As jon said, it needs to include something like "we throw all sorts (of things)". "We throw all sorts" by itself is a fragment and does not make sense if you take it literally.

I don't think it's a trap at all. It's much more convenient for the both the student and the teacher. Once you (as a student) have found a teacher you like, then it's much easer to schedule many lessons at once. I would really recommend that you take a few single sessions first and try different teachers however. Don't buy a package right away, only after you've found the right teacher for you. I also know that when I was a student, buying more lessons at one time made me extra motivated to learn! Since I had already commited to taking all those lessons, it was like a promise I made to myself that I would finish all of them. I have found that when students and I have a dispute, the italki policy has been very fair about refunds, getting paid and how much. For packages, I know that partial payments and partial refunds are possible depending on how many lessons were actually taught and the reasons for cancellation (I read it in the Terms of Service under Session Package). Anyway, you should try a few teachers and if you trust one of them enough then you can try a small package from them. You really should give it a try before you criticize it. Who know, maybe you will end up liking it! Good luck with your studies of English!

You're welcome Amy!  I'm a Dodger fan.  I see that you are part of the package promotion that italki is running.  How were you able to be part of that?

I've taught some beginning level Chinese students before and a textbook written in Chinese is probably not the answer here.  I think the best approach is to keep things simple and work on her basic communication skills and vocabulary before working on things like grammar, sentence structure, etc.  I would try to find a very simple English textbook, something targetted at elementary school Grades 1-2 (there may be some books that go from Grades 1-6).  My feeling is that she should be able to progress very quickly and once her basic communication skills are up to par, you can put her into your regular program.

If it helps, both of you could use Google translate to get the gist of what each of you are saying.  Machine translation stinks but in this case would be better than nothing!  <a href="http://www.translate.google.com">www.translate.google.com</a>

Good luck!

Mrbin,

This is how to use this website to book a teacher for a lesson.

Go ahead and click on Amy's picture.  This will take you to her profile.  Click on "Teacher Profile".  This is where you can see what courses she offers and what times she is available.  The system will automatically adjust the times to match your time zone.  Click on the "Schedule Session" button and you are on your way to learning English and about American culture!

Hi Anna,

What I've been doing is turning down friend requests unless they have some specific question.  Some other teachers I've seen however have hundreds of friends, and others spell out very specifically in their profile, I am here to teach!  I guess it's really up to the teacher how active they want to be on the social networking part.  As far as getting real students however, what's worked best for me is answering questions in the answers section.

Hope this helps!

Johnny has a very complete answer but I would disagree that they are synonyms. They are not exactly the same concepts and are not totally interchangeable. As he says at the end of his post, "reason" is a basis for an action or state while "excuse" is a justification for an action or state. For example: "Why were you late for class?" Reason: I missed the bus. Excuse: I stayed up late to study and overslept. This made me miss the bus.

I'm relatively new at this online teaching thing but I thought Phil's post on "when a language partner becomes a language student" was very interesting.  Although he did not generate a paying student from his language partner "friend", the point is that the relationship evolved to where it could have happened.  I think the key is that some activity in the community beyond just being in the teacher listing is a way to market yourself.  I am going to start being more active in answering questions, etc. so people have something to judge me on beyond my profile.