At Home-School Tutoring, we’re in no doubt about the effectiveness of private tuition. But what evidence is there that individual tuition really makes a difference?
Every Child schemes
The effectiveness of individual tutoring was very clearly shown with the success of the Every Child schemes launched by the Labour government in 2008.
For the Every Child Counts (ECC) scheme, launched in selected English Primary Schools, a specialist numeracy teacher provided one-to-one support for the lowest-achieving Year 2 children for half an hour a day over the course of a term.
The findings, published by the ‘Every Child a Chance Trust’, showed an average gain, in number age, of 14 months were made after 20 hours of individual teaching.
Meanwhile, the Trust’s Every Child a Reader (ECaR) program showed participating children advanced almost two years in the reading age after 40 hours of individual reading.
With school budget cuts, money is no longer ringfenced for these schemes but we continue to work with many schools who choose to help their struggling disadvantaged pupils to catch up with individual tuition.
Recent private tuition studies
In August 2017, the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF) published a Teaching & Learning Toolkit document answering the question ‘How effective is one to one tuition?
“Evidence indicates that one to one tuition can be effective, on average accelerating learning by approximately five additional months’ progress,” states the EEF.
Short, regular sessions were found to give the best results.
The EEF also found tuition in groups of two or three could be as effective as one-to-one tuition. Results were variable, however, suggesting “the quality of teaching in one to one tuition or small groups is more important than the group size.”
Programmes involving teaching assistants or volunteers were also found to have a valuable impact, but tended to be less effective than those using experienced and specifically trained teachers, which have nearly twice the effect on average.
Not just any tutor…
At Home-School Tutoring (HST), we ensure all our tutors are qualified and committed to meeting our high teaching and service standards before accepting them onto our register. We also follow up references and obtain enhanced Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) checks.
That’s why you can be sure of patient, engaging lessons and great results.
Contact your local HST Area Adviser for free advice if you’re considering private tuition for your child, yourself or someone else.
Visit our Locations page and complete the enquiry form or pick up the phone and give them a call. They’ll be delighted to help.