality tutors. Chegg Tutors recruits tutoring instructors from some of the most prestigious institutions in the country, ranging from Harvard University to the University of Pennsylvania. Tutors must meet strict qualifications before they can begin working with students. If you’re worried about finding a quality instructor for your student, be sure to consider language tutoring from Chegg Tutors.
2. Best for Pay-As-You-Go Pricing: Skooli
Price: $0.82 per minute with a 15-minute minimum per session
Most tutoring websites require that you enroll in a monthly subscription plan or purchase a lesson package before you can access long-term tutoring services. This model can be frustrating for parents of students who only need sporadic help or who aren’t sure how much tutoring they’ll need.
Skooli is 1 of the only tutoring sources we’ve seen offer no-commitment pay-as-you-go pricing. Tutoring sessions begin at less than $1 a minute, and you’ll only need to commit to a single 15-minute tutoring session. This can be an excellent option for parents who are still searching for the right tutor and want to work with multiple tutors to find the best fit before making an expensive commitment.
3. Best for Balancing Costs: Wyzant
Price: varies by individual tutor
If you want more control over the tutor that your child sees, consider browsing instruction options on Wyzant. Wyzant is an online tutoring marketplace that allows instructors to set their own hourly rates, giving parents more control when balancing costs. Wyzant also offers parents a massive selection of tutors, each of whom bring their own unique teaching style and personality.
Many parents prefer to find their tutors through Wyzant because many tutors also offer in-person instruction to supplement online lessons. Online tutoring can be especially difficult for students living with learning disabilities like dyslexia or dyscalculia. If your student has trouble focusing during video lessons, consider adding another layer of interactivity with occasional in-person tutoring sessions.
4. Best for Unlimited Course Access: Udemy
Price: varies by course; many courses begin at $19.99
Private tutoring can quickly become prohibitively expensive — especially if your student learns best through repeated sessions. Udemy is an online course marketplace that offers lessons and courses on nearly every language. From improving German pronunciation to specific lessons on Japanese kana stroke order, many courses on Udemy are highly-specialized and allow your student to zero in on his or her specific learning needs.
Once you purchase a course through Udemy, your student has access to all course material for life. There are no deadlines or due dates included with Udemy courses, so your student can work through the material at their own pace and review lessons as needed without incurring additional costs.
Though courses on Udemy don’t include 1-on-1 instruction, many course instructors make their contact information available to students who have specific questions about the material.
5. Best for Assistance From Native Speakers: Preply
Price: varies by individual tutor
If your student is learning a new language for a practical purpose like travel or study abroad, it can be helpful to learn from a native speaker. Working with a native speaker can give students more in-depth advice on the tenses, phrases and verbs they’re most likely to hear abroad, as well as improve pronunciation and assist in communicating more effectively with other native speakers.
Preply is an online tutoring marketplace that specializes in connecting students with tutors who speak a variety of languages. Like Wyzant, tutors on Preply may set their own rates, and options begin at less than $20 per hour of instruction. As you browse tutors, you can view each tutor’s qualifications as well as their native and secondary languages. You can also sort tutors by languages spoken to narrow down your options further.
6. Best for Tutor Selection: Club Z!
Price: varies by location, subject and student grade level; free quotes available by phone
If you’re having trouble selecting a tutor for your student, you might want to take advantage of Club Z!’s unique tutor match program. Before your student begins their lesson, Club Z! will interview him or her to learn more about your student’s current skill level, learning style, preferences, personality and more. From there, Club Z! will assign an expert tutor to your student depending on their unique needs.
Don’t think that your student has the best match? The Z! Guarantee will continue to match your student up with tutoring options until they find the right choice.
8. Best for Military Families: Tutor.com
Price: sessions begin at $39.99 an hour with discounts available for package plans; complementary tutoring for military families
In partnership with the U.S. Department of Defense and Coast Guard Mutual Assistance, Tutor.com is the only tutoring website we’ve seen to offer complementary tutoring services to students who come from a military family.
Tutoring from Tutor.com is available around the clock, which can be a major benefit for families stationed overseas who need assistance outside of the standard hours offered in the United States.
Tutor.com also offers tutoring services completely anonymously, and their team is standing by to assist with anything from one-time homework help to months of scheduled sessions.
9. Best for Small Group Tutoring: Revolution Prep
Price: small group tutoring sessions begin at about $40 per hour; private lessons are available at a higher price point
Small group tutoring can be an effective way for parents to balance the 1-on-1 attention of private tutoring with the more affordable pricing of tutoring with a group. Small group tutoring from Revolution Prep matches your student up with up to 2 other students of their language skill level for learning sessions.
Tutors who work with Revolution Prep must meet high educational standards, and all tutors are full-time employees who must also undergo continuing education. If you want more personalization for your student without the price of independent tutoring, consider signing your child up for a small group tutoring package.
Help Your Student Get Ahead
Explore all of your options before you choose a tutor or tutoring website to help your student get the best possible experience learning their language of choice. If your 1st tutor doesn’t click with your student, don’t give up — it can sometimes take a bit of trial and error to get the online language tutor that’s right for your child.
Start with our list of recommended online tutoring service to find a language tutor today.
Southern New Hampshire University Online
SNHU Online Offers:
- Flexible schedules
- Affordable tuition
- Online tutoring
- Access to electronic research materials
- Specialized academic advising
- Supportive online community
About Sarah Horvath
Sarah is an expert in the insurance, investing for retirement and cryptocurrency space.