One of our best tutors. Quality profile, experience in their field, verified qualifications and a great response time. James will be happy to arrange your first English lesson.
James
One of our best tutors. Quality profile, experience in their field, verified qualifications and a great response time. James will be happy to arrange your first English lesson.
- Hourly rate £150
- Response Time 4h
- Number of students 50+
£150/hr
1st lesson free
- English
- English Literature
- Creative writing
- 11 plus
- School Entrance Exams
Cambridge graduate, qualified teacher / examiner / 7+ to 16+ specialist / 90% success rate
Lesson location
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At James's house: London
- Online
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at your home or in a public place : will travel up to 50 km from London
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Ambassador
One of our best tutors. Quality profile, experience in their field, verified qualifications and a great response time. James will be happy to arrange your first English lesson.
About James
7+ to 13+ consultant and examiner with 16 years experience. 90% of my students have won places at St Paul's, COL, Westminster and KCS Wimbledon. Unlike many tutors I can cover all subjects - English, maths, reasoning and interview preparation. I have one of the best success rates in London as I focus exclusively on entrance to these top tier schools. If you wish to discuss your situation I can arrange to call you prior to booking lessons. My lessons are always results orientated and I specialise in expert initial assessments which are used to create structured study plans for my students.
I cover most of the competitive schools in the London area including Westminster, St Paul's, Latymer, Merchant Taylor's, Tiffin, Eton and many more. As well as English, Maths and Reasoning, I also cover interview technique, exam strategies and confidence building. As an additional service, I can create custom practice papers for you based around the pupil's individual needs.
I tutor one to one but also organise group mock exam sessions through Exam Academy - my exam preparation consultancy. I have helped many pupils get into their first choice of school and can provide excellent references from London and international based clients.
I offer a 'no strings attached' initial consultancy where I can answer any questions you might have.
I look forward to hearing from you.
University :
- University of Cambridge - Philosophy / English [2.1]
School :
N/A
GCSEs
- Religious Studies [A*]
- History [A*]
- English Literature [A*]
- English Language [A*]
- Chemistry [A]
- Biology [A]
- Art [A]
Manchester Grammar School
A Levels
- Religious Studies [A]
- History [A]
- English Literature [A]
- English Language [A]
Prizes and Scholarships :
Unconditional offer to read English at Cambridge University
Highest grade in the year for English Literature GCSE at Manchester Grammar School (1998)
2005 Bright Futures Graduate award - 2nd in the country for a marketing paper on consumer trends. (£1000 prize)
Marketing training bursary awarded by the AQR (£5000 prize)
Other Qualifications :
TEFL - Cert TESOL (90% - Distinction)
About the lesson
- All Levels
- English
All languages in which the lesson is available :
English
In the first lesson, I provide a detailed assessment of every student which allows me to put together a detailed study plan. Every student is different and I take care to tailor everything to their needs.
Following this, every lesson is carefully planned, usually covering a mix of required subjects (I cover maths, English, reasoning and interview preparation).
I discuss the outcome of each lesson with parents so that everyone is clear on progress.
As I have over 15 years experience I am able to create past papers and questions that are tailored to the student; these are normally sold by other companies for hundreds of pounds. These are provided to you as part of my service - they are not available anywhere else.
I work alongside educational psychologists which allows me to support any needs a student may have. I have experience teaching a wide range of SEN clients, including those with ADHD, dyslexia and students with working memory issues.
Review
All of our reviews are collected by us and are 100% reliable. They correspond to a real experience lived by the students of James.
Perfect! James is very professional, friendly and patient, he helped me with my questions of the application (to Cambridge), if you are looking for a tutor, I would highly recommend him.
Perfect! I came across James very late in the 11+ process ie around 2-3 weeks before the second stage exams and interviews for the leading London day schools (W, St P, KCS, City) where we had identified clear gaps in my son’s knowledge of English and Maths. In a very short amount of time, James was able to provide highly effective tutoring which improved performance significantly. I am delighted to say that we got an offer for our top choice and offers for most of the others mentioned above. Highly recommend James given his strong specialist knowledge of the 11+ process and his ability to customise work based on each individual child. I can definitely say that the process would have been far less stressful had we had him as a tutor much earlier on!
