AS and A Level · Years 12-13
A Level Spanish tutors
Adds literature or film study, extended essays in Spanish, and an independent research project. The subjunctive stops being optional here: avoiding it is possible and it caps the marks for range, so learning it as a set of triggers is time well spent.
- USD 28-34 per hour
- One-to-one, online
- Free 1-hour trial class
What AS and A Level actually demands
Three or four subjects studied in real depth, and the grades universities actually offer against. The jump from IGCSE is larger than most students expect: questions stop testing one topic at a time and start combining several.
Approachable early and deceptively demanding later. Pronunciation and basic structures come quickly; the subjunctive, the past tenses and the ser/estar distinction are where grades are actually decided.
Where A Level Spanish students lose marks
- The subjunctive avoided entirely, which caps the mark for range and accuracy
- Preterite and imperfect used interchangeably, changing the meaning of what was written
- Ser and estar chosen by habit rather than by rule
- Speaking prepared as memorised paragraphs that do not survive an unscripted follow-up question
Is this the right subject at this level?
Students taking Spanish at any level, and particularly those who made fast early progress and have now plateaued, which is almost always a tense-and-mood problem rather than a vocabulary one. It suits students willing to use structures that feel uncomfortable, since avoidance is what caps the grade.
What it costs
USD 28-34 per 60-minute one-to-one lesson at AS and A Level, the same rate in every city we teach in. Billed monthly against lessons actually taught, with no prepaid blocks and no minimum commitment.
Paired lessons (2 students) are USD 20-24 per student. Small group lessons (up to 6 students) are USD 14-17 per student. What each format is good for is here.
How we teach it
One-to-one, online, with a shared whiteboard. The first thing we establish is the exact syllabus the student is entered for: schools do not always publish the version they actually enter, and preparing for the wrong paper structure wastes a term.
After that the work is diagnostic: a past paper under timed conditions, marked together against the published scheme, to find out where the marks are genuinely going. That is almost always more useful than covering the syllabus again more slowly. The full process is here.
Spanish: questions parents ask
My child made fast progress and has now plateaued. Why?
Almost always the past tenses and the subjunctive. Spanish is approachable early because the present tense and pronunciation come quickly, and the plateau arrives exactly where preterite, imperfect and subjunctive have to be used accurately rather than avoided.
Does the subjunctive really matter?
For the higher grades, yes. Avoiding it entirely is possible and it caps the marks for range and accuracy. It is learnable as a set of triggers rather than as an abstract concept, which makes it far less daunting than students expect.
How should the speaking exam be prepared?
Not by memorising paragraphs. Rehearsed answers collapse the moment an examiner asks an unscripted follow-up, which they will. Practising flexible material that can be redirected is more robust and scores better.