Case Study #29 - Language arts for an online homeschooler
Miles and Eric Gardner were in the second half of 1st grade when their family decided to start tutoring for the twins. They are both students with the charter school Blue Ridge Academy, and both were struggling with various aspects of online school. Their parents helped them as best they could, but ultimately decided that the boys needed additional enrichment in order to succeed.
Plan of Action:
When tutoring began, Miles struggled with speaking, reading comprehension, and writing. Whereas Eric was doing well with reading but struggled with writing. The tutor worked with them both separately, addressing their individual needs. For Miles, the tutor challenged him by engaging him in conversations where he had to provide detailed answers, helping him to become more comfortable sharing his thoughts. The tutor also had him write out responses to reading comprehension stories. For Eric, the tutor primarily focused on writing exercises, putting emphasis on correct grammar and punctuation, as well as organizing his points before writing. Eric struggled sometimes maintaining his attention span during lessons, and the tutor helped him stay on track.
Results:
After only a few months of tutoring, both Miles and Eric had made vast improvements. Miles had begun reading well above his grade level, and was becoming more and more comfortable expressing his thoughts in both speaking and writing. Eric’s writing skills had also greatly improved; he made less technical errors, and found it easier to focus on the task of writing itself.
Outlook:
Both students paused their tutoring over the summer, after a semester of impressive hard work. Their family was incredibly proud of the improvement they both made in such a short amount of time! They plan to resume tutoring for the twins in 2nd grade, in order to continue providing the same level of support and enrichment.