Perfect! James is an excellent English tutor. On the first lesson, he was immediately able to engage with my son by asking for his interests and selecting materials accordingly. He taught him 11+ comprehension and creative writing techniques and provided specific feedback to up-level his work in a balanced and encouraging way. He is keenly aware of the specific requirements of each school and targets the lesson's content accordingly. At the end of each lesson James would proactively discuss with me what they worked on, where my son did well and what needed to be further improved. Overall we had an excellent experience, my son made significant process and his 11+ results have been above our expectations thanks to James' help.
Perfect! Friendly and easy to work with.
Perfect! James was really great, he was super, super conscientious and was able to identify my son's weaknesses in English and give him the most accurate guidance, which made him improve very quickly.
Perfect! Always enjoyable and massively helpful
Perfect! We couldn’t recommend James more highly. His lessons and guidance have been instrumental across the 13+ process. We are so pleased with the results and the offers received so far. Definitely reach out to James—don’t think twice about it!
Perfect! Great tutor. Really knows his stuff for 11+.
Excellent! James’s class is helpful.
Perfect! James has tutored my eldest child and is now tutoring my second child. He has been an exceptional tutor. Very focused and child led. Both kids have really enjoyed the sessions and have an excellent relationship with him (despite being very different). He has an enormous wealth of expertise and was able to give excellent, constructive feedback from the beginning. He was able to teach for the 11+ and fill in the gaps for my children coming from a local state school. Eldest child surpassed our expectation, getting into all private schools he applied for.
I have recommended James to multiple people already and would have no hesitation in recommending him or using him for my other children.Excellent! it would be 5/5 if James cost less ( but he's worth it)
James definitely knows his subject back to front and helped get my daughter across the line with a great grade of A at A level. Under the circumstances and very tight last minute deadline we were delighted to get in with James as he's a great Maths tutor and he gave a lot of flexibility where he could. 100% recommend him as a top rated maths tutor
Subject : Maths
Outcome : A Grade at A level- James's response :Hi David,
Thanks for the review. Are you sure I taught your daughter Maths A Level? It was possibly English?
Best regards,
James
Perfect! Subject : English
Perfect! Subject : School Entrance Exams
Perfect! Great teacher!
James was enthusiastic and encouraging throughout the process. Son is at a local (non outstanding!) state primary and there was some catching up to do but James did so without it feeling overwhelming or any sense of ‘cramming’.
Subject : 11+ School Exam Preparation
Outcome : Success at QE Boys entrance test Offers at: Westminster Under School City of London Boys (Academic Scholarship) UCSPerfect! A great tutor
James is a very helpful, responsive, engaging and thorough tutor, who managed to help improve my son's confidence and interview technique in a very short space of time. He provided extremely helpful feedback and advice and my son found the sessions very enjoyable and helpful. We would not hesitate to recommend James.
Subject : 11+ School Exam Preparation
Outcome : Offers from highly selective schools including St Paul'sPerfect! Subject : English Literature
Perfect! Subject : English Literature
Perfect! Subject : 11+ School Exam Preparation
Perfect! My daughter loves him! He puts so much effort to explain. Made a great plan to study as well.
Subject : 11+ School Exam PreparationPerfect! Excellent Tutor
I approached James to in preparation for the English Language GCSE in the beginning of year 11. We created a loose plan to cover and review all the types of GCSE questions within the two (AQA) papers. On the basis of individual lessons, he allowed me to chose the subtopics within the question to work on and provided model answers, guidance in planning, and criticism of the answers I produced. This proved to be very useful and helped develop exam technique and boost the quality of the answers.
Out of class I sent James many essays, all of which where marked and constructively criticized; all the reply's where sent back very quickly.
It is also important to mention that James was instrumental in making and editing the personal statement I made to City of London School, which was successful.
All in all an excellent tutor who helped me progress from a 6 in English language in the mock to a 9 in the GCSE.
Subject : English
Outcome : 9 in the English Language GCSE and 7 In English Literature GCSEPerfect! Excellent Tutor
I approached James to in preparation for the English Language GCSE in the beginning of year 11. We created a loose plan to cover and review all the types of GCSE questions within the two (AQA) papers. On the basis of individual lessons, he allowed me to chose the subtopics within the question to work on and provided model answers, guidance in planning, and criticism of the answers I produced. This proved to be very useful and helped develop exam technique and boost the quality of the answers.
