Can Zeal tutoring close the achievement gap?
At the start of the ‘16-’17 school year, Entrepreneurship Prep Woodland Hills principal Ashley Squires and Director of Curriculum and Instruction Liz Monda had identified a large range of gaps in their middle school students’ math knowledge using NWEA MAP and other interim assessments.
Ms. Monda and her colleagues needed to identify the root causes of those skill gaps, intervene in real time with strategies that uniquely motivated students, re-assess and adjust course — for each child, every day.
Delivering this caliber of personalized instruction was overwhelming, especially in classrooms of 30+ students, all bearing different challenges, gaps and motivations. Zeal was an opportunity to add a large group of data-driven tutors to the E-Prep team to deliver direct instruction.
Implementation
EPWH introduced Zeal to all 5th through 8th grade students December ’16 with the goal of students spending an hour per week on Zeal. E-Prep teachers implemented Zeal in the full-class model, with all students in a given classroom logging in to Zeal at once.
Via headphones with mics, students received math coaching on a variety of skills from Zeal tutors — at grade level, on prerequisite skills nested underneath the grade level content, and, as they progressed, above grade level.
With the ability to watch the coaching sessions their students were receiving (coaching sessions are all recorded on Zeal), teachers kept track of what the Zeal coaches were supporting their students with and made sure they also addressed those misunderstandings in their math blocks.
Zeal’s standards-based questions challenge my scholars, the coaching and differentiated routes keep them motivated and the stickers and peer-messaging make it fun. Zeal is engaging, effective and truly helps teachers productively differentiate.
— Annie Ericson, 8th Grade Teacher, EPWH
Impact
Over the course of E-Prep’s 3-month pilot period, teachers quickly rallied their students to a learning trend of 1+ new skills mastered per student hour. By the end of March 2017, EPWH students had mastered 7+ new standards in Zeal on average, on pace with an extra half year of NWEA MAP growth.
By augmenting teacher capacity with a strong tool for filling gaps in students’ knowledge, Zeal allows E Prep math teachers to spend more time focused on grade-level standards and less time differentiating or tutoring themselves. Zeal assistants have reduced the overwhelming amount of differentiated instruction required to deliver excellent education for all E-Prep students.
