ClassWide Peer Tutoring

Instructional Practice
Comprehension, Oral Reading Fluency, Vocabulary
Tier I,II
1st—12th
Time

30 mins

Target Student

CWPT is designed to be used with all students in a classroom. CWPT can be particularly beneficial for students who demonstrate difficulties with fluency, spelling, vocabulary, or comprehension; students with special needs, students who are culturally and linguistically diverse, or students with ADHD.

Description

According to What Works Clearinghouse, ClassWide Peer Tutoring (CWPT) is a peer-assisted instructional strategy designed to be integrated into any existing reading curriculum. CWPT provides students with increased opportunities to practice reading skills by asking questions and receiving immediate feedback from a peer tutor. Pairs of students take turns tutoring each other to reinforce concepts and skills initially taught by the teacher. Thus, students will fulfill both the role of the tutor and tutee. The teacher creates age-appropriate materials, taking into account the students’ language skills and disabilities.

 

This is an instructional practice. An instruction practice is a teaching method that guides interactions in the classroom and supports student learning. Instructional practices involve an educator using particular method, practice, or protocol during instruction.

How To

The primary goal of CWPT is to facilitate students' achievement and mastery of any classroom content subject matter. It incorporates a stimulus-response tutoring technique with error correction and game format that benefit both the tutor and the tutee.

 

In a CWPT classroom, students are paired with a same-aged peer to to learn the academic task at hand. Each student in the pair will take turns playing the role of the tutor) and the tutee.  During tutoring, the tutor will provide the content stimulus to the other student.  This stimulus could be a pronounced spelling word, a stated math problem, a direction for reading a passage aloud, or any other skill that involves right-wrong answers.  The other student (the tutee) performs the learning student role by responding orally or in writing (or both, depending on the task). During this time, the tutor monitors and assesses the correctness of the responses. 

 

CWPT is based on a basketball game format with the entire classroom being divided into two equal ability teams who are competing to be the winning team by earning the most points during the tutoring process. In each tutoring pair, the responding student (the tutee) earns points based on the correctness of the answers. The tutor awards 2 points for every correct answer and as soon as the tutee makes an error in a response, the tutor provides the correct answer for the tutee to model. One point is awarded for every assisted answer the tutee correctly practices three times in both the oral and written form if possible. Each student performs his/her specific role for a specified amount of time (typically no longer than five minutes) , and at the end of that time, the students switch roles so that the tutor now becomes the tutee and vice versa, allowing the same amount of time for the new tutee to earn points and be more directly involved with the content in the responding role. At the end of the second round of tutoring, the points earned from all members of the two teams are added together to determine the winning team for the day. 

Research

Ayvazo, S., & Aljadeff-Abergel, E. (2014). Classwide peer tutoring for elementary and high school students at risk: Listening to students' voices. Support for Learning, 29(1), 76-92. doi:10.1111/1467-9604.12047

Maheady, L., & Gard, J. (2010). Classwide peer tutoring: Practice, theory, research, and personal narrative. Intervention In School & Clinic, 46(2), 71-78. doi:10.1177/1053451210376359

Lundblom, E. G., & Woods, J. J. (2012). Working in the classroom: Improving idiom comprehension through classwide peer tutoring. Communication Disorders Quarterly, 33(4), 202-219. doi:10.1177/1525740111404927

Bowman-Perrott, L. (2009). Classwide peer tutoring: An effective strategy for students with emotional and behavioral disorders. Intervention In School & Clinic, 44(5), 259-267.

Neddenriep, C.E., Skinner, C. H., Wallace, M. A., & McCallum, E. (2009). Classwide peer tutoring: Two experiments investigating the generalized relationship between increased oral reading fluency and reading comprehension. Journal of Applied School Psychology, 25(3), 244-269. doi:10.1080/15377900802487185

Research Summary

What Works Clearinghouse (IES)

 

Best Evidence Encyclopedia (BEE); Condensed Report

Related Resources

Sample rule chart

Sample scoring sheets: Figure 5Figure 6

Comprehension questions prompts

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