Web-based support for peer tutoring

Peer tutoring is students helping other students. A peer tutoring system is designed to benefit both the tutors and junior students (tutees). The problems with a peer tutoring system are that students generally lack the physical space to pass messages, exchange and share information, and expand communications. It should be easy to obtain feedback from students and information about their problems. To further benefit both tutors and tutees, an effective and user-friendly system needs to be established to enhance communication and share and exchange information. This paper reports a Web-based system, which has been developed to assist face-to-face peer tutoring by extending tutorial discussions using technological advances. The functions of the system include: the posting of learning resources by tutors for tutees; question-and-answer sessions for tutors and tutees; open-forum discussions on a subject among tutors only, tutees only, and among tutors and tutees; easy e-mail communications with tutors and tutees; frequently asked questions; video-conferencing facilities; monitoring of the various peer tutoring activities; and the administrative function. This paper discusses the Web-based support for supplementing and complementing peer tutoring, and presents the general problems encountered by tutors and the main interests of tutees in the peer tutoring system.