6 Sweet Sites to Find the Russian Tutor Who’s Right for You
You can totally teach yourself Russian, but at some point, you might need an assist.
And Russian tutors are there to provide you with just that.
Whether you take Russian lessons on Skype or in person, a good Russian tutor can help you finally score the shot you’ve been trying to make.
The six resources below can help you find your perfect teammate in the game of Russian learning.
Contents
Download: This blog post is available as a convenient and portable PDF that you can take anywhere. Click here to get a copy. (Download)
Why Use a Russian Tutor?
A Russian tutor can help you pinpoint and target your weak points. While online Russian courses can help you learn a lot of information, you might not notice what you’re struggling with most. One-on-one tutoring can give you more direct feedback on how you’re doing and what you need to work on.
Additionally, the right Russian tutor can give you strategies to improve your learning. Russian learning tools can make or break your learning, and a good Russian tutor can help direct you on how to use them, thereby improving your learning and efficiency.
For example, if you’re studying with a media-focused Russian learning platform like FluentU, a tutor can advise you on what level of video you should be watching. They can also give you handpicked vocab to create a custom flashcard set in this program.
FluentU takes authentic videos—like music videos, movie trailers, news and inspiring talks—and turns them into personalized language learning lessons.
You can try FluentU for free for 2 weeks. Check out the website or download the iOS app or Android app.
P.S. Click here to take advantage of our current sale! (Expires at the end of this month.)
Finally, Russian tutors can give you valuable speaking practice. Speaking practice (particularly with native speakers) is a valuable way to reinforce what you’ve learned about vocabulary and grammar while preparing yourself for real-life conversations. You can get some free practice through Russian language exchange, but it can be a lot less awkward if you just pay someone to help you. After all, you won’t be asking someone to do you a free favor and you won’t need to repay their kindness through your own services, which might be stressful depending on your schedule and goals.
6 Places to Find Your Perfect Russian Tutor
TakeLessons
TakeLessons offers plenty of variety for both online and in-person tutors, so you may very well find the perfect Russian tutor here for your needs and preferences.
You can enter in your location on this site to look for Russian tutors near you. If you live in or near a big city or hub of Russian speakers, there’s a very good chance you might be able to have in-person tutoring. You can even filter with whether you’d like your tutor to come to your house or if you prefer to travel to meet them. Otherwise, you can also search for tutors who offer online lessons.
Additionally, you can filter your results by scheduling. For instance, if you only have time for your tutoring on Saturdays, you can look for tutors who are available on Saturdays.
You can also filter by price, and there are a variety of price points available, starting at around $15 for 30 minutes.
Most tutors are native speakers, and you can view the tutors’ qualifications in their profiles. Many tutors even have teaching backgrounds.
Care.com
Yes, the go-to source for babysitters also has Russian tutors!
The one caveat here is that no online tutors are available, so you’ll have to live near your tutor in order to enjoy their services.
However, Care.com has a wide array of in-person tutors with different experiences, backgrounds and pricing. Many tutors are native speakers, though you’ll also find many non-native speakers who have studied Russian.
Some prices start at just $10-15 per hour, though more experienced tutors are usually pricier. Tutor profiles list their backgrounds, ages and what subjects they tutor.
Verbling
When you want your Russian learning delivered to your desktop, laptop, tablet or smartphone, Verbling can help you connect with a great tutor.
To help you narrow down which tutor you want to work with, Verbling offers plenty of search features. First, you can whittle down your candidate pool by searching by the tutors’ schedule availability. You can also select what languages you want your tutor to speak, which is particularly helpful if you’re more comfortable learning Russian using a language other than English. You can also narrow down your budget range to find a price point you’re comfortable with. Plus, you can filter by special skills, including test preparation, age groups and even subjects like business Russian, listening comprehension and more. Want to master regional variations? You can even select what country your tutor is from.
Verbling tutor profiles are also quite detailed, noting the tutor’s number of students, number of lessons taught and some background information. Profiles often have introduction videos, making it easy to judge which tutor you might feel most comfortable with.
Pricing starts at around $6 per hour and goes up to around $40 per hour, and the average is around $16.
Verbalplanet
If you can’t resist a good Skype tutoring session, Verbalplanet can help you connect with an online Russian tutor in a simple, streamlined way.
Verbalplanet features online tutors who are native Russian speakers. Lessons are tailored to fit your experience, needs and learning goals. Tutors also provide analytics to help you monitor your progress and give you a better idea of your skills.
You can select your tutor based on helpful information, including availability, price, feedback from former students, number of lessons taught and more.
Classes are 45 minutes each, and prices range from around $12 to about $36 per class.
Preply
Preply is another strong option for finding tutors to provide Skype-based lessons.
With Preply, you can study Russian with native speakers, many of whom have professional teaching backgrounds.
Tutor profiles include a huge array of helpful information, including introductory videos, background information, how many lessons the tutor has taught, how much experience the tutor has, what languages the tutor speaks, what levels of student the tutor works with, subjects the tutor can teach, scheduling availability and even reviews of the tutor.
You can search tutors by price, country of birth, availability and specialty. For advanced students who are native English speakers, there are even tutors who don’t speak English, which could help give your Russian skills a real workout!
Prices range from under $5 per hour to $40 per hour.
Superprof
Whether you want your tutoring in person, online or even in a group, Superprof has tutors available for you. You can filter to see only tutors offering the setup you prefer.
Some tutors are native speakers while others aren’t. This is usually clarified in a tutor’s profile, which also provides information on the tutor’s methodology, background, rates and levels taught. You can also see reviews.
The average lesson costs around $23 per hour.
Who will you choose as the ideal teammate to support your Russian learning?
With these six resources, you’ll have plenty of options.
Download: This blog post is available as a convenient and portable PDF that you can take anywhere. Click here to get a copy. (Download)
And One More Thing...
If you love learning Russian and want to immerse yourself with authentic materials from Russia, then I should also tell you more about FluentU.
FluentU naturally and gradually eases you into learning the Russian language and culture. You'll learn real Russian as it's spoken by real Russian people!
FluentU has a very broad range of contemporary videos. Just a quick look will give you an idea of the variety of Russian-language content available on FluentU:
FluentU makes these native Russian videos approachable through interactive transcripts. Tap on any word to look it up instantly.
Access a complete interactive transcript of every video under the Dialogue tab. Easily review words and phrases with audio under Vocab.
All definitions have multiple examples, and they're written for Russian learners like you. Tap to add words you'd like to review to a vocab list.
And FluentU has a learn mode which turns every video into a language learning lesson. You can always swipe left or right to see more examples.
The best part? FluentU keeps track of your vocabulary, and gives you extra practice with difficult words. It'll even remind you when it’s time to review what you’ve learned. You'll have a 100% personalized experience.
Start using the FluentU website on your computer or tablet or, better yet, download the FluentU app from the iTunes or Google Play store. Click here to take advantage of our current sale! (Expires at the end of this month.)
