In these stand-alone activities, youth practice their reading and math skills while participating in fun team games that also build upon their social-emotional skills.
Youth will practice recognizing age-appropriate sight words during a team relay race.
Related Collections
Power Hour Upper Elementary
In seven sequential units, young people explore academic topics including how one learns, problem-solving, goal-setting and mindfulness.
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Education Core Program Area
Education programs complement and reinforce what youth learn during the school day while creating experiences that invite them to fall in love with learning. Rooted in social-emotional skills, programs in this area enable all youth to be effective, engaged, adaptive learners who are on track to graduate with a plan for the future. As an informal learning space, Clubs have an opportunity to offer both remediation and enrichment, all while inviting youth to discover and pursue passions that connect to future opportunities. Education programs include experiential learning, so that youth learn actively, through a “hands-on” and “mind-on” approach.
At each developmental stage, Education programs will prompt youth to plan and prepare for the future. This includes observing and practicing the social-emotional “soft skills” that lead to early successes in building and maintaining friendships, and engaging in programmatic experiences that prepare youth to learn and work in middle school, high school and beyond. Programs and experiences for elementary school-aged youth build the foundation for employability and career exploration, supporting the skill development necessary for success in post-secondary education and the workforce.
Education Outcome Statement: To enable all youth to be effective, engaged, adaptive learners who are on track to graduate with a plan for the future.
Education Skills: In order to successfully learn and work, youth need to build not only academic skills, but also social-emotional skills. Social-emotional skills help youth build healthy relationships with themselves and others, recognize and manage emotions, and solve problems. All Education programs, including Power Hour, are designed to build the academic and social-emotional skills that enable youth to become effective, engaged, adaptive learners who are on track to graduate with a plan for the future.
Effective Learners
Engaged Learners
On Track to Graduate With a Plan for the Future
Academic Skills
Critical Thinking
Asking Questions
Analyzing and Interpreting Information
Designing and Constructing Explanations
Literacy
Numeracy
Working Memory
Love of Learning
Academic Interest
Thinking About Thinking
Creativity
Postsecondary Awareness
Career Awareness
Digital Literacy
Professionalism
Cognitive Flexibility
Financial Literacy
Social-Emotional Skills
Communication
Collaboration
Identifying and Solving Problems
Planning and Carrying Out Investigations
Evaluating
AcademicSelf-Efficacy
AcademicPerseverance
ConfidenceinAcademic Abilities
RecognizingStrengths
Stress Management
Self-Discipline
Self-Motivation
Goal-Setting
Ethical Responsibility
Perspective-Taking
The Youth Development Professional’s Role in Academic Success
Positive youth development is an intentional approach that engages youth in their communities, schools, organizations, peer groups, and families in a manner that is productive and constructive; recognizes, uses and enhances young people’s strengths; and promotes positive outcomes for young people by providing opportunities, fostering positive relationships and furnishing the support needed to build their leadership strengths.
Youth development practices that promote teaching and learning are key to the effectiveness of Education programs. Effective Education programs, when facilitated with high-quality youth development practices, help youth develop the attitudes, behaviors and skills needed to become effective and engaged learners who are on track to graduate with a plan for the future.
Youth development professionals can help all youth become more effective and engaged learners with the following practices:
Modeling curiosity and encouraging youth to ask questions.
Aiming for co-inquiry as a “guide on the side” not a “sage on the stage.”
Planning for success and allowing for mistakes. While youth development professionals provide the support necessary for youth to successfully complete projects and activities, they also include enough challenges so that youth have the opportunity to learn from their mistakes.
Helping youth connect what they learn to previous experiences.
Asking questions to check for understanding and to prompt youth to think about their thinking.
Teaching learning strategies in addition to content, so that when youth learn new things, they also learn how to learn more effectively.
Attending to each young person’s diversity and lived experience, by providing multiple options for engagement, representation and expression.
Youth development professionals help all youth stay on track to graduate with a plan for the future using the following practices:
Being intentional about giving youth a voice in Education program activities and establishing multiple opportunities for youth to make choices, have input, or share leadership roles in the Club’s programs and activities.
Engaging community partners to serve as mentors and volunteers to enhance programming.
Modeling positive workplace behaviors and incorporating opportunities for youth to practice them in the Club.
Helping youth connect experiences and interests to future career opportunities.
Practice Positive Youth Development to Create Inclusive Clubs
Inclusion is a core component to building a safe, positive environment in your Clubs. In order to fulfill our mission, Clubs must create safe, positive, and inclusive environments for all youth and teens – including every race, ethnicity, gender, gender expression, sexual orientation, ability, socioeconomic status and religion. By creating inclusive environments in our Clubs, we improve the overall experience for all young people.
