Structured Peer Tutoring
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Project is designed for middle school students (grades 6-8) at the Boys & Girls Club (Ladmo Branch) in Tempe, Arizona. Population largely consists of children of color as well as children from low-income families.
Project will take place at the Boys & Girls Club (Ladmo Branch) in Tempe, Arizona. Peer tutoring will take place inside of the Learning Center.
Project will be implemented in the Spring of 2020 and will occur every Tuesday and Thursday as an additional rotation to the regular program offered at the organization. Project will be sustained over time by staff and volunteers.
Project will be to implement a structured peer tutoring program at the Boys & Girls Club (Ladmo Branch) for middle school students. Students will have the opportunity to participate in collaborative learning with other students in a range of academic subjects.
Former personal experience with structured peer tutoring in AVID has demonstrated positive results. My hope is to replicate this collaborative learning format at the Boys and Girls Club (Ladmo Branch).
Students will participate in structured peer tutoring groups for 50 minutes every Tuesday and Thursday as this program will be integrated into the scheduled programming at the Club. Students will working in groups of 4-5 and may or may not have a facilitator directly working with them.
Volunteers will receive training on how to facilitate these tutoring groups, as the role of the facilitator in collaborative learning settings is different from the traditional role of a tutor.
Program will need to be sustained by staff and volunteers; a secondary component to this project could consist of recruiting more local volunteers for the Club.
Volunteers could be recruited from local high schools and marketed as a service opportunity.
Students will receive training on how to practice social skills that are conducive to collaborative learning.
Students who demonstrate these skills will be rewarded with snacks, additional time to socialize, etc.
Student participation will be tracked on a white board and students will receive rewards once they exceed a given benchmark.
Learning center is in need of consumable supplies and instructional resources. Fundraising will address this need in order to optimize the Learning Center as a space for collaborative learning to take place.
Empirical research on collaborative learning demonstrates two major benefits to structured peer tutoring: increase in academic achievement and increase in social cohesion among young adolescents.
Tutoring groups will be facilitated, however, not led by, volunteers. The objective of structured peer tutoring is to have the students help one another solve problems.
Academic achievement benefits students who help and students who are being helped.
Over time, structured peer tutoring groups can take place on a more frequent, and perhaps even daily basis.