Mr East English Tuition

What a day! GCSE results day 2026.

I’ve loved hearing from students and their families today. My WhatsApp was going crazy this morning once schools started releasing results.These are just some of the lovely messages I’ve received.

For many students it's been a day of excitement, relief and celebration. I’ve heard from so many who are delighted with their results and rightly proud of what they have achieved after all their hard work.

But I don’t want to write one of those results day posts which suggests that absolutely everybody got exactly the grades they wanted. A small number of my students just missed out on a grade they had hoped for or needed.

And yet, in every single case, there has been something to celebrate. There isn’t one student I worked with this year who didn’t work hard and put in an enormous amount of effort. Ultimately, that is all we can ask of ourselves and of our young people.

Every results day seems to bring another round of national discussion about standards, grade boundaries and whether young people somehow have things easier than previous generations. As somebody who taught in secondary schools for 20 years and now works with teenagers every day as a tutor, I sometimes find the wider negativity surrounding young people depressing.

Today I’ve felt nothing but pride in them.

Pride in the students celebrating grades they perhaps never thought possible. Pride in those who quietly achieved what they needed. And just as much pride in those who might be disappointed tonight but who worked incredibly hard and kept going.

A GCSE grade tells us something but it certainly doesn’t tell us everything about a young person.

So, whatever was written on that piece of paper today, my advice is to look forwards. Celebrate what went well. Reflect honestly on anything that didn’t. Learn whatever lessons there are to learn from the experience and then focus on what comes next. That strikes me as a useful mantra for life.

Today is bittersweet for me because it also marks the end of my time with this group of year 11 students and, in most cases, their families. I’ll be lucky enough to carry on teaching younger siblings in a few families but there are students I’ve got to know who I now probably won’t see again.

I will really miss them.

It is always lovely, though, when former students get back in touch months or even years later, so if you’ve used my tuition service, please do keep in touch. I genuinely love hearing where life takes you.

And finally, to all the parents and carers who have been waiting anxiously alongside their teenagers, your wait is over too. I hope you can relax a little tonight, celebrate what deserves celebrating and then support your teenager with whatever their next step might be.

Well done to all of them.

Thanks, as ever, for reading.

Phil 👍📚

Thoughts on the eve of GCSE Results Day 2026...

For many teenagers up and down the country, the wait is almost over. Tomorrow, Thursday 20th August, students will receive their GCSE results.

Tonight, I also want to acknowledge the wait for parents and carers. Results day is a nerve-wracking time for everyone. Tomorrow will bring smiles, relief and, hopefully, delight for many young people. For others, it may bring disappointment and difficult conversations about why results weren't quite what they had hoped or expected.

Having worked with young people for well over 20 years, first as a classroom teacher and now as a full-time English tutor, I've experienced many results days and shared some of those highs and lows with students and their families. And I know there will be plenty of teachers and tutors feeling nervous tonight too.

Since becoming self-employed, I've found results day feels slightly different. When parents are paying you directly to support their child, there is inevitably a sense of responsibility and perhaps a little more personal pressure. I'll certainly be waiting anxiously tomorrow to hear from the year 11 students I've had the privilege of working with.

But one thing I think is really important to remember is that no single teacher or tutor is responsible for the number on a student's results sheet.

What goes into those numbers is enormously complicated. In many ways, the journey towards them begins long before secondary school: with parents and carers reading stories, talking, playing and encouraging curiosity; with that first day at primary school; with years of teachers, family members, friends and others offering encouragement and support. And, most importantly, with the young person's own effort, experiences and choices along the way.

Paying for additional tuition is no guarantee of a particular exam result. That might seem an odd thing for someone who runs a private tuition business to say but I've always tried to be realistic with parents. A tutor is one part of a much bigger picture; so many different factors can affect how a student performs on one particular morning in an examination hall.

Every year, I remind students of something very simple: you are more than a number on a piece of paper.

That doesn't mean GCSE results aren't important. Much of my professional life is spent helping young people prepare for these examinations and achieve the best results they can. But education should also equip young people with skills, confidence, curiosity and resilience for a life that stretches far beyond the classroom and examination hall.

So, if you have a teenager receiving results tomorrow, perhaps the most important thing is to listen.

If they've done well or better than expected and are delighted, celebrate with them. If they're disappointed, give them the space to feel disappointed and to talk. Some may feel embarrassed or worry that they've let parents, teachers or tutors down. Reassure them that they haven't.

There will be conversations tomorrow about next steps: A levels, college courses, apprenticeships, vocational training and all sorts of other routes. It's a big day for the nation's teenagers, but it's also a big day for the parents, carers, teachers and tutors who've been lucky enough to accompany them on part of their journey.

