My Tutoring Routine for Reading

For the past couple of years, I’ve been tutoring small groups and individuals. I work with a variety of students in multiple subject areas at all levels. Reading is one subject area that parents often want support for their children. After experimenting with different activities and routines, I’ve finally found a routine with activities that have been effective for me as a teacher and for my students. This, of course, isn’t the only way, but I hope that by sharing my routine I can inspire other teachers (and parents) reading this to try it, too.

Most of my tutoring sessions last about an hour. I always check my students’ folders first for any homework or classwork that needs to be addressed. If there isn’t anything from school to work on, we work through the following routine.

Dictation

Dictation is a great warm-up activity. Depending on the student’s level, I typically choose four to five sight/high-frequency words for students to spell in a dictation journal. If a student is proficient with their sight/high-frequency words, I’ll choose words to review from a past phonics unit. After writing the words, we’ll check the spelling right then and there. This activity takes about five minutes and gives me a lot of insight into what students are retaining.

2. Sight/High-Frequency Word-of-the-Week

If a student is working on becoming more proficient in their sight/high-frequency word recognition, we’ll spend some time focusing on one word that has been a struggle for the student. There are plenty of activities available for practicing sight words. We’ll spend about ten minutes working on a game or activity. If a student is proficient in sight/high-frequency words, I’ll skip directly to Step 3.

3. Word Study

For my younger students primarily, Word Study is the cornerstone of my tutoring practice. When I meet with a student who is coming to me for reading support for the first time, I will assess their phonics knowledge. I prefer to use the Primary and Elementary Spelling Inventories from Words Their Way. This helps me to pinpoint where a student needs support or enrichment. Once a student’s level is determined, I use word sorting and word building activities to teach concepts in phonics. Depending on the type of activity, I block about twenty to thirty minutes of our session time for Word Study.

4. Guided Reading

Generally, the last part of our tutoring session focuses on reading fluency and comprehension. Each week, I will pick a fluency skill and a comprehension skill or strategy to focus on with each student. None of my students work on the same skill or strategy at the same time — my tutoring sessions are truly tailored for each student’s individual needs (just as with Word Study). In fifteen minutes time, I can guide my students into deeper knowledge of how to be a successful reader. We usually end our sessions with some kind of Response to Reading activity to reinforce the focus skill/strategy.

5. Quick-Write

This is a bonus activity for my students who skip the sight/high-frequency word practice. For the last five minutes of a tutoring session, students choose a prompt and write without stopping for those five minutes. For my reading students, this is a fun transition out of reading mode. For my writing students, this is a warm-up activity. Regardless of whether quick-writes are used as a warm up or cool down activity, its great to see students using the knowledge they gain from reading and apply it to their own original writing.

If you are a tutor or teacher reading this post, I would love to know how you teach reading to small groups and individuals. If you decide to try my routine, I would love to know how it worked for you. I’m happy to read and respond to your comments and messages.

Until next time… Happy Teaching!