IGCSE Science Tutor in Al Muteena

Everything in a science plan hangs off which series the student is entered for, so this comes first. Cambridge International runs IGCSE, O Level and International A Level examinations in a June series and a November series, with Primary and Lower Secondary Checkpoint tests in March, May and October. The February and March series is offered to India only. A student in Al Muteena therefore has June and November, and nothing else.

That restriction has a practical edge. An earlier version of the research behind these pages offered the February and March key dates as a worked example, and pages went out quoting a February examination window and a late-November entry deadline to UAE parents. A wrong date is worse than a thin page, because a parent acts on it. If any provider gives you a February series date for a Dubai school, that is a reason to doubt everything else on their page.

Pearson Edexcel International GCSE examinations are available in May/June and November each year. The November 2026 final timetable ran from late October to 19 November 2026. Results follow at known intervals: June 2026 results reached centres on 19 August 2026 and students on 20 August 2026, and November 2025 results reached students on 22 January 2026. Those dates keep their years here because they are citations, and the year is what makes them checkable.

One further Cambridge rule matters and almost nobody mentions it. Every centre is allocated to one of six administrative zones, and Cambridge states that it is essential to use the correct version of the timetable for your zone, adding that it cannot accept responsibility for candidates who miss an examination after using the wrong version. A parent downloading a timetable from a general search result rather than from the school is taking a risk for no reason.

Parents are often surprised by how much this question matters. A Year 11 may be entered for three single sciences, a double award or a single combined award, under one of two boards, at one of two tiers. Each combination has a different paper structure, a different practical arrangement and a different amount of content, and revising from the wrong set of resources is one of the most expensive mistakes available in the final term.

On the Cambridge side, the single sciences carry the codes 0625 for Physics, 0620 for Chemistry and 0610 for Biology. Coordinated Sciences 0654 is a double award covering all three, and Combined Science 0653 is a single award. The double and combined awards are not simply the single syllabuses shortened: content is selected, so a student revising physics from 0625 material while entered for 0654 will study topics they are not examined on and miss emphasis they are.

On the Pearson side, the single sciences are 4PH1, 4CH1 and 4BI1, with 4SD0 Double Award Science as the combined route. The structural difference parents notice most is the practical arrangement: Cambridge single sciences assess practical skills in a separate paper, while Pearson assesses them inside the written papers. That single difference changes the final month of revision substantially.

The first action for any family in this cluster is to find the examination entry letter and read the codes on it. Then check the paper structure against the board's own published specification, because syllabus versions change and a tutor working from an old one will prepare the wrong things. This is a five-minute task that routinely improves a revision plan more than an extra month of sessions.

For Cambridge single sciences the practical component is worth a fifth of the grade, and there is usually a choice the school made on the student's behalf: a practical test taken in a laboratory, or an alternative-to-practical written paper. Parents almost never know which, and students frequently revise as though the component does not exist because it is the one part of the course with no obvious textbook chapter.

The two options demand different preparation. A practical test rewards apparatus familiarity, measurement technique and the discipline of recording readings as they are taken. An alternative-to-practical paper rewards the ability to read a described experiment, identify the variable being controlled, criticise a method and process somebody else's results. Both reward table layout and graph discipline, which is why those two skills are the best use of a late session.

Pearson's arrangement is different: practical skills are assessed inside the written papers rather than in a separate component. That does not make them less important, it makes them harder to see. A student who has never deliberately practised method criticism will meet it embedded in a longer question and treat it as a comprehension exercise rather than a technique with marks attached.

The action here is specific and takes one email: ask the school which practical component each science is entered for, then plan accordingly. In the final eight weeks, two sessions spent on the practical paper format are usually worth more than two spent on content, because the format is unfamiliar and formats are learnable.

Eight weeks is the shortest window that reliably changes a science grade, and it only does so if the plan is specific. The mistake families make is to attempt a full syllabus sweep, which spreads attention so thinly that nothing is secured. The better approach is to accept that some topics will be left alone, and to spend the window on the behaviours that cost marks across every topic at once.

Week one is diagnosis: the last two marked papers, read against the published mark scheme, with the losses counted by cause rather than by topic. Most students discover that two or three habits account for more lost marks than any content gap. Weeks two to four attack those habits, alongside the two topics with the clearest return, which is usually electricity in physics, moles in chemistry and genetics vocabulary in biology.