I'll be thinking tomorrow of all the students I've worked with, and of young people receiving their results across the country.

And perhaps this is the thought I'd most like them to carry into tomorrow:

Your results matter, but they do not define you. Whether tomorrow brings celebration or disappointment, it is one day in a much bigger life still waiting to be shaped.

Thanks for reading.

Phil 👍📚

Do we experience life or record it?

I went to a brilliant swing night in Valletta on my recent holiday to Malta. At various points during the evening, I found myself watching people watching the band through their phones.

I should say immediately that I took photographs too. I like having pictures from holidays and I'm certainly not suggesting we should all throw our phones into the sea.

But I do sometimes wonder whether we've become anxious about allowing a lovely moment simply to happen without recording it. A song starts and almost instinctively the phone comes out. We film something that is happening directly in front of us, sometimes watching much of it through a little screen.

I wonder what we're afraid of losing. The memory? The proof that we were there? Something to share afterwards?

It's something I've tried to become more conscious of myself. Take the photograph, certainly. Maybe a short video. And then put the phone away and actually watch the thing you've paid to see.

Perhaps there's something here for those of us who are parents, teachers or who spend our working lives with young people.

We talk a lot about teenagers and their phones but I think we sometimes forget how much young people learn simply by watching the adults around them. If we want them to become more comfortable with putting their phones away and being properly present in an experience, perhaps the best place to start is by modelling that ourselves.

That might mean putting our own phones away at the dinner table. Watching a whole performance rather than recording it. Going for a walk without constantly checking notifications. Or simply showing that it's perfectly possible to sit quietly without immediately reaching for a screen.

There's a link to learning here too. So much of successful learning depends on attention: reading something carefully, listening properly, noticing detail and giving our brains the opportunity to process what we've experienced. These are habits I try to encourage in my tuition sessions too. Technology can remember an extraordinary amount for us but our own memories still need exercising.

None of this is intended to be preachy. I'm as attached to my phone as most people are. I'm simply increasingly interested in the way these remarkable technologies have changed our behaviour and what that might mean for the young people growing up surrounded by them.

Perhaps not every memory needs to exist in our camera roll. Some are worth keeping in our heads.

Thanks, as ever, for reading.

Phil 👍 📚

Whilst away in Malta, I found myself reflecting on the way smartphone technology has changed human behaviour.

I'm mindful of not being hypocritical about this. I use my phone regularly and, like most of us, rely on it for all sorts of things. These incredible little devices are enormously useful. On holiday especially, we used ours for maps, finding places to eat, checking buses, taking photographs and keeping in touch with family and friends.

But I also found myself noticing just how often people were staring at their screens. And this wasn't just teenagers. Young, middle-aged and older people alike could be seen in cafés, restaurants, by the pool, on buses and walking around beautiful places with their attention fixed on a phone.

Which perhaps explains why something very ordinary made me smile.

A group of young lads sitting together in a bar playing UNO.

They were laughing, talking, winding each other up and concentrating on a simple card game. Nobody needed a charger, headphones, Wi-Fi or an algorithm to keep them entertained.

I don't think the answer to concerns about screen time is to lecture teenagers about how dreadful their phones are. Phones are part of their world and they're not going anywhere. And adults aren't exactly in a strong position to lecture when so many of us struggle to put our own phones down.

Perhaps we can approach excessive screen time by making sure there are other things around too: cards, board games, books, cooking, sport, walks, conversation. Things that make it easy to spend time together without everybody disappearing into separate screens.

Sometimes a pack of cards really is enough.

Thanks for reading.

Phil 👍 📚

This is bringing back 'Blue Peter' trauma memories...they look nothing like the ones in the YouTube video 🤣

Enjoy the eclipse everyone 👍

A slightly ridiculous thing happened while I was on holiday in Malta. Several ideas about how I might improve my tuition sessions next year came to me while I was swimming around the rooftop pool.

I don't think I'm a workaholic! I certainly wasn't deliberately thinking about work. In fact, I think that's probably the point. I was relaxed, away from my phone, doing something physical and not concentrating particularly hard on anything. And my mind was free to wander.

We sometimes talk about boredom as though it's something that needs to be eliminated, particularly for young people. The moment there's nothing happening, out comes a phone. But I increasingly wonder whether we're losing something important when every empty moment gets filled.

Some of our best thoughts arrive in the shower, on a walk, staring out of a train window or, apparently, swimming around a rooftop pool in Malta. Perhaps our brains sometimes need us to stop feeding them things and give them a little space to do their own thing.

