Research on the instructional quality of private tutoring is scarce. Meanwhile, poor instructional quality may be a reason for the minimal or null effects of private tutoring on academic achievement reported in many studies. It is also not clear what makes a good private tutor. To fill in these gaps, the study examined whether the structure of…

Peer Instruction, first introduced by Eric Mazur in the late '90s, is a method aiming at active student participation in lectures. It includes conceptual questions (so-called ConcepTests) presented to the students, who vote on answer alternatives presented to them and then discuss their answers in small groups. As professors have been reported to…

Mathematics Learning Support Centres are becoming more and more common in higher education both internationally and in Germany. Whereas it is clear that their quality largely depends on a functioning interaction in consultations, little is known about how such consultations proceed in detail. On the basis of models from the literature and recorded…

Peer-assisted learning (PAL) is an educational method commonly applied in academic teaching. It is characterized by the interplay between peer teachers and learners who are at a similar academic level. Although it has been shown that peer teachers benefit from participating in PAL, little is known about their perception of motivation and rewards.…

In this article, we outline the process undertaken to establish and evaluate a mathematics centre at the Ravensburg-Weingarten University of Applied Sciences. Firstly, we outline some of the current research into centre evaluation. Secondly, we give a brief overview of our centre, including details on staffing, teaching format, goals, etc.…

Cross-age tutoring is characterised by status and age differences between tutors and tutees. Tutees are often inactive in this setting, because responsibility for effective learning is transferred to the more experienced tutors. This study focused on improving the outcomes of cross-age tutoring for tutees by providing tutors with a tutor training…

There are many benefits to peer and near-peer tutoring. The current literature suggests that near-peer teaching within the domain of gross anatomy may lead to the development of numerous competencies for burgeoning medical professionals. The aim of this study was a quantitative and qualitative approach to explore which professional and personal…

Peer-assisted learning (PAL) is nowadays commonly implemented in medical education. Mostly PAL is utilized to specifically support teaching within one subject or a specific curricular situation. Here, we present a large-scale peer teaching program that aims to address the individual student's learning needs. In addition, it provides a platform for…

Children with externalized behavioral problems (BP) are at increased risk of being affected by a lack of social skills and academic engagement, and reading difficulties can frequently occur. Peer-tutoring (PT) interventions demonstrably promote both positive behavior and academic outcomes. To foster these effects, using interdependent group-reward…

The aim of the current study was to investigate the impact of private tutoring on parental involvement and the parent-child relationship. Seventy-six students voluntarily participated in the longitudinal study (38 students newly signed up for private tutoring and a matched control group). Data were collected with a student questionnaire that was…

Children who do not adequately master the transition from "learning to read" (LTR) to "reading to learn" (RTL) will clearly fall behind in every subject area during their secondary education. The purpose of this study was to determine whether a simple reading comprehension strategy developed by Schumaker, Denton, and Deshler…

In the past decades, society in general has become strongly diverse. This change also affects schools. As a result, learning groups cannot be seen as homogeneous and taught in this way. One of the challenges is students' linguistic skills. Dealing with different linguistic competencies should not only be a focus of formal education in schools but…

The relevance of the chosen problem is caused by the necessity of finding a model of qualitative growth of specialists training in conditions when cuts in expenditure of the state budget allocated to education occurs annually. Besides, the development of technology inevitably leads to the expansion of the list of subspecialties employers need. The…

Auscultation torsos are widely used to teach position-dependent heart sounds and murmurs. To provide a more realistic teaching experience, both whole body auscultation mannequins and torsos have been used in clinical examination skills training at the Medical Faculty of the University of Muenster since the winter term of 2008-2009. This training…

Although tutoring is very effective, tutors often neglect certain strategies such as direct negative feedback. This might be because they want to avoid threatening their tutee's face. The concept of face derives from politeness theory and refers to the aspects of autonomy and social appreciation people claim for themselves and strive to negotiate…