Out of class I sent James many essays, all of which where marked and constructively criticized; all the reply's where sent back very quickly.
It is also important to mention that James was instrumental in making and editing the personal statement I made to City of London School, which was successful.
All in all an excellent tutor who helped me progress from a 6 in English language in the mock to a 9 in the GCSE.
Subject : English
Outcome : 9 in the English Language GCSE and 7 In English Literature GCSEPerfect! Excellent Tutor
I approached James to in preparation for the English Language GCSE in the beginning of year 11. We created a loose plan to cover and review all the types of GCSE questions within the two (AQA) papers. On the basis of individual lessons, he allowed me to chose the subtopics within the question to work on and provided model answers, guidance in planning, and criticism of the answers I produced. This proved to be very useful and helped develop exam technique and boost the quality of the answers.
Out of class I sent James many essays, all of which where marked and constructively criticized; all the reply's where sent back very quickly.
It is also important to mention that James was instrumental in making and editing the personal statement I made to City of London School, which was successful.
All in all an excellent tutor who helped me progress from a 6 in English language in the mock to a 9 in the GCSE.
Subject : English
Outcome : 9 in the English Language GCSE and 7 In English Literature GCSEPerfect! Great Teacher
James is just great! He has been very efficient and professional in teaching our son.
Subject : English
Outcome : "9"Perfect! Excellent tutor - highly recommend
We would highly recommend James. We approached James to prepare our son to sit the 8+ Entrance exam for KCS. James was very quick to understand our son’s strengths and weaknesses and helped him to develop and further his reasoning, comprehension and creative writing skills. At the end of each lesson, James would always provide a brief summary of how each lesson went, what they did and advise on additional things we could do between each lesson. Our son felt prepared on the day of the exam and we were elated to be offered a place at KCS.
Subject : School Entrance Exams
Outcome : Offer from KCSPerfect! James offered very clear and precise ideas about how to approach English papers of various kinds. My daughter found it very helpful and also thought his approach clear and engaging.
Perfect! Subject : School Entrance Exams
Perfect! Subject : English
Perfect! A great start
James was excellent with the children. He took time getting to know them and assess where they would most benefit from his help. Kind and clearly enthusiastic, the kids warmed to him straight away. A great start.
Outcome : More lessons!Perfect! great first lesson
fun and educational
Subject : School Entrance Exams
Outcome : My son learnt quite a bit -Perfect! 11+
Excellent tutor
Subject : 11+ School Exam PreparationPerfect! Exam Preparation
We are so pleased to have found James. He is very professional, knowledgeable and experienced. My son finds his lessons enjoyable and I can see he is making good progress. James has made an accurate assessment of my son's abilities and has a clear idea of what needs to be achieved.
Subject : English
Outcome : Very happy with progressPerfect! James has a wonderful way with children!
Subject : 11+ School Exam PreparationPerfect! Great tutor
James worked with our daughter over 3 months to help her prepare for an 11+ exam at fairly short notice. He was friendly, prompt and very enthusiastic at each session and she really enjoyed working with him.
Subject : 11+ School Exam Preparation
Outcome : Our daughter came close but didn't pass - though James felt she could have if there had been more time to prepare. However working with him built her confidence hugely and I recommend him highly.Perfect! Brilliant tutor
Subject : School Entrance ExamsView more reviews
Recommendations
Recommendations come from relatives, friends and acquaintances of the teacher
James was an excellent tutor. He has a strong understanding of the West London school system, is very good with children, and a great teacher. Highly recommended.
We couldn’t recommend James more highly. His lessons and guidance have been instrumental across the 13+ process. We are so pleased with the results and the offers received so far. Definitely reach out to James—don’t think twice about it!
Our son is from a state primary and with no tutoring he had passed 11+ for state grammars and ISEB for St Pauls and Eton. We were a bit unclear about the assessments and the preparations for the second stage of St Pauls 13+ admissions. With only a few weeks (6 weeks) before the assessment, we got in touch with James. In a fairly short notice, James helped us understand the process and helped our son with techniques to improve his persuasive writing skills. We could see a marked improvement in his writing and confidence level in the few sessions with James.
