Who am I?
Hello, my name is Iain (イアン). I am a writer, artist, performance storyteller and English tutor from Sussex in the South East of England!
I have a bachelor's degree in Philosophy with Japanese from the University of Reading, with a year as an exchange student at Hosei University in Tokyo. That was one of the best years of my life as I met many dear Japanese friends and got up to all sorts of activites and adventures including kaiseki ryori classes, martial arts and...DJing!
I also have a master's degree in Creative Writing from the University of Bangor and am a trained performance storyteller, telling original and traditional stories adapted for a modern audience including some stories from Japan. I am currently working on a big creative project involving writing, illustration, voice acting, music and video.
I am a playful and imaginative person and I love to meet new people. Having been an exchange student learning Japanese, my number one aim for tutoring is for students to feel comfortable to risk making mistakes and experiment with English. No need to be shy! I will happily give you feedback, but if you’d prefer just to talk freely that’s fine too.
I have a lot of experience creating voices for characters and learning accents, so I can especially help you to improve your pronunciation.
I also have work experience in the corporate world, as well as my time in academia, so I can help you with business English and proofreading essays.
What are my lessons like?
I speak some Japanese, but my lessons are more suited to students of all ages who already know the basics of English and are looking to improve fluency and confidence.
I offer three main types of lessons. Optional feedback and tailored homework is available for all lessons.
Storytelling:
Structured lessons based around improvising and writing a story together, these lessons can be as silly or serious as you like! You don't need to have creative background, anyone can tell a story!
Free Talk:
I can give you a choice of topics or you can suggest your own. We can use English articles, videos, literature etc. as a starting point or just have a relaxed, friendly and unstructured talk.
Skills:
We can work on any particular skills you’d like to improve such as vocabulary, pronunciation, idioms and expressions.
Our First Lesson
In our first lesson we will start with a quick introductory chat to say hello and discuss whether you’d like to focus on one type of lesson or a combination. We'll then continue with more conversation or storytelling. After this I will customise future lessons for you.
If you take a storytelling class, I can perform and record the story we write together for listening practice.
Looking forward to meeting you!
***UHIDE