Our Successful Students

I am a pharmacist from Jordan and I was extremely stressed out because of the TOEFL exam and so hopeless to get the required scores especially in the speaking and the writing sections. I was stuck in 23 in the speaking even though I studied for long hours, bought several books, and registered for online TOEFL websites that have a good reputation. Actually, I took private classes to evaluate my responses and determine my weakness, and I was told that my English skills were fine, and I followed their advice. Unfortunately, my score did not raise.

What actually moved the needle is taking Sherlen’s group Speaking Studio. My scores after the Studio classes:

May 26th, 2018: Speaking 26, Writing 21

Then, I took private classes with her. In each class, she charged me with positive energy to keep up the good work. Her optimism is contagious and she really cares about her students. I consider this to be crucial in the TOEFL classes because the TOEFL is, all by itself, stressful and cannot be studied as a scientific test that I am used to.

I followed all of her recommendations, strategies, and I completed my TOEFL journey. Believe me, I know that taking the same exam several times is challenging and lowers our self-esteem, but the only thing that you really need is a professional evaluation to sense your progress and adjust your track and study effectively. Thank you again, Sherlen.

Well, my TOEFL journey was not very long, but it was definitely different. In the beginning, I decided not to waste my time and money on repeating the exam over and over. Instead, I gave myself 9 months of preparation. I decided to invest in myself in the right direction. So, I started my journey to find a good tutor. Another teacher referred me to Sherlen as the best Speaking teacher.

Here comes the big change:

Sherlen is a highly experienced English Coach! She can easily diagnose your areas that need improvement and definitely emphasize your strengths. She works on the fossilized mistakes (pronunciation, grammar, and others) that we do unconsciously and mistakes that block us from getting the score we need. Consequently, you become aware of your own areas that need development, and this is the first step on your improvement journey.

Sherlen also has the best follow up I have seen among all other tutors. She communicates with you to follow up on your progress even if you are not currently enrolled with her!

Last but not least, I encourage every student who tried many tutors and lost hope to give it a chance and try Sherlen and you will never regret this decision!! I did so and now I am done with TOEFL forever in a very short time.!

I just got my scores and I’m very happy because it was my first attempt. I started my preparation in February but due to COVID, my test was rescheduled several times, but that made me study even harder, especially for the speaking section. The nursing board requires 26+ on the speaking section. For that particular section what I did was:

1/ Record myself when practicing. Practiced at least 1 hour of my speaking.

2/ Reading out loud to improve my speech, intonation, and learn how to speak moving my mouth like a native. Smithsonian magazine has a big supply of academic articles to read.

3/ Using templates.

4/ And finally, I had the BEST teacher helping me to get my speaking score, Sherlen Tanner!

She taught me I had to open up my mouth (my speech had poor clarity), to use helpful sentences to maximize my responses and we also work on my intonation. I would say that I wouldn’t have been able to make it in the speaking section without her! She is the best. I hated Toelf for so long but I must recognize I speak better now. Now, I can finally say bye to TOEFL.

I want to thank Sherlen for her amazing TOEFL classes. I tried to study TOEFL by myself but I didn’t improve my score, then I decided to search for a TOEFL tutor to help me with this tough test. I saw one of her success stories, so I decided to take classes with her. I took intensive classes with her and she worked hard with me with all sections.

I increased my score from 78 to 95 and then she encouraged me to retake the exam again and I took it on February 28. At that time, my score was 103. Her digital course also helped me to get ideas about different topics.

She did her best to see my success and put her time to prepare me by finding my weak points and fixing them. Also, she helped me to control my stress. Thank you for everything, Sherlen!

Finally, I can close this chapter in my life, and I look forward to starting my real journey!! I have to admit that it wasn’t easy! It actually was a hell of a roller-coaster with the worst and best rides of it!

It’s essential for me to say a huge THANK YOU to the best tutor for TOEFL, Sherlen Tanner!

It was an honor to work with you. Your methods of studying and your perpetual support got me to continue and not to give up.

