Extra curricular essay (helping Thanh in English)

Please critique my essay

When I was still a junior, I was told by my teacher to help Thanh in English, one of my favorite subjects. Since then, I was very excited to help him because not only he helped me in my Physics and Chemistry, but also it was the first time that I was a tutor. My role was only to explain what he hadn't understood in class and correct his exercises. At first, I thought it was very simple but in fact we met a lot of trouble, as far as we went on

For the first few lessons, our work went on fluently because he could easily remember almost everything I had said, such as the pronoun, the simple present form... That time, he was able to do his exercises and we were both happy because of our progress. However, trouble happened when we were doing our revision a week after. I gave him exercises that I downloaded from the internet on which we had studied but then he couldn't do anything. He seemed to forget nearly everything. Of course, that made me really angry. We were just beating a dead horse. Consequently, I blamed him for being not really focus on what I had told him.

The situation happened to me again in my Math class. However, this time I was in Thanh's position. After one week, I couldn't do the same kind of exercises that I had done before without any problem. Thus it was because I hadn't practiced during the week. It seemed to be a good excuse but it took time and effort to learn something new though it was a bit of cake or very challenging. Nothing could be learned after being seen for the very first time. Therefore, I did blame Thanh mistakenly because this happened to everyone.

From the experience, I've learned that if I want to understand someone, I have to place myself in his position, in order to get to know him well. Everything should be judged inside out.

When I was a junior, my teacher (which teacher?) suggested me to become Thanh's tutor to improve his English. (avoid passive voice) Since English was one of my favorite subjects and Thanh helped me in my Physics and Chemistry classes, I was very excited to help him. My role (maybe responsibility?) was to explain what he hadn't understood in class and correct exercise questions that he got wrong.


For the first few lessons, our work went on fluently because he could easily remember almost everything I had taught, such as the uses of pronoun and simple present form. That time, he was able to do his exercises and we were both pleased with our progress. However, trouble happened when we were doing our revision a week after.(I think this sentence is a bit akward...) I gave him exercises that I downloaded from the internet on which we had studied but then he couldn't do anything. He seemed to forget nearly everything. Of course, that made me really angry. We were just beating a dead horse. Consequently, I blamed him for being not really focusd on what I had taught him.

The situation happened to me again in my Math class. However, this time I was in Thanh's position. (maybe you could combine these two sentences..)After one week, I couldn't do the same kind of exercises that I had done before without any problem. Thus it was because I hadn't practiced during the week. It seemed to be a good excuse but it took time and effort to learn something new though it was a bit of cake or very challenging.(too formal?) Nothing could be learned after being seen for the very first time.(I think your voice is too extreme here...you could say it is difficult to learn something for the first time) Therefore, I did blame Thanh mistakenly because this happened to everyone. ( I think you could rephrase this sentence..)

From the experience, I've learned that if I want to understand someone, I have to place myself in his position, in order to get to know him well. Everything should be judged inside out.( good point!)

Since then, I was very excited to help him because he not only helped me in my Physics and Chemistry, but also, it was the first time that I was a tutor.

At first I thought it was very simple, but in fact we met a lot of trouble, as we went on.

However, trouble happened when we were doing our revision a week later.

I gave him exercises that I downloaded from the Internet on which we had studied, but then he couldn't do anything.

Consequently, I blamed him for not really being focused on what I had told him.

oops...I just realized that ahpahf723 edited this nicely! I should have looked more closely!!

:)