James is a highly experienced tutor. He helped my boy to prepare his English comprehension, creative writing, persuasive writing along with 11+ interview. His help was tremendously beneficial and lead to exceedingly satisfactory outcomes.
James was exceptionally helpful in helping our son practice for his secondary school interviews. He gave our son structure to think about topics he could be asked about.
James was a superb tutor for our son. He immediately identified his strengths and weaknesses and was very exam focused throughout. He gave excellent structure and strategies, particular to each exam style.
James has an extensive knowledge of the 11+ and was invaluable in assisting both our child and us through the process. Coming from a state primary, this was exceptionally helpful.
James bonded well and had an amazing rapport with our child. Our son genuinely looked forward to the sessions.
There is no way our child would have been so successful in his 11+ without James.
We’ve already booked him for our next child!I interviewed many tutors and James was by far the most focused, knowledgeable and, above all, relaxed in his approach with children. You want your child to enjoy their sessions and he makes sure they’re having fun and learning at the same time!
James covers all the mains areas of exam prep with a careful and tailored emphasis on the more challenging aspects of story writing, problem solving, maths, exciting vocabulary and techniques for improving reasoning skills.
He offers regular feedback so you know exactly where your child is improving and what the expected outcomes are. Throughout this process you feel you are a partner and support in your child’s learning.
Work is scaled to ability and James carefully builds up their skills and confidence until the work during his sessions is more challenging than the assessments themselves. He teaches valuable techniques that helped my child solve problems quickly and clearly.
Regardless of outcome, my child has learnt valuable skills from James and we are in an excellent position thanks to his tutoring. I will update when we have results!James is an incredible tutor. He brings a wealth of knowledge for 11+ exam prep and runs his sessions in a very engaging way. With his help, both of my children have passed entrance exams for very academically selective London independent schools - in fact, every single school we applied for. I have never seen a young child looking forward to a two hour English session - with James both of my children’s did! I highly recommend James as tutor.
James has tutored both my daughters for the 7 plus and 11 plus and I am constantly impressed by the high quality of his imaginative lessons. He is an excellent tutor and both girls enjoyed his lessons tremendously.
James was my son's tutor for approximately 6 months before his 11+. He is an amazing teacher who knew how to get the best out of my son. He made the lessons fun and engaging. He was extremely supportive throughout the process and therefore my son was full of confidence when it came to the exams. In fact he wishes he could still see James! I would highly recommend him!
We contacted James a few weeks before my son's 11+ exams and asked if he could assess our son, identify any weaknesses and address them in the few weeks left.
James was brilliant: he worked with my son for a couple of sessions, identified where he needed help, and helped him improve his skills, through targeted sessions and exercises.
James focused on Creative Writing and Grammar, and his help was beneficial and lead to an excellent outcome - offers for our 1st choice grammar and private schools.
Highly recommended!James worked with my son to prepare him for his 11+ English exams. James showed him techniques to help him better prepare for the various papers he needed to sit. James was patient and always made my son feel that he was making good progress.
James is a top notch tutor that created 'sweet trouble' for us to make decision on whether SJS or WUS;)
His 'macro' control in terms of outlining the strength and weakness together with making a realistic study plan was a key to our 7+ success.
His commitment and attention to details were also excellent!
No hesitation for recommendations!James has been working with my son for the past year to help him prepare for 8+ assessment at KCJS. His approach of going to the basics of how to tackle tricky comprehension questions and story writing worked for my son who was struggling with English a little bit. With maths and reasoning as well he was able to identify areas of improvement and work specifically on those. And his small end of session feedbacks were most valuable for me to understand how my son was progressing.
My daughter applied to a number of 'premier league' day schools and some boarding schools for entry this coming September. As the competition is becoming tougher, we decided to employ a private tutor. When I initially contacted James Mason, he replied very promptly which is always a good sign. When he came to meet my daughter, I already knew that he would be the perfect tutor - he was highly educated himself and came across as very friendly, patient and firm when he needs to be. My daughter went from being quite scared of doing complicated maths questions to being offered academic scholarships from 2 of the schools she had applied to, which was an amazing result. James was also full of tips about the schools we have applied to and what they are looking for in terms of their admissions procedure as well as interview techniques. At the end of all the exams, my daughter was offered a place at JAGS, Queen Anne's in Reading, St Catherine's in Guildford and Priors Field in Godalming. I would highly recommend James to anyone who needs a bit of help for 11+ exams.
