FEATURE FOCUS: SUMMER LEARNING LOSS
Using tutoring to mitigate the summer holiday ‘learning loss’
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n our third piece this month looking at summer learning loss and what it means for pupils and schools, Florence Milner, UK Schools General Manager at MyTutor, explains the benefits of summer tutoring.
The summer holiday is eagerly awaited by pupils and school staff alike. It’s a welcome opportunity to rest and recharge after a tough academic year and often unforgiving formal examinations. However, we know that while the break from school is welcomed, so long outside of the classroom is far from beneficial for young people. While this applies to other breaks from school over the course of the year, it is the summer holiday, that six-week stretch following the end of the academic year, which is the most significant.
Studies have shown the impact of the summer learning loss, arguing that it can take an average of six weeks at the start of the autumn term to get pupils back to the level they were at before going off for the summer. It is also thought that
eleven weeks of maths skills can be lost over the holidays, while pupils might lose up to a month of learning across their other subjects. Preventing this is a key priority for schools and pupils over the summer, to avoid wasting precious time when the academic year resumes. Especially because it is pupils from more economically disadvantaged households who are disproportionately affected. While their more affluent peers may be visiting museums, exploring art galleries or travelling abroad, these are too often out of reach for deprived pupils. Fortunately, there are ways to mitigate this learning loss and prevent pupils from spending their first few weeks of the new academic year retreading old ground.
Through MyTutor’s work with schools we know that teachers are keen for their pupils to
keep learning throughout the summer. Tutoring over the summer holidays can help build a solid foundation for the upcoming school year, while making sure learning from the previous one is not lost. It means pupils can maintain and even improve their knowledge and skills to start the new year in the best possible condition. The impact of tutoring is clear. Research from the Education Endowment Foundation has stated that high quality tutoring can be incredibly effective in supporting pupils to make progress with their learning, with one-to-one tutoring providing approximately five months’ additional progress on average. Small group tutoring was found to provide around four months’ additional progress on average.
This is why the National Tutoring Programme (NTP) was introduced following the Coronavirus pandemic, to provide schools with the funding to spend on tutoring support as needed. We continue to be a proud member of the NTP. While I admit there have been some challenges, it has had a profound impact on the tutoring landscape and has widened access to children who would otherwise never had had the opportunity to learn with a tutor.
Indeed, over the 2020/21 academic year, more than 40% Year 11 pupils in state schools were offered school-based tutoring in part due to the NTP; fewer than one in ten state school pupils received private tutoring during this period. The NTP also saw the biggest gains in pupil learning in schools serving the most deprived communities. As these young people are the most affected by summer learning loss, anything which mitigates this is to be applauded. The ‘standard’ tuition offer is undoubtedly of help to pupils over the summer in combatting learning loss. However, there are alternatives which can be even more helpful. We’ve offered special programmes in the past, including an Easter programme designed
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www.education-today.co.uk July/August 2023
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