As far as my own studying tip that I would say helped me tremendously is to write and type down everything you speak and to try always to read out loud. Don’t give up! You will eventually get it done; just continue practicing, and you’ll write this post sooner than you expected.

I am a pharmacist from Thailand, and English is not my native language. My TOEFL journey started six years ago. My First TOEFL speaking score was 14. I have tried more than a dozen times to improve my scores. Even though I studied every day and attended many online classes, I could not pass the TOEFL with the required score (speaking 26).

When I met Sherlen, I had hit the ceiling for two years in my score for speaking at 23-24. Sherlen Tanner was by far the best teacher I have had for TOEFL. She coached me through some very challenging phonetics pronunciations, was honest with me, and very supportive.

Sherlen cares deeply about her students and shares the victory when they pass the TOEFL exam. I was blessed to find her, and I wish all of her students every success with the TOEFL exam. My final score for speaking was 26.

Every Toefl success story is beautiful, but mine is my favorite!

Hello there, guys! I’m Simina, a Romanian pharmacist that was struggling with the same problem as 95% of the foreign medical personnel are dealing with in order to be able to accomplish their board’s requirements and be eligible to obtain their licenses here in the USA.

For me, the toughest battle was the Toefl exam! It was nothing complicated for me to pass the foreign pharmacy exam but I got very intimidated by this exam especially since I missed the speaking score four times!

Finally, I challenged myself by sitting for the Toefl exam. Although I got the required scores on R, L, and W, I missed the speaking score with three points. I and missed it again and again and again! Even if after achieving an English base I was convinced that I can accomplish everything by myself and I didn’t want to ask for help, my stubbornness disappeared once I realized that I cannot face this battle alone anymore. I wasn’t used to experiencing failures regarding my education or career and it took me about 6 months to ask for help! If I knew, I could’ve definitely saved up at least 2-3 months. So, please once you tried once and figured out your weaknesses don’t repeat the same mistake I did, ask for help! You’re gonna save yourself some time (and money).

So, finally, I found out about Sherlen Tanner. She was a blessing. She was very patient in correcting my shortcomings which were mostly regarding topic development and delivery. She assessed my speaking level and then, progressively guided me in correcting each mistake. I can definitely confess that working with her or knowledgeable Toefl teachers like her is a guarantee that you’ll have a deep understanding of your shortcomings and a very effective study process since she’ll provide you with plenty of study tools and techniques/ strategies!

Achieving a high Speaking score of 26 is the toughest challenge that foreign graduate pharmacists face when they plan of becoming a pharmacist here, in the United States. So, people keep trying and others give up after taking the exam six, thirteen, or twenty times. However, recommending Sherlen for me after my wife read reviews about her had changed everything for me.

Sherlen stands out as an innovator in English language teaching. Her creativity, unique teaching approach, high energy, and integrity make learning fun, brain-friendly, and effective. She taught me that language learning is like sports and you only get better with practice. Sherlen makes this both fun and effective with the Weekly English Workout.

She sets the guidelines to follow to achieve an outstanding score. As a result, I was able to improve my speaking score from 23 to 28. In addition, my writing score went up from 21 to 24 after Writing group classes. With these scores, I’ll be able to pursue my dream of becoming a pharmacist in the United States.

I can promise you that Sherlen will not only put out 100% as a teacher, but will also motivate you to move forward in your language journey and make real progress.

Thank you Sherlen for your genuine support and help,

Your Proud student, Laith

Hello everyone! My name is Nui. I’m a pharmacist from Thailand who currently has just passed TOEFL (finally!). Back in early 2017, I had to prepare for the FPGEE exam. Since I would be in the US for 2 weeks in late 2017 for FPGEE exam, I thought I would give TOEFL a try too, so I started looking for a tutor who could help me with my speaking though I was (over)confident that my speaking was good enough to pass the TOEFL. Then I found Sherlen. I took only 1 private session with her and didn’t really care much about practicing because, again, I thought I had already been good enough. However, I was wrong. In late 2017, I got both good news and bad news. I passed FPGEE but unforgivably, failed the TOEFL. I got 24 in speaking. Although my then-boyfriend proposed to me because I passed the FPGEE, I couldn’t deny the fact that I still had to work on TOEFL again.