James is very clear and specific in teaching his student on the exam skills. He is very strong in the English Literature analytic skills and is able to pass on the skills effectively in less than 10 lessons. He is patient and always give positive comments to encourage student to reach the next level.
James tutored our son for 18 months.
He is a fantastic tutor and built a great rapport with our son. He tailored his teaching to best fit our sons's needs and made a huge difference to his confidence and knowledge. We felt he took the time to get to know how our son and this has greatly benefited his learning.
James is reliable, patient and flexible. He provided great support and encouragement during the gruelling exam process and I have no hesitation in recommending him as a tutor.James's assistance was invaluable in securing A* / A GCSE English grades for my son. He was patient and flexible and adapted his teaching style to my son's needs. It was very important for my son to get these grades in order to secure his place at St Paul's sixth form. James was also very knowledgeable regarding the school's application process and selection criteria.
James also works for Examberry, the 11+ educational consultancy of which I am Director and Managing Partner. He has taught classes covering Maths, English and Reasoning for the last few years and has been one of the most successful tutors we have ever had, helping secure places for dozens of students.We got in touch with James regarding guidance with my son's comprehension passages for 11plus at a super selective school in London. James took 6 class for my son. James guided my son in understanding exam technique by getting my son to do some very good passages both in prose and poetry. My son found his guidance very positive and encouraging. James also took a mock interview which helped my son get into the right frame of mind. Thank you James !
James taught my daughter for her recent 11 plus examinations. He was absolutely brilliant. He is very bright yet totally humble and child friendly! He is reliable, timely, well presented, kind and extremely knowledgeable. He went out of his way, outside the session even, to present past papers and mark work. Her recent successes have been due to James help; especially bearing in mind, that however engaging, my daughter has mild dyslexia and ADHD and so was never going to be the easiest pupil! It did not phase James and he made an excellent rapport with my daughter; communicating her sessions directly with her which worked very well for us. I could not recommend him more highly.
James tutored our daughter for the 2014 11+ exams.
We found his approach to be very effective.
Whilst being kind and considerate, James managed to gain our daughter's full attention for the 90-120 minutes sessions which she actually enjoyed.
James had quickly a very good understanding of her strenghts and weaknesses and put in place a strategy to strenghten the areas for development.
He found a way to provide her/us with constructive feedback.
His experience with the 11+ exams for top London schools was also very valuable.
As a result, Zoe got offered 3 places.
I highly recommend his services.James is a superb teacher. He is very efficient, he knows how to approach his students to make them confident towards their subject. He was helping my son for his BMAT exam; essay writing, and Aptitude and Skills papers. I am so happy with him. I will recommend James to anyone.
James has been teaching our daughter since last year, he is well qualified, dynamic and enthusiastic. He has what it takes to be an exceptional teacher.
James was invaluable to me in preparing for the Unit 4/Hume section of my philosophy A2 exam. My teacher at school had left us with something of a deficit of knowledge for this paper and James essentially had two weeks in which to teach to me Humes Enquiry, along with some possible criticisms and the essay technique required for the exam. He was absolutely brilliant in this regard, combining his ability to simplify and explain the more subtle points of Humes argument with a pragmatic approach to essay structure due to the very small amount of time we had to prepare. He helped me make notes on the text itself whilst also providing me with detailed and bespoke essay structures upon which to lay my own thoughts and the content of my essays. With his help not only did i achieve my first choice of university (Oxford) but i also achieved the first A* in philosophy at my school, in addition to receiving the highest mark in the year for the Unit four paper. I am in no doubt that without his help, my overall mark would have been horrendously dragged down by my lack of formal preparation for this paper. I cannot recommend him highly enough-efficent, friendly, organised and extremely intelligent.
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Rates
Hourly rate
- £150
Pack prices
- 5h: £750
- 10h: £1,500
online
- £150/h
free lessons
The first free lesson with James will allow you to get to know each other and clearly specify your needs for your next lessons.
- 1hr
James's Video
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