November - Connection Update!

Tutoring began on October 8th! We’ve had nine total tutoring sessions, each for an hour and a half. We started our sessions with 4 students attending, and numbers quickly quadrupled! We are now tutoring 19 students enrolled in all grades K-5! In addition to having 19 students attending, we have many wonderful volunteers tutoring. Numerous eighth grade students have been volunteering as tutors and doing an excellent job! Each tutoring session we have had 3-8 eighth graders volunteering. Tutors have been making connections with their students and fostering positive relationships regarding school/academics. Students are even asking for their tutors if they don’t see them.

While at tutoring, students are working on various skills, most recommended by their teachers and their NWEA scores. This is a district test that is given 2-3 times per year in grades K-8. This assessment of skills drives instruction for teachers in the classroom, intervention groups at school, and focus areas for tutoring. Students are also completing skills on IXL during their time at tutoring. Some of these skills are assigned by teachers while others are directly related to a student’s skill plan, which is based on their NWEA scores. Tutoring students are also working on their spelling words each week, practicing them with their tutors in various ways. We’ve had students do practice with Play-Doh, Bananagrams, whiteboards, flashlight spelling, blind spelling, and more! This seems to really be supporting students in their spelling tests each week. Students have also been completing math pages from school while at tutoring. This allows the student more practice with their classroom work and gives tutors an idea of additional things they can work on with their students.

Parents have shared how much progress they are seeing with their children, and teachers are seeing skills gained as well. Assigned skills are being completed while at tutoring and supplemental reading from teachers is supporting students in the classroom also.