Description
Tommy Champion found his passion for teaching the humanities and mentoring students on executive functioning quite early, during his undergraduate studies at Davidson College. After receiving his graduate degree in Valencia, Spain, he now works as a writing and language specialist, executive function coach, music teacher, and musician. Tommy’s approach to teaching is rooted in personal communication with students, allowing him to customize his tutoring style to their specific needs and empowering students to take ownership of their learning.
TOMMY’S PHILOSOPHY & APPROACH
Executive Functioning is all about teaching students the tools and strategies to excel in their academics, work, and life. Specifically, I work with students of all levels to develop the skills required to stay on top of their work.
I take a modern approach to Executive Function coaching. I focus on five main tools with my students: Google Calendar, Google Tasks, Google Keep, Gmail, and Google Drive. Almost every school provides the Google Suite of educational products to its teachers and students, but I’ve found that very few are using these tools to their full extent. The traditional methods of Executive Functioning, which are primarily paper-based, are not as effective for students who work almost entirely on a laptop or tablet… If the student already struggles with organization, then it doesn’t make sense to put them in charge of something that they can easily lose, leave at home, or forget to look at.
In addition to the nuts and bolts of these helpful tools, I also focus on communication skills with my students. You’d be surprised as to how many students do not know how to write an email in ‘letter’ format, and, as a result, end up sending text-message-like communications to their teachers and mentors.
Finally, I empower students to organize all aspects of their life. My sessions with students focus on checking school-related online platforms for any missing assignments, creating benchmarks and goals for assignment completion, and inquiring with teachers about partial credit, partial credit, extra help sessions, or extra credit opportunities. Once a student’s most immediate concerns are addressed, we focus on a student’s work for the week and come up with scheduled times to get the job done. Student-set reminders ensure that they take ownership and responsibility for their work.
If you’re interested in learning more about Tommy and his approach to Executive Functioning, you are welcome to call us at (203) 352-3500 or email us at [email protected].
