Peer Tutoring.

My principal told me this past Monday that I needed to change the way I write things in my lesson plans from "Students will work together on "  to "Students will teach each other" because he wants it to be that on my lesson plans.  So I'm thinking of stating "Using peer tutoring, students will teach each other" since its actually more accurate.

Peer tutoring is defined as students working in pairs to help each other learn or practice the current mathematical task.  It has also been around in some form since 1795 when it was first promoted in Scotland and over the past 30 to 40 years, it has become quite popular for pairing up students of mixed abilities.

It has been suggested that when pairing students up, they should be of different abilities and students should switch who does the tutoring regularly because as a person explains the material, they are extending their own understanding and learning. So one student is the expert while the other is the novice. 

In addition to extending their understanding, students often undergo higher academic achievement, better relations with other students, increased motivation, and improved social and personal interactions.  Furthermore, teachers have more time to provide individualized instruction as needed while students are getting individualized instruction when the teacher is not available and it cuts down on misbehavior.

Other benefits include  the fact that the interaction between students promotes learning, reinforces individual learning by instructing others, active learning is promoted by direct instruction between students, students are more comfortable with each other, promotes mathematical discussion between students,  and it is the best way to promote mastery.

One thing about peer tutoring is that it is best to provide training for all students so they know what to do and what the teacher's expectations.  Without those, the expert students may do the work for the other student or allow them to copy.  Furthermore, by training all students, it makes it easier for students to switch from tutor to the one being tutored so both have a chance to show their knowledge. 

I have peer tutoring in my classroom and I've seen students who do very little actually gain confidence and begin turning in more and more work until they are succeeding.  Let me know what you think, I'd love to hear.  Have a great day.