IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/cysrev/v67y2016icp238-246.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Effectiveness of a group-based academic tutoring program for children in foster care: A randomized controlled trial

Author

Listed:
  • Harper, Julie
  • Schmidt, Fred

Abstract

The consistently poor educational achievement of children in foster care has been associated with many negative outcomes including long term poor adult adjustment (e.g., higher rates of suicide, criminality, and substance abuse). The current study was undertaken to improve foster children's academic skills through academic remediation. Across this two year randomized study, 91 children in out of home foster or kinship care, between grades 1 and 8 inclusive, completed the study. One-half were randomly assigned to the 30-week direct-instruction small group tutoring condition, while the other half served as wait-list controls. A statistically significant increase in standard scores was found on reading decoding, spelling and mathematic skills for the children who received tutoring, but no differences were obtained on sentence comprehension. Significant effect sizes, in the small to moderate range, were also found in support of the tutoring condition across these three domains. The implications of these positive findings as they relate to improving educational achievement among children in foster care are discussed.

Suggested Citation

  • Harper, Julie & Schmidt, Fred, 2016. "Effectiveness of a group-based academic tutoring program for children in foster care: A randomized controlled trial," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 67(C), pages 238-246.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:cysrev:v:67:y:2016:i:c:p:238-246
    DOI: 10.1016/j.childyouth.2016.06.009
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0190740916301864
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.childyouth.2016.06.009?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Flynn, Robert J. & Marquis, Robyn A. & Paquet, Marie-Pierre & Peeke, Lisa M. & Aubry, Tim D., 2012. "Effects of individual direct-instruction tutoring on foster children's academic skills: A randomized trial," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 34(6), pages 1183-1189.
    2. Harper, Julie & Schmidt, Fred, 2012. "Preliminary effects of a group-based tutoring program for children in long-term foster care," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 34(6), pages 1176-1182.
    3. Zinn, Andrew & Courtney, Mark E., 2014. "Context matters: Experimental evaluation of home-based tutoring for youth in foster care," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 47(P3), pages 198-204.
    4. Berlin, Marie & Vinnerljung, Bo & Hjern, Anders, 2011. "School performance in primary school and psychosocial problems in young adulthood among care leavers from long term foster care," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 33(12), pages 2489-2497.
    5. Forsman, Hilma & Vinnerljung, Bo, 2012. "Interventions aiming to improve school achievements of children in out-of-home care: A scoping review," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 34(6), pages 1084-1091.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Hickey, Andrea J. & Flynn, Robert J., 2020. "A randomized evaluation of 15 versus 25 weeks of individual tutoring for children in care," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 109(C).
    2. Andre Nickow & Philip Oreopoulos & Vincent Quan, 2020. "The Impressive Effects of Tutoring on PreK-12 Learning: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of the Experimental Evidence," NBER Working Papers 27476, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. McGuire, Austen & Gabrielli, Joy & Hambrick, Erin & Abel, Madelaine R. & Guler, Jessy & Jackson, Yo, 2021. "Academic functioning of youth in foster care: The influence of unique sources of social support," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 121(C).
    4. Connolly, Paul & Sebba, Judy & Winter, Karen & Roberts, Jennifer & Tah, Priya & Millen, Sharon, 2023. "The effectiveness of book-gifting programmes to enhance the reading skills of children in care: A randomised controlled trial of ‘Reading Together’ in England," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 153(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Evans, Rhiannon & Hallett, Sophie & Rees, Alyson & Roberts, Louise, 2016. "The acceptability of educational Interventions: Qualitative evidence from children and young people in care," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 71(C), pages 68-76.
    2. Tordön, Rikard & Bladh, Marie & Svedin, Carl Göran & Sydsjö, Gunilla, 2020. "Challenging intellectual, behavioral and educational prerequisites for interventions aimed at school aged children in foster care. A compilation of Swedish test results," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 108(C).
