The tutoring takes place in the schools in which the children are enrolled either during their school day or after school. Tutors are placed in schools throughout the city of Duluth with a concentration on the schools in low-income neighborhoods. Building relationships and trust with children and teachers includes working with children who have challenging behaviors, motivating children to learn, understanding children's needs, listening to children, gaining children's trust, and asking questions of teachers and supervisors. Literacy Tutoring includes reading to children, listening to children read, writing with children, various methods for tutoring in reading, and the curriculum used by Duluth schools. The training occurs during the second and third week of each quarter.
Tutors attend the three parts of the training before beginning their tutoring.
Sessions on reflection and problem solving are held each quarter so that tutors can see how their tutoring experiences connect to their personal and professional goals, and are impacting the lives of children. They also share ways to motivate children and gain children's participation in reading activities. Graduate students, under the direction of classroom teachers, university faculty and reading specialists, will lead these sessions. One of the purposes of this project is to create a comprehensive tutoring manual incorporating all of the tutor training activities identified above. The America Reads and Darland Program trainers have developed portions of the manual, therefore this project will integrate all aspects of this training into one manual and web site.