Cross Age/Cross Disability Peer Tutoring: a Strategy for Math Instruction

Abstract

Finding the most successful method for helping students with special needs learn and excel in the least restrictive environment is a mission of school districts and special education programs. A guiding objective has been to identify the methods that work and successfully apply them in the practical general education setting. Students with disabilities have challenges learning in a traditional classroom setting. Common teaching techniques can be ineffective methods for students with special needs. The purpose of this study was to determine how serving as a peer tutor in math impacts the math skills and persistence of students identified as having Emotional/Behavior Disorders (EBD). Cross-age peer tutoring has been demonstrated to help students learn. This study used Cross-age and Cross-disability tutoring. Three students were chosen as tutors from an EBD level II special education program in an upper Midwestern middle school/high school program. The tutors chosen were all older than the tutees by at least one grade and considered to have higher basic level math skills. Three tutees were chosen from a group of students in a program for students with cognitive disabilities located directly across the hall. Students showed a slight improvement in basic math skills in post test results. Students were found to increase total math time involvement when actively tutoring compared with the traditional daily math lesson sessions.