Reading, writing, and arithmetic at the primary stage
Primary tutoring is most often booked for one of three reasons: a specific gap (reading fluency, basic arithmetic, handwriting), exam preparation (SATs or 11+), or general academic confidence. The right approach differs by case. A child with a reading gap needs phonics-based fluency practice, not enrichment. A child preparing for 11+ at Tiffin needs targeted paper drills, not general maths support. A child with low confidence needs success experiences before they’ll engage with stretch.
The strongest primary tutors diagnose properly in the first session. Rather than launching into a curriculum, they assess where the child actually is — sometimes asking the child to read a passage aloud, sometimes giving them a quick mental maths quiz, sometimes asking them to write a paragraph about their weekend. That diagnostic informs the six-month plan. Tutors who walk in and start teaching topic one without assessment are wasting the first month.
Phonics-based reading instruction works at primary stage when applied properly. The synthetic phonics approach (Letters and Sounds, Read Write Inc, Jolly Phonics) breaks reading into decoding and blending, with explicit teaching of the 44 phonemes in English. Tutors trained in any of these systems can lift reading age by 12–18 months across a school year of weekly tuition. Tutors who default to “let’s just read together” without explicit decoding instruction usually don’t move the dial.
SATs preparation in Year 5 and Year 6
The KS2 SATs cover English reading, English grammar/punctuation/spelling (GPS), and maths (arithmetic and reasoning papers). The exam is taken at the end of Year 6 and the results follow the child to secondary school. Most state primaries spend significant time in Year 6 on SATs preparation, but classes of 30 leave plenty of room for individual gaps to go unaddressed.
A weekly SATs tutor in Year 5 and Year 6 typically structures lessons around the official sample papers. One week’s lesson might cover arithmetic Paper 1 questions on long multiplication and division, the next might cover GPS Paper 1 punctuation rules, the third might cover reading Paper 1 inference questions. The tutor identifies which paper sections the child loses the most marks on and weights the lessons accordingly. Generic “Year 6 maths tutoring” without paper-specific drilling produces students who know more maths and don’t necessarily score higher on the actual SATs.
Reading specifically benefits from individual tutoring at this stage. SATs reading papers reward inference, vocabulary in context, and structural analysis — skills that are hard to teach in a class of 30. A tutor working one-to-one can stop mid-passage, ask “what does this word mean here?”, explore how the writer’s choice creates an effect, and slow down where the child needs depth. Reading scores often jump a band within ten weeks of weekly individual tutoring.
11+ preparation: a market in itself
The 11+ market in London and the home counties is competitive and specialised. Different target schools use different paper styles. Tiffin uses GL Assessment-style maths and English with a heavy verbal-reasoning component. Sutton Grammar runs similar. Henrietta Barnett uses bespoke papers with a creative writing task. Westminster, KCS, Habs, City of London, and Latymer Upper run their own pre-test and entrance papers, each with distinct features. ISEB Common Pre-Test underlies many independent admissions but each school weights it differently.
A specialist 11+ tutor names target schools explicitly. They have recent students who’ve sat the same papers and they teach against those specific papers, not against generic “11+ practice books”. They run timed mock papers from January of Year 5 onwards and adjust the prep based on where marks are leaking. Generalist tutors who claim 11+ expertise without naming schools are usually offering something closer to advanced KS2 tutoring, which isn’t the same.
Pacing matters as much as content. The tutors we see deliver actual offers tend to start light in Year 4 (45 minutes weekly), build to 60 minutes weekly through Year 5, and intensify to two sessions weekly in the eight to twelve weeks before the exam. Anything more risks burnout — and a burnt-out ten-year-old underperforms on the day. Anything less risks the child arriving at the exam under-practised.
What it costs and how to book
A weekly 11+ tutor at £55 an hour from October of Year 4 to January of Year 6, roughly 65 sessions across 15 months, costs £3,575 plus the 5% commission of £179. SATs preparation across Year 5 and Year 6 with a weekly £35-an-hour tutor sits at around £2,500. Year 1 to Year 3 phonics or arithmetic catch-up at £30 an hour, weekly, runs £1,170 across an academic year.
Compare those to specialist 11+ tutoring agencies in London — Bonas Macfarlane, Keystone, the established Wimbledon firms — where the same tutors typically charge £75–£120 an hour with a meaningful agency margin, and the platform model saves £1,500–£3,500 across a typical 11+ booking. Several of the highest-rated 11+ tutors on the platform left agency work for the higher take-home and the freedom to set their own pace.
To book, post a brief naming the year group, the specific goal (SATs, 11+ for named target schools, reading/maths catch-up, general support), and your preferred mode. Tutors pitch back within 24 hours, you take a free 30-minute trial, and ongoing sessions begin once both sides agree. The 5% commission is paid by the family on top of the tutor’s rate, with no agency margin and no contract lock-in. For primary in particular, watch the trial lesson with your child — fit matters more at this age than for any other tutoring market.