    3. Brännström, Lars & Karlsson, Henrik & Vinnerljung, Bo & Hjern, Anders, 2018. "Childhood risk factors for disability pension among adult former Swedish child welfare clients: Same or different as for majority population peers?," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 84(C), pages 94-102.
    4. Kirkøen, Benedicte & Engell, Thomas & Follestad, Ingvild B. & Holen, Solveig & Hagen, Kristine Amlund, 2021. "Early academic struggles among children with home-based support from child welfare services," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 131(C).
    5. Brännström, Lars & Vinnerljung, Bo & Hjern, Anders, 2015. "Risk factors for teenage childbirths among child welfare clients: Findings from Sweden," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 53(C), pages 44-51.
    6. Chih-Feng Chien & Ching-Jung Liao & Brent G. Walters, 2018. "Enriching Service-Learning by Developing e-Tutoring in Foster Homes," Systemic Practice and Action Research, Springer, vol. 31(2), pages 221-238, April.
    7. Forsman, Hilma & Vinnerljung, Bo, 2012. "Interventions aiming to improve school achievements of children in out-of-home care: A scoping review," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 34(6), pages 1084-1091.
    8. Flynn, Robert J. & Marquis, Robyn A. & Paquet, Marie-Pierre & Peeke, Lisa M. & Aubry, Tim D., 2012. "Effects of individual direct-instruction tutoring on foster children's academic skills: A randomized trial," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 34(6), pages 1183-1189.
    9. Hickey, Andrea J. & Flynn, Robert J., 2020. "A randomized evaluation of 15 versus 25 weeks of individual tutoring for children in care," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 109(C).
    10. Hansson, Åse & Gustafsson, Jan-Eric & Nielsen, Bo, 2018. "Special needs education and school mobility: School outcomes for children placed and not placed in out-of-home care," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 94(C), pages 589-597.
    11. McGuire, Austen & Gabrielli, Joy & Hambrick, Erin & Abel, Madelaine R. & Guler, Jessy & Jackson, Yo, 2021. "Academic functioning of youth in foster care: The influence of unique sources of social support," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 121(C).
    12. Durbeej, Natalie & Hellner, Clara, 2017. "Improving school performance among Swedish foster children: A quasi-experimental study exploring outcomes of the Skolfam model," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 466-476.
    13. Vinnerljung, Bo & Brännström, Lars & Hjern, Anders, 2015. "Disability pension among adult former child welfare clients: A Swedish national cohort study," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 56(C), pages 169-176.
    14. Goemans, Anouk & van Geel, Mitch & Wilderjans, Tom F. & van Ginkel, Joost R. & Vedder, Paul, 2018. "Predictors of school engagement in foster children: A longitudinal study," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 88(C), pages 33-43.
    15. Marion, Élodie & Mann-Feder, Varda, 2020. "Supporting the educational attainment of youth in residential care: From issues to controversies," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 113(C).
    16. Forsman, Hilma, 2020. "Exploring educational pathways over the life course in children with out-of-home care experience: A multi-group path analysis," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 111(C).
    17. Zinn, Andrew & Courtney, Mark E., 2014. "Context matters: Experimental evaluation of home-based tutoring for youth in foster care," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 47(P3), pages 198-204.
    18. Roberts, Jennifer & Winter, Karen & Connolly, Paul, 2017. "The Letterbox Club book gifting intervention: Findings from a qualitative evaluation accompanying a randomised controlled trial," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 73(C), pages 467-473.
    19. Connolly, Paul & Sebba, Judy & Winter, Karen & Roberts, Jennifer & Tah, Priya & Millen, Sharon, 2023. "The effectiveness of book-gifting programmes to enhance the reading skills of children in care: A randomised controlled trial of ‘Reading Together’ in England," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 153(C).
    20. Olsen, Rikke Fuglsang & de Montgomery, Christopher J., 2018. "Revisiting out-of-home placed children's poor educational outcomes—Is school change part of the explanation?," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 88(C), pages 103-113.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:cysrev:v:67:y:2016:i:c:p:238-246. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/childyouth .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.