kid wants to get into med school, so need all help she can get
OK, harsh reality check time – if she’s struggling with A-level maths and Chemistry in a school environment she might be really going to struggle in the ‘self learning’ world of University!
Now, if the motivation IS there and the teacher is genuinely crap, a tutor will obviously help, and if the motivation is not there but a tutor would force activity to happen a tutor *might* help. However in the first case I’d expect a good proportion of the learning to be possible themselves using this new-fangled internet thing.
I’ve done a wee bit of chemistry tutoring in the past. I like maths. I’m at the other end of the country (I assume) so can’t help out in any structured way – but if your concern is simply that as “a parent” you don’t know enough to be able to help her understand, or to occassionally look over her work and ask some challenging questions.* I’d consider trying to help with the odd ad-hoc question. I wouldn’t want to do it for a child who wasn’t motivated though, and it doesn’t make sense to do it if every single part needs massive hand holding to grasp the concepts (so if GCSE level was learned parrot fashion to pass an exam but not understood there is a massive learning curve).
* I do recall that I often took a “well its good enough” attitude at that age – and ignored any constructive advice on embellishing answers.
Does she read books? The key to the maths is probably being interested AND understanding how the concept is actually applicable in real life (e.g. with medical examples since that is where her interest lies). You might want to get her a copy of http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/1848878451/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1634&creative=19450&creativeASIN=1848878451&linkCode=as2&tag=polwart-21&linkId=EEDOMIFJZIYY44KV as it covers a wide range of maths ideas in a fun way. If she won’t read that and “get it” then she needs someone engaging with her face to face regularly.