Tuition, teaching, exam support! Bespoke sessions for your needs. 10 years' experience in geography GCSE and A Level and as a senior leader for geography across Yorkshire and the North West.

Learn more about Richard

• When did you develop an interest in your chosen field and in private tutoring?

  Ever since I discovered that geography is the key to the world (both metaphorically and of the literal sense). One minute you can be studying a woodland, 1 km from your classroom, to then examining glacial processes and tourism in Nepal. As for tutoring, what can I say...I am a teacher and it is a great experience to be able to help people make real improvements and see a love for a subject come alive.

• Tell us more about the subject you teach, the topics you like to discuss with students (and possibly those you like a little less).

  I love physical geography and how we interact with it. My geology teacher once said, 'Geology and physical geography is like trying to complete a jigsaw, but without the box showing the picture and that some of the pieces are missing'. It's taken decades to find out what we know and there is still so much that we don't! It really is fascinating! As I have got older, I have become more interested in the concept of place and how it changes over time and how our feelings change with it. If you had asked me when I was 18 I would have said it was all 'wishy washy'!

• Did you have any role models; a teacher that inspired you?

  My English teacher, who was also my Head of House, was really passionate. She certainly helped me realise my potential. It is such a traditional cliche, but very true!

• What do you think are the qualities required to be a good tutor?

  Passion for the subject, the ability to build a good rapport and patience. There is an art to working out what foundations to tutee has and being able to check the solidity of the foundations so you can move upwards together. Tutoring is all about team work!

• Provide a valuable anecdote related to your subject or your days at school.

  I signed up to walk 55 miles, during the day and overnight for charity. I think the group of 100 of us managed to raise £50,000 in total to support the building of a new library in Lesotho, Africa. I was lucky enough to be able to go and see it and spend time with the students at the school. Memories and people which will stick with me and have shaped my adult self.

• What were the difficulties or challenges you faced or still facing in your subject?

  The statistics! I was never good at maths (or maybe I never had a consistently good teacher - I always felt inadequate at it). I think I still have maths-phobia today. However, when I discovered the art of statistics this enlightened me! I do love a good Spearman Rank or Chi-Squared to prove or disprove something, although I do have to get my sheet out to remind me the steps I need to do to calculate them!

• Do you have a particular passion? Is it teaching in general or an element of the subject or something completely different?

  In my spare time I fire steam engines on a 1950's heritage railway. We educate people in the present, about the past, to support their future. I.e. what it would have been like to have lived and worked in industrial Britain! I've been very lucky to fire the Flying Scotsman, but am equally happy firing a small shunting locomotive in the school holidays!

• What makes you a Superprof (besides answering these interview questions :-P) ?

  I am a geek - my wife always tells me to stop incorporating geographical language into our daily lives. For examplem, when we are out shopping I might just say, 'I am just going to meander over there...'!