One of my pool ideas, incidentally, was to develop my weekly vocabulary challenges next year by getting students to look at the origins of words as well as their meanings. So at least something productive came from all that floating about!

Thanks for reading.

Phil 👍 📚

The original epic…

Christopher Nolan’s 'The Odyssey' has apparently sent sales of Homer’s poem through the roof. UK print sales reportedly rose by 1400% in the weeks around the film’s release.

I really enjoyed the film, and my first visit to the beautifully refurbished cinema here in Sutton Coldfield. I'll definitely be returning to Royal Cinemas soon. It has inspired me to take these two copies of 'The Odyssey' off my bookshelves and start reading it tonight.

Why two copies? I’m lucky enough to have a partner who shares my love of literature, so we’ve decided to read it aloud together, taking it in turns, roughly a hundred lines each, before swapping over.

I love reading aloud, and I can’t wait to make a start this evening. The opening few lines in this translation are fantastic...

Sing to me of the man, Muse, the man of twists and turns
driven time and again off course, once he had plundered
the hallowed heights of Troy.

It is one of the great stories, the original epic. A tale of adventure, monsters, temptation, courage, homecoming and what it means to be human, still capturing imaginations thousands of years after it was first composed.

If your teenager has seen and enjoyed the film, why not encourage them to find out a little more about Homer’s poem? They might even be tempted to pick up a copy and have a go at reading it themselves. Sometimes a film can be the perfect doorway into a book.

Thanks for reading.

Phil 👍 📚

I've been back from Malta for over a week now and, as is often the case after a holiday, I've found myself thinking about some of the things I noticed while I was away.

One of the great things about getting away, I think, is simply having a bit of distance from normal routines. You're somewhere different, seeing different things, eating different food, meeting different people. Somehow, your mind has a little more room to wander.

I certainly wasn't sitting by the pool thinking, 'What can I post about Mr East English Tuition when I get home?' But I did find myself reflecting quite a lot about young people, education, reading, phones, attention, nature, language, happiness and all sorts of other things.

So, over the next few weeks, I'm going to share some of those holiday thoughts. They're not intended as grand pronouncements or answers to anything. Just observations, really, from a teacher and tutor who remains fascinated by how we learn, what captures our attention and what helps young people, and the rest of us, to live interesting and curious lives.

Thanks for reading.

Phil 👍 📚

..the picture was taken in Mosta. The rotunda is one of the largest unsupported domes in the world. I really must check that my thumb doesn't make an unwelcome appearance when I'm taking holiday snaps 🤣

🎧 A summer podcast recommendation…

As well as enjoying plenty of reading over the summer, I’m getting back into listening to podcasts. I’ve recommended "Radical' with Amol Rajan before, but another series which deserves as many listeners as possible is 'Rosebud' with Gyles Brandreth.

I’ve loved listening to and watching Gyles for years. 'Rosebud' combines conversations with a wide range of guests with episodes from his own diaries. I’ve just listened to his conversation with Adrian Lester, having recently been lucky enough to see him playing Cyrano de Bergerac in London. A fantastic actor and such an interesting man.

This recommendation is perhaps more for parents than teenagers, but I think podcasts can be a wonderful way for young people to spend time in intelligent company, listening to interesting people having proper, thoughtful conversations. And some teenagers would certainly get a great deal from Rosebud.

A few episodes that might be good places to start:

🎭 Adrian Lester
📚 Matt Haig
🎭 Ralph Fiennes
🎤 Lenny Henry
🎙️ Amol Rajan
📚 Harlan Coben.

Perhaps have a listen yourself and see if there’s an episode you could recommend to your teenager.

Thanks for reading.
Phil 👍 📚

I’ve just spent 15 minutes in the garden with a friend doing Butterfly Conservation’s Big Butterfly Count.

If you’ve not come across it before, it’s a brilliant bit of citizen science and a lovely way to encourage teenagers to connect with the natural world. Simply spend 15 minutes outside, notice the butterflies you see and identify the different species.

There’s something much more satisfying about being able to say, “That’s a Red Admiral!” rather than simply, “What a beautiful butterfly.”

And those individual observations matter: together, they contribute to a dataset that helps scientists understand how our butterfly populations are changing.

It’s also a reminder that learning doesn’t always have to happen at a desk. Looking closely, identifying, naming, noticing differences and becoming curious about the world around us are all forms of learning.

So, if you’ve never tried the Big Butterfly Count, why not give it a go with your teenager? Head into the garden or your local park, put aside 15 minutes and see what you can spot.

Learning to name the things around us can change the way we notice the world. It can also improve your teenager's writing.

Happy butterfly spotting.

Thanks for reading.

Phil 👍 📚 🦋