Learning Contracts: Road Maps to Success

Now that the Labor Day barbecues have come and gone, one reality is hitting home: Summer is in the rear-view mirror. Students across the country have returned to school and are settling in for a new year of reading, writing, problem-solving, investigating and exploring. Just as your child's teacher is providing direction for her new group of students, you can provide direction for your at-home tutoring sessions. In fact, there's no better time to chart a new tutoring course than in September, when the whole school year stretches in front of you.

There are several ways to plot out a plan of action for your tutoring sessions, but one of the most effective is the "Learning Contract." Promoted by leading differentiated-learning researchers, the Learning Contract provides a clear "road map" for students and teachers (or tutors!) who are striving to meet certain educational goals. The great thing about a Learning Contract is that in can be modified for students at any grade or ability level, and it can be made relevant to any academic subject.

You may want to spend an entire tutoring session creating a Learning Contract with your child. That way, you're spending the requisite amount of time needed to make a workable, solid contract — and you're also subtly reinforcing your child's understanding of this contract's importance. Before you start putting everything in writing, take some time to discuss goals. Depending on what you and your child hope to gain from tutoring sessions, this goal can be broad ("I want to read more fluently") or narrow ("I want to be able to apply the Pythagorean theorem"). In general, broad goals work best for Learning Contracts — particularly when you want the contract to remain applicable over weeks or even months of tutoring.

Once you and your child work together to determine the Learning Contract's goal, you can begin outlining the details of the contract. In general, the most effective plans focus both on "content" and on "skills." For example, if your child's contract is science-based, the "content" portion of the agreement may include learning about balancing chemical equations. The "skills" portion, on the other hand, might include hands-on, lab-style practice so that she knows how to use tools like graduated cylinders. Or, the "content" of a history-related contract might be "Understand the main causes of the American Civil War," while the "skills" portion outlines the need to "differentiate between primary and secondary documents."

With the desired skill-goals and content-goals determined, your child's contract can begin to address specifics. In other words: What are the most realistic and beneficial ways in which your child can achieve his goals? Be as specific as possible. For example, your science learner may write that she wants to be able to balance chemical equations — without using her book for help — within three weeks' time. You and she can outline the ways in which this goal can be achieved (e.g., through practice problems, by using models, etc.). Or, your history learner might want to use the public library to find five primary and five secondary documents by the end of the month. The most attainable goals are those with time pegs. Help your child to set deadlines and to understand the importance of meeting those deadlines — a valuable skill both for the learning contract in particular and for her academic career in general.

If you're interested in hiring a tutor who can help your child achieve his Learning Contract goals, take a look at the many experts featured here. These tutors can help you and your child design a contract, and they can also help implement it every step of the way.