Purpose: Students' relative skill levels change over time, so grouping students based on skill involves regularly reassessing students' skill levels and re-grouping them accordingly. Use the following checklist as a guide for setting initial student groups. Depending on the length of the tutoring program, students may need to be re-grouped periodically.
Why should you create data-informed student groups?
If using small groups, group students based on academic performance to improve session effectiveness. Grouping by similar needs allows tutors to plan efficiently and support all students more effectively. Once academic data is considered, adjust groups based on personality and learning styles as needed.
Checklist for Creating Data-Informed Student Groups
Primary Consideration: Academic Mastery Data. First, consider students’ prior mastery of the session’s content.
- Program Diagnostic Data
- If applicable, how did students perform on similar questions from the first baseline assessment at the start of the tutoring program? Which students struggled with which content elements?
- School Baseline Data
- If applicable, how did students perform on similar questions from a recent in-school summative assessment? Which students struggled with which content elements?
- Program Session Assessments
- How have students performed on end-of-session assessment tasks related to this session’s content?
- Other Relevant Data
- What prerequisite skill and knowledge gaps might prevent students from accessing this session’s content?
- What are students’ Lexile levels?
- What are students’ first languages?
- If a student’s first language is not English, can you place that student with a tutor who speaks their first language?
- What short-term goals have students set recently that might relate to this session’s content?
- What prerequisite skill and knowledge gaps might prevent students from accessing this session’s content?
Secondary Considerations: What other information, qualitative or quantitative, might you consider for each group?
- Students’ Personalities
- How extraverted or introverted is each student?
- Students’ Maturity Levels
- How old is each student in this group? How developmentally mature are they?
- Would some groups act less maturely than their constituent students alone? What about more maturely?
- Students’ Learner Profiles
- What other learning needs and habits does each student in this group have?
- How quickly does each student in this group tend to absorb new material?
- How much practice time does each student in this group tend to need?