After I got married in early 2018 and permanently moved to the US, I tried to study TOEFL by myself. Yet, I failed. I tried to study with a different tutor, I failed. I tried to follow some “recommended” speaking templates from the TOEFL IBT Study Group, I still failed. I was so frustrated. I had no idea what I had done wrong so finally, in the end, I reached out to Sherlen again who once proved that I wasn’t as good at speaking as I thought I had been.

Sherlen helped me a lot with my accent reduction and pronunciation. I, then, realized that no matter how good the speaking templates are, if you don’t have good pronunciation, you will never ever get a good speaking score. Sherlen didn’t try to keep me with just herself. I mean, some teachers don’t want their students to practice with anyone but the teachers. However, Sherlen is not like that. She talked to my husband and guided him on how he could help me with my speaking. Surprisingly, my husband followed her instructions strictly. When Sherlen told him that I had problems with R, TH, CH, and V sounds, he turned from a loving husband to a nightmare. I had to practice how to pronounce those words correctly with him. He forced me to practice until my jaw almost fell off. When he went to work, I practiced speaking by myself or studied with Sherlen and did her homework. When he came home, he asked me independent questions and fixed my grammar and pronunciation from my answers. He even tried to grade my answers. When I was too tired to continue, he threatened me that I would disappoint Sherlen. When we were on vacation, for 2 hours on the road, he intensively fixed my grammar and pronunciation. He didn’t even listen to me when I asked for his mercy and continued fixing me. That vacation was a nightmare!! It was a pain that my husband followed every guidance my teacher gave him. When I told Sherlen about him, she laughed and said that it was a good thing because she could tell that I had some improvements.

On June 15th, it was either my 8th or 9th time sitting at the test center. Even the man at the register could remember me. I thought I could befriend him. I walked out of the test center with a swollen head. I couldn’t be bothered to care anymore. I even ignored my favorite donut that my husband offered after the test. I couldn’t tell him that if I failed and had to deal with the nightmare version of him again, I would definitely glue his mouth.

On June 25th, I got my result. I PASSED! I got 26 in speaking! FINALLY! I burst into tears! I felt like Atlantis who just threw the globe off his shoulders! I was over the moon! People say “work hard pays off”. Here I am!

I can say that without Sherlen, I would not have passed the test! She was so kind, considerate, and understanding. She knew which flaws that the individual had. She evaluated them and had them fixed. I had studied with a few TOEFL teachers, she is the best one. I didn’t only have a teacher, I also had a mentor and a friend. Thank you Sherlen for being part of my success.

You will not regret having her as your tutor. If you want to practice intensively, you can ask her to talk to your spouse and you will see a good outcome!

I was stuck in the speaking section for almost 2 years. I tried to study by myself and my speaking scores were 23-25, up and down. I tried every method that online tutors recommended on Youtube channels, but I still failed. I didn’t know what I did wrong; I had no idea. I blamed my nervousness and excitement during the test for this. But it wasn’t all about it. I finally decided to reach out to Sherlen.

She could indicate my problems in the first class we met. What I had to do was to follow her suggestion. Eventually, I took the test even before I finished the 1-month private class with her and I passed!! Thanks to Sherlen. She’s a lifesaver. I don’t know where I would be without her help. Now, I can pursue my professional career without worrying about TOEFL.

I am an Egyptian pharmacist who has taken the FPGEE in October 2016 and I took a lot of TOEFL online ETS official exams besides training on various TPO websites, I was actually improving my score each time but I never got more than 25 in the speaking section. I tried a couple of tutors, one of them was Mrs. Sherlen Tanner who was able to do the fine-tuning with her great help and outstanding experience.

