Individual Tuition and Looked After Children in Secondary Schools, A Pilot Project: results, recruiting schools for a Wave 2 pilot
In 2020/21 Virtual School Heads in the West Midlands (Coventry, Sandwell, Birmingham, and Dudley) partnered with Equal Education in providing a regional scale tutoring intervention programme for Yr 10 children in care (CiC) in what became called the Tutors: Individualised Learning Programme (TILP). The aim was to improve the educational outcomes for Children in Care, working with teachers within schools who were known to the young people and training and supporting them in the provision of one-to-one tuition over one academic year to improve literacy, writing and reading skills.
We at ReadingWise are proud to be a part of this programme, offering tutors additional material through the ReadingWise modules to support the literacy and reading strands.
Whilst tutoring and individual intervention programmes have been delivered for a number of years, central to this programme was measuring impact. The strict design defined assessments, methodology and delivery. This was to ensure that the tutoring was helping vulnerable students to attain higher.
Sixteen Year 10 Pupils and 10 tutors from 8 schools participated in Wave 1 (2020/21).
The Programme
The 'Tuition: Individualised Learning Programme' (TILP) is designed to:
- Target literacy attainment;
- Provide standardised benchmarking using the New Group Reading Test (NGRT) through GL Assessment;
- Identify gaps in learning and provide strategies, suggestions, and interventions;
- Address pupils’ individual literacy needs through teaching strategies and ReadingWise;
- Train staff in using ReadingWise for reading intervention and supporting SEMH needs;
- Raise literacy attainment alongside supporting emotional needs (SEMH).
Preliminary Results
Overall, 66% of pupils made progress with 44% making at least 2yrs+ Reading Age and 22% of pupils making between 4-14months progress. TILP has not only provided a stable link with a key member of staff from school, who was there to support and tutor the TILP Pupil, but also delivered tuition and support consistently and effectively, irrespective of whether the school was open or closed.
The project was implemented over a year when COVID saw young people suffering the consequences of lockdowns and disrupted education. Additional training and support was offered to tutors to help them help the young people cope with these challenges.
Wave 2
Wave 2 will commence in September 2021. Year 9 students in Care will participate in the TILP project for a 2yr period (2021/22-2022/23). This will enable us to maximise the opportunities for development of academic literacy skills but also to develop emotional literacy at an earlier age.
DfE Funding
Wave 1 of this pilot was funded by Virtual Schools. This will continue but additional streams of potential funding are now available through the DfE National Tutoring Programme (NTP), a ring-fenced grant given directly to schools to support provision of school-led tutoring in the academic year 2021/22.
Participating in Wave 2 of the TILP
If you are interested in finding out more about the TILP Project and participating in the next academic year, please email Gwen Fennell, TILP Strategic Director on [email protected]
