Volunteer Task List

Are you a volunteer feeling stuck in a rut in your role? Are you a coordinator of teacher who needs a task for a new volunteer or one who seems bored in their current role? Look no further than the list below to find some new ideas for volunteer tasks! They are categorized by skill, class format and purpose.

READING

• Read to student for fluency model
• Listen to students read
• Practice sight words on flashcards with students
• Do collaborative oral reading with learners
• Make “stories-on-tape” for independent reading fluency practice

WRITING

• Respond to dialogue journals
• Help a student generate ideas when writing
• Help a learner revise writing assignment

LISTENING & SPEAKING

• Have a conversation about a reading assignment (to check comprehension)
• Be available for questions or conversation during break
• Do extra conversation time for students who are reticent to speak in class
• Model a dialogue with the  teacher
• Do a dialogue with a learner (especially when there is someone without a partner)
• Model a roleplay with the teacher
• Do a roleplay with student
• Do a “hot seat” type of activity where whole class asks question of volunteer
• Lead a dictation so students can hear a new voice
• Practice talking on the phone
• Conduct mock citizenship or job interviews

ONE-ON-ONE SUPPORT

• Guide a student through practice problems so they can do the rest independently
• Help students with low-vision
• Connect students to employment, internship and volunteer opportunities
• Shadow a student who has a disability

ADMINISTRATIVE

• Create a list or binder of community resources such as food shelves, assistance with bill-paying, etc.
• Prep materials
• Take and enter attendance
• Call students who didn’t come this week
• Type up student writing or post student work on bulletin board
• Advocate via phone for students (landlord, insurance, etc.)
• Proctor a real or practice test
• Help monitor students while they take a test
• Hand out papers, supplies, etc.
• Make copies
• Grade papers / practice tests
• Prepare practice materials
• Make activity supplies (cut-outs for games, laminate pictures, collect realia/visuals)
• Help with registration / sign-up for new classes
• Remind students to sign in and sign out of the attendance sheet

COMMUNITY BUILDING

• Give new students a tour of the building
• Greet each student as they come in or say good bye with each as they leave
• Be available for questions or conversation during break

DIGITAL LITERACY

• Circulate and help students work on computers
• Orient learners to a distance learning program
• Monitor for appropriate computer / internet use
• Show a student how to use his/her phone (to turn off the volume)
• Help with on-line research projects
• Help learners set up/connect digital devices

CLASS / CLASSROOM MANAGEMENT

• Check in with a student who has had behavior changes
• Encourage/direct students who are off task
• Hand out papers, supplies, etc.
• Help students get the correct classroom materials
• Help students through learning games like bingo, SWAT, scrambled sentences, etc.
• Help the teacher model instructions for learning activities
• Lead students who arrive early in a reading task or other activity
• Make sure students are doing the correct task
• Meet with learners to conduct personal interview re: learning goals, preferences, student assessment of ESL class
• Monitor individual, pair or group activities and report progress/problems to teacher
• Organize books, materials, etc.
• Provide more challenging work for advanced students
• Sit with a group of normally talkative students to reduce side chatter during instruction time
• Sit with lowest-level students and help them through an assignment
• Split class into two groups for level-appropriate running dictation. Teacher leads one, Volunteer leads another
• Translate, if bi-lingual
• Work through part of yesterday's lesson with a student who was absent

ONLINE AND HYBRID

• Breakout room leader
• One-on-one online tutor
• Online class participant monitor (in-person or remote)
• Tech helper (in-person or remote)

OUTSIDE-OF-THE-BOX

• Lead art projects with learners
• Make illustrations
• Tell other community members about the great program they volunteer with

Contact Tutor Training Coordinator Meghan Boyle at mboyle@literacymn.org with questions or comments about this Tutor Tip.