How to get the most from tutoring: what parents do between sessions

Copy the schedule the studies used

Three or more sessions a week. Thirty to 60 minutes each. At least 10 weeks. The same tutor every time. One to three students, with four the ceiling the EdResearch for Action brief by Robinson, Kraft, Loeb, and Schueler supports. That is the design in the brief. The brief found little evidence that once-a-week tutoring is enough, and programs run during the school day had effects roughly twice as large as programs outside school.

The Chicago Match/Saga program is the clearest example. AmeriCorps fellows tutored two students at a time, in math, one class period every school day, in 12 Chicago public high schools. As reported in the brief, math grades rose by 0.58 GPA points (a C- average became a C+), students were 50% less likely to fail math, and 28% less likely to fail a non-math course. The research team's own working paper (Guryan, Ludwig, and co-authors, NBER Working Paper 28531, March 2021) puts the first-year figures at 0.56 GPA points and a 49% drop in math course failures, at $3,500 to $4,300 per student per year.

You cannot buy a daily in-school tutor tonight. You can copy the parts that matter: frequent, small, consistent, and tied to this week's classwork.

What to send the tutor before the first session

A tutor who starts with a stack of your child's real work skips two sessions of guessing. Send this by email the day before, and ask for a two-line reply naming the first skill they will work on.

• The last two tests or quizzes in the subject, wrong answers included. Photos are fine.
• The exact stuck topic, in one sentence. Not "math" but "regrouping when subtracting across a zero" or "cannot say what a paragraph was about."
• Anything the teacher has said, quoted. "Fine on facts, freezes on word problems" beats your summary of it.
• The class's current unit and the next one, from the teacher's newsletter or the online gradebook.
• A time budget: how many sessions a week, how long, and how many weeks you are committing to. Ten weeks is the minimum the research supports.

What does a good tutoring week look like?

Here is a week that fits the studied range: three 45-minute sessions, 15 minutes of printed practice the day after each one, 12 weeks. It is the same plan the planner at the bottom of this page starts from.

• Monday, 4:00 to 4:45 pm: session 1. Tutor reteaches the stuck idea, then works three problems from this week's classwork.
• Tuesday, 6:30 to 6:45 pm: one printed page on the skill the tutor named. Timer on, stop at 15 minutes even if it is not finished.
• Wednesday, 4:00 to 4:45 pm: session 2. Tutor checks Tuesday's page first, then moves on.
• Thursday, 6:30 to 6:45 pm: second printed page, same skill or the next one the tutor named.
• Friday, 4:00 to 4:45 pm: session 3. Short check on the week's skill, then a preview of Monday's class topic.
• Saturday, 9:00 to 9:15 am: one page, then done. Sunday: nothing.
• Sunday evening, 5 minutes for you: read the tutor's note, check the gradebook, and send the tutor one line if anything changed at school.

What to ask your child before and after each session

Do not ask "how was tutoring?" You will get "fine." Ask questions with a specific answer. Two minutes is enough.

Before: "What is the one thing you want to get unstuck on today?" If they cannot name one, text it to the tutor yourself from the last homework.

After: "Show me one problem you can do now that you could not do on Monday." Then: "What page did the tutor say to practice tomorrow?" Write the answer on the fridge. That is the next day's practice assignment.

Stay out of the teaching. Re-explaining the lesson at the kitchen table puts your child back in front of their hardest audience. Let the tutor teach.

Practice between sessions: 10 minutes, then stop

The page should match the skill the tutor named, not random review. The EdResearch brief warns that handing students simpler, older material can leave them further behind the class. Ask the tutor to name the skill, then print the page that matches it:

• Multiplication facts: the multiplication page, so the reps happen without an adult explaining each one.
• Fractions or a missed upper-elementary unit: the fractions page, because the visual models match how tutors reteach the idea.
• Decoding or early reading: the phonics page, because 10 minutes of sound-to-letter practice is the follow-through most reading tutors ask for.
• General arithmetic or word problems: the math page, where you pick the grade and operation the tutor named.

How do you know it is working? Check at week 4 and week 10

Week 4 is too early for grades to move. Look for three things instead: your child can explain the tutor's method in their own words, homework in that subject takes closer to the time the teacher expects, and the tutor's notes name a different skill than in week 1. Two of three means keep going.

Week 10 is when grades and quiz scores should show it. Compare the last three quizzes to the three before tutoring started, and ask the teacher: "Is the work in class closer to grade level than in September?" If nothing has moved by week 10 at three sessions a week, the match is wrong, not your child.

Send the teacher a two-line note after week 2: who the tutor is and which skill you are targeting. Ask what unit is coming next month and forward the answer to the tutor.

When to change tutors

Change the tutor when any of these is true after four sessions: the tutor will not write down what was taught; sessions are spent finishing homework instead of rebuilding the missing idea; your child cannot name one thing they learned; or the tutor keeps cancelling, so you are below three contacts a week. A warm person who helps with homework once a week is not what the studies measured.

Do not change tutors because week 3 was hard. Effort goes up before grades do. Change for a pattern, not a bad Tuesday.

How to end tutoring well

Taper, do not stop. Drop from three sessions a week to two for three weeks, then one for three weeks, and keep the 10-minute pages going on the empty days. Ask the tutor for a one-page handoff: skills that are solid, skills still fragile, and the next unit where trouble is likely. Give a copy to the teacher.

Keep the Sunday gradebook check after the tutor is gone. The first slipping quiz is the signal to restart at three sessions a week for four weeks.

Use the planner below to set this week's sessions and practice minutes. It tells you whether the plan is in the range the studies used and links to the practice page for the subject.