Finally, a few days ago after my 13th attempt, I got my dream score and I am done with Toefl forever and my dream of becoming an American pharmacist will come true. Thanks, Mrs Tanner for your help, motivation when I used to be so frustrated by posting other students’ accomplishments, and great support. I will never forget you and you are a part of my success story. I got 29 in Speaking! Thanks again.

Hello! If you guys are struggling with TOEFL, check out my story! Maybe it can help someone put the TOEFL exam behind them!

My name is Annamaria and I`m a Pharmacist from Romania and I`m closer to being a licensed Pharmacist in the United States thanks to Sherlen Tanner !!!

I have never taken the exam before and I`ve heard horror stories about students struggling and taking it 10+ times and I thought “that`s not going to be me !”. So in November, I started looking for online classes and of course, there are quite a few teachers out there! On a Facebook group, there were a couple of students recommending Sherlen so I started looking for reviews and that is how I got convinced to try it out, the success stories from her students have spoken on her behalf!

When I started the Speaking Studio, I felt that I would never be as fluent and fast as my colleagues were and it seemed impossible! But a good teacher knows how to motivate her students and that is what Sherlen did! She focused on each student’s mistakes and she gave great advice on how to improve our English! There were a few mistakes that I was making that I was not even aware of but with her technique, I was able to erase even my fossilized mistakes! She was giving a lot of homework that she was giving feedback on later and this is how I improved my English! If you are very motivated and you have the right teacher on your (online) side, it is possible so don`t give up!!

The Reading Studio seemed super hard at the beginning. Before the online courses I could never finish in time and the questions were so tricky that I could not have been doing it on my own. But with the right directions and tricks, Sherlen made it look possible! I remember taking the exam (which was not easy !!) and thinking how much time I saved because I had the proper “training” and I knew what I needed to focus on!

Finally, the Writing Studio was for me the hardest! I had so many problems in the beginning, I was struggling on my Integrated essay, Sherlen was constantly giving me feedback and that`s how I was able to score 29!! She has these very well-thought templates that she teaches that made the difference in the exam!

In brief, I am beyond happy with my choice and I recommend her to anyone who wants to pass the TOEFL exam! It takes a lot of determination and you will come across challenges from time to time. And that is why if you have a very good teacher helping you through these challenges and motivating you and shaping your English skills can make a difference! I think it`s better to focus on skill-building for a few months and then just pass the exam than to take the exam without being prepared which can be frustrating. In my opinion, you will even save more money and energy if you focus on how to improve your English and just take it when you feel prepared! So that is why I recommend Sherlen Tanner with all my heart! Thanks to her I am closer than ever to pursue my dream as a Pharmacist in the United States!

Finally, I got my desirable TOEFL score: “91”, which is even more than I expected. I decided to share my experience because maybe one of you is on the same path applying to professional programs and you are wondering how to start … I am going to be happy to help you in any way.

I am a Cuban dentist applying for Dental schools that ask for a TOEFL score of 80 to 84. I learned BASIC English from school (I mean from elementary to Univ) very basic, then I moved to the US. My English skills got a bit better with the “daily routine” (working, TV, etc)

Once I passed the National Board Dental Examinations, I felt more confident with the language, so I decided to study for the TOEFL. I planned 1 MONTH of preparation. I saw so many videos on YouTube (even when I was cooking, driving, walking) and I paid attention to all the details, advice and I took notes of the templates. Also, I practiced a series of tests from the ETS TOEFL that I bought. After a month of a lot of effort and expectations, I took the test and I was positive until I saw a 72 score. I was really disappointed and frustrated because I asked myself what I can do to really improve that score. I didn’t want to take another month and increase the score by just 5 or 10 points.

Finally, God gave a light! One of my friends recommended that I look for a teacher specialized in the TOEFL test. That was the best decision I made; the results talked for themselves. Sherlen Tanner was a blessing! I wish I met her before. I took 8 private lessons. She focused on my weaknesses with patience and dedication. She gave me useful tips, and we practiced together. For homework, she provided me resources to practice by myself and I got the feedback. Her lessons were worth every penny! I increased 19 points within a month of preparation. I am pretty sure that I could do it better if I would have more time for the preparation.