Weeks five and six turn to the practical component and to data handling, because both are learnable formats and both appear in every paper. Weeks seven and eight are full timed papers under something close to examination conditions, marked properly, with the final sessions spent on the specific question types still going wrong. Nothing new is introduced in the last fortnight, because new content at that point displaces practice of content already known.

The plan in the table is a template rather than a prescription, and the dates it hangs on are the school's: the mock result, the entry confirmation and the first paper. A tutor who cannot tell you which week of this countdown your child is in does not have a plan.

Rates in this market are published inconsistently, and three of the six most visible competitor pages quote no price at all. What can be verified is worth stating with its source. Unitors publishes IGCSE tuition from AED 150 an hour. TutorChase quotes AED 270. BartyED publishes AED 650 for a premium named tutor. EdFlik advertises from AED 45 to AED 65 and Tutopiya from roughly AED 33 to AED 52. The Bestimate rate survey for Dubai places specialist tuition at AED 200 to AED 450 or more and in-home visits at AED 180 to AED 350.

The verifiable part is the method, not just the number. Each of those figures sits on a page a parent can open, which is what makes it useful; a rate quoted without a source is just a claim. Monthly, Bestimate estimates roughly AED 240 to AED 600 for budget tutoring on a weekly one-hour pattern, AED 600 to AED 1,200 in the middle band and AED 1,000 to AED 2,000 or more for specialist exam-year support.

Science has a specific cost feature: a family often needs more than one subject. Three single sciences with three different weak topics is not one tutoring request, and a provider who implies one tutor covers physics, chemistry and biology at Extended level with equal depth is overstating. Sometimes one tutor genuinely can, more often two is the honest answer, and that doubles the budget conversation. Asking about it early is better than discovering it in April.

IB Gram does not publish an hourly table on this page, because the hours a student needs depend entirely on the window remaining and on how many subjects are involved. The arrangement is a free trial lesson, a written diagnosis and then a plan sized to both. Every figure above belongs to the provider or survey named with it.

The scheduling argument matters more for science than for most subjects, because a Year 11 sitting three sciences needs more sessions in the same week than a student sitting one subject. Four sessions a week across two tutors is a logistics problem for any family, and it is the point at which in-home delivery usually breaks down: two tutors, two commutes, two arrival times that depend on Al Ittihad Road.

Online removes that entirely. Sessions can be stacked on a weekend morning, split across two evenings, or placed at 7am before school in the final fortnight, which is a slot no visiting tutor would offer. Nothing travels, so nothing is late, and a session that was going to be cancelled because of traffic simply happens. For an eight-week countdown where consistency is the whole point, that reliability is the substance of the argument rather than a convenience.

IB Gram does not send tutors to homes in the UAE; home visits are offered only in India. Lessons for Al Muteena families run one-to-one over live video on Gulf Standard Time, with past papers and mark schemes shared on screen and sessions recorded for later review. In-home science tutoring is available locally from independent tutors and agencies at published market rates, and for a younger student who will not stay on task without someone in the room it may be the better choice.

The comparison below is written for a three-science Year 11 specifically, because that is the hardest case and the one where the format difference shows most clearly.

A science countdown in Dubai does not run on the board's calendar alone. Arabic, Islamic Education and Social and Moral Studies are mandatory in all Dubai private schools regardless of the licensed international curriculum, and KHDA required implementation by the start of the 2025-26 academic year, with April 2026 the equivalent date for schools whose year begins in April. Instructional time for those subjects is calculated on a 40-minute lesson unit. Those are real weekly hours that cannot be moved to make room for revision.

Ramadan then reshapes the school day across the emirate and moves household routines substantially, with study time shifting to late evening after Iftar for many families. A plan that ignores it either fails during the month or quietly stops. The workable approach is to reschedule into post-Iftar slots for the month and to treat it as a different kind of term rather than a lost one.

Eid holidays, winter and spring breaks, National Day and the school's own mock window all compete for the same weeks. Mapping those dates before buying any hours is unglamorous and it is the single most useful planning act available to a family in this cluster. What remains after the mapping is the real revision window, and sizing the plan to it is why some plans survive twelve weeks and others collapse in week three.

The regulator context is worth one sentence for completeness. Dubai private schools are overseen by KHDA, which is responsible for enhancing and overseeing the quality of private education in the emirate. Abu Dhabi and Al Ain fall under ADEK, Sharjah under the Sharjah Private Education Authority, Ras Al Khaimah under its Department of Knowledge, and Ajman, Umm Al Quwain and Fujairah under the federal Ministry of Education. IB Gram holds no permit or approval from any of them and should never be described as approved by one.