Computer-Supported Human Mentoring

Abstract

With more learning opportunities comes more achievement, yet there are still gaps between marginalized students that technology cannot address alone. And while personalized tutoring can help to solve this problem, it is expensive to facilitate. Personalized Learning2 (PL2) is designed to assist human tutors by connecting them to various instructional resources. Preliminary findings on PL2 found that the software was able to help mentors focus on their students and positivity expand how they taught.

Computer tutor data indicate that more learning opportunities yield greater achievement, but also confirm there are gaps in the number and quality of opportunities marginalized students receive that technology alone does not address. Personalized learning with mentors can close this gap in opportunities but is expensive to implement. We introduce a free, web-based application, Personalized Learning2 (PL2), designed to improve mentoring efficiency by connecting mentors to intervention and instructional resources.