My best advice for all of you guys is>> if you want to go straight to your TOEFL GOAL score, do not hesitate to look for an expert to help you. You will save MONEY, STRESS, and the most valuable thing in my opinion: TIME!

Sherlen has group lessons other than private lessons. I didn’t go with that option because I was running out of time, but believe me, her classes, whether private or group will make a difference in your TOEFL score very quickly, if you follow her study plan and the tools she provides! THANK YOU SO MUCH, Sherlen Tanner, and good luck to all of you guys!

Hi, my name is Javier E. de la Barca, and I’m a dentist who graduated from Cuba who is in the process of validation of his dental license in the USA. Like many internationally educated professionals, I had to take the TOEFL in order to be accepted in a university to obtain my desired certification. For that reason, and for the recommendations of my sister and colleagues, I came to Mrs Tanner for training and guidance on that test.

From the beginning, she was very accommodating, and despite she is very busy, she found a convenient spot in her schedule for me. I’m very grateful to her because of her advice and teachings I was able to successfully pass the TOEFL at the first attempt, and get the score I needed to apply to my dreamed school.

Moreover, I feel that she also helped me to improve my language skills for my future professional performance. For all that and more, I highly recommend her program for people who are interested in succeeding this difficult, but not impossible test.

I can’t even express in words the happiness, the excitement, and the relief that I feel after one and a half years of undergoing many trials and tribulations. I was dreaming of this moment since 2019 when I began my journey. I must tell you that everything that you feel now when it comes to this “torturous” exam is exactly what I felt until today.

I never believed in my life that a simple English test would challenge my mind, my soul, and my life in the way it did. It was impossible for me to think that after passing so many exams (which were very difficult) for my Pharmacy degree, and after passing FPGEE in the English language, my progress could be stopped by TOEFL, an English proficiency exam. Therefore, I tried everything that I thought would help me. I took classes with many tutors last year and even though I learned something from each of them, I could not get the desired score. I was always missing one or two points in Speaking or Reading. The frustration and the anger increased month by month until I met Sherlen and I enrolled in her Reading group classes for almost 3 months and also in private classes for Speaking.

First of all, Sherlen is a great person, not just an amazing teacher. She knows how to keep her students motivated and not allow them give up on their dreams. Yes, I cried so many times and I was so close to giving up on myself, but Sherlen was always there to give me the hand that I needed to lift me up. I need to thank Sherlen for part of my success; for the patience, encouragement, and support that she provided me along this road.

Thanks to her amazing teaching techniques, the cause-effect strategies which made it easier for me to comprehend the meaning of the passages; and thanks to her making me aware of the strong statements that always are tricky in the answer choices, I was able to achieve my desired score. Her classes are fun and challenging, and every student is engaged in the practice. In Speaking, I was stuck at 25 and I thought that nothing will work for me to cross that bridge, but Sherlen diagnosed me very quickly

She realized that my own worst enemy is myself because I am a perfectionist. She always encouraged me to keep talking and to not stop even when I make a mistake in order to synthesize the given information and not to be stressed when talking. Also, her shadowing strategy is a very good tool to become fluent in speaking. I was afraid to take the exam again because of failing, but she repeated to me that you do not have to be perfect in speaking to be able to pass the exam.

One week before my exam, I was completely exhausted and overwhelmed. I couldn’t not concentrate anymore, so I went to my exam with the state of mind “whatever it is, it is. I will do my best and that’s it”. Surprisingly, when I didn’t care so much, I didn’t stress so much to be perfect; and I managed to get 26 in speaking. After you realize that you gave every last ounce of your energy towards preparing for this exam and you are about to give up…remember to look back at the reasons why you started this journey in the first place and keep moving forward. Even when there seems like there is no light at the end of the tunnel, remember that you have what it takes to pass this exam and you just have to detach a little bit from your strong desires to win, in order to reach your end goal. Always remind yourself that you have what it takes to do this and that what is worth having, is worth working for. Everything worth having is worth fighting for!