Tutoring Results: How Do Students Perform With Private Instruction?
Education advocates have forever lauded the advantages of Private Tutoring. Over the past several decades, organizations have compiled tons of data to illustrate the many advantages of home tutoring.

It should come as no surprise that there is a positive correlation between rising grades and private instruction. After all, tutors are simply another opportunity to visit material outside of class.

But what do the numbers say?

  • A study at the University of Oregon in 2000 evaluated the number of words per minute a sample of students could read aloud. Within two semesters of bi-weekly tutoring sessions of 30 minutes each, second graders increased their reading speed by a whopping 38% and third graders improved by 20%.
  • An article published in the Elementary School Journal in 1990 tested two groups of students with a multiple-choice exam. One group of students received no tutoring, while the other received 6 months of hour-long weekly instruction. The results indicated that for both second and third graders, the tutored students outperformed the other group in every category: vocabulary, spelling, and reading comprehension.
  • Another study published in the Journal of Educational Psychology found that middle and high school students achieve the best results in mathematics after one-on-one tutoring. On the other hand, elementary school students experience the biggest jumps in reading and spelling.
  • As a tutor, the greatest accomplishment isn’t helping a student bring their grades up – it’s giving them the motivation and confidence to be successful learners. Time and time again, parents have seen their children actually get excited about learning thanks to an encouraging tutor.
  • In fact, the US Department of Education published a study in 1990 called “Dropout Prevention Strategies.” The organization found that when students were paired with a tutor, there was a drastic decline in student absences and disciplinary referrals. It turns out that tutors provide a much-needed emotional boost to many students.

As teachers continue to rely on technology in the classroom, this also opens up a unique opportunity for online tutoring. While extensive research hasn’t yet been conducted on online instruction, personal anecdotes still show us how successful these programs can be.

Online Tutoring: A Firsthand Account

Doug and Meredith Lenney are two parents who decided to try an online tutor for their 7th grade son, Aaron. They admit that “online tutoring wasn’t our first choice, but the price was reasonable and Aaron really needed help in math and science.”

After making the transition to middle school, Aaron’s grades started slipping and his parents started looking for answers. So, in March 2014, Doug and Meredith hired a tutor out of Atlanta, Georgia – a nearly 4-hour drive from their home in Charlotte, NC.

Why? “All of his lessons are over the internet,” answers Meredith Lenney. “All we have to do is connect to Skype and Aaron has one full hour of private instruction on our home computer.”

Within six months, Aaron’s grades slowly climbed from a C average to an A-. His parents were astonished, but more importantly Aaron had regained his confidence inside the classroom.

Online instruction reveals that students can achieve the same results as a conventional tutor, but over the web. It is both exciting and uplifting to think about the endless possibilities to help students excel.