When youth development professionals use positive youth development practices, they help ensure all youth:
Have a voice
Have a sense of belonging
Can meaningfully participate in programming
As you implement Power Hour, consider strategies that help youth feel affirmed, safe, and engaged with Club experiences that meet their needs and abilities. For more information on building and sustaining an inclusive environment, see pages 23-24 of the Program Basics BLUEprint. To access, visit BGCA.net and search for "Program Basics BLUEprint."
Positive Youth Development Supports Character and Social-Emotional Development
All programs, including Power Hour, offer opportunities for youth development professionals to model, recognize, reinforce and reflect on character development. Positive youth development provides direction for how you interact with, engage and model behavior for youth. You get to shape the lives of young people every day. As a result, you set the expectations and show youth what the essential character traits (i.e., caring, citizenship, fairness, respect, responsibility and trustworthiness) look like in practice. These character traits come to life when youth practice social-emotional skills like teamwork, conflict management and emotional regulation. Young people use skills to lead themselves and others, as well as demonstrate positive attributes in citizenship, like community engagement and voting.
Youth can start to build character using “caught and taught” approaches. Youth “catch” social-emotional skills when they observe youth development professionals modeling appropriate behaviors, and when they interact with peers. Youth can also be “taught” skills to build good character when skills are explicitly introduced and practiced through program sessions and activities. Use the following formula to understand how character develops over time.
Youth Development Professionals Model Good Character + Youth Practice Skills Regularly = Character Development
To build character traits, be sure to include many opportunities for youth to practice the social-emotional skills that are embedded in Power Hour. These include skills related to:
How youth feel about themselves
Their relationships with others
Their ability to regulate emotions
Their ability to solve problems
For more information, see Practicing Social-Emotional Skills to Achieve Character Development on page 22 of the Program Basics BLUEprint. To access, visit BGCA.net and search for "Program Basics BLUEprint." It will show you the specific social-emotional skills that young people should practice in order to demonstrate positive behaviors indicative of essential character traits.
Youth development professionals facilitating Power Hour can model good character in the way they support all learners, offer feedback rather than criticism, and encourage honesty and responsibility.
When character development is present:
Youth development professionals model, and youth practice, skills that display respect, fairness, trustworthiness, responsibility, caring and citizenship.
Youth understand and successfully get along well with others.
Youth are better able to control their emotions and solve problems.
When character development is absent:
Youth do not feel a sense of belonging at the Club.
Youth lack skills that foster positive peer relationships.
Youth lack self-control and act out in frustration.
Evidence Basis for Power Hour
Background
In order to enable all young people, especially those who need us most, to reach their full potential as productive, caring, responsible citizens, Boys & Girls Clubs focus on three priority outcome areas: Academic Success, Healthy Lifestyles, and Good Character and Citizenship. Power Hour is a foundational program in the Education Core Program Area, which supports positive outcomes in Academic Success. Many Clubs encourage all youth to participate in Power Hour at the beginning of each Club day, during that powerful time between school and home when Clubs can support youth in their academic endeavors. Power Hour offers opportunities for youth to learn new skills from youth development professionals and their peers, explore strategies they can use to be more effective learners, and receive support as they study and complete their homework. As a key program supporting Academic Success, Power Hour is designed to help all youth graduate on time, with a love of learning and a plan to succeed in today’s modern workforce.
Research
A 2000 evaluation by Schinke et. al. found that when Power Hour is implemented with fidelity, and includes active learning and focused homework assistance, the program should positively impact student engagement and achievement.
Power Hour was intentionally designed to include the following elements and approaches that have been found through education research to be effective.
Integrating mentoring and social-emotional skill building. In a rigorous review and meta-analysis of after-school youth development programming, Hollister (2003) analyzed 10 programs; the small number was due to the study’s strict methodological standards. He concluded that mentoring and tutoring seemed to be effective components of afterschool programs, promoting in-school outcomes (e.g., attendance, test scores, grades, retention/drop-out prevention), learning, better behavioral adjustment and higher academic achievement. Programs that met the authors’ criteria for being evidence-based showed stronger impacts on school engagement, grades, test scores, self-esteem, pro-social behavior and non-use of drugs. The authors described evidence-based programs as consisting of sequenced skill-building activities, active learning techniques and activities, clear focus on the development of particular skills, and explicit goals to promote these skills. Power Hour is designed to support both academic and social-emotional skill building in each activity. Additionally, the program is structured to include community building, relationship building and mentoring.
Individualized support of math and reading skills. A meta-analytic study by Lauer and colleagues (2004) analyzed 53 out-of-school-time programs (after-school and summer) for low-achieving or at-risk K-12 students, focusing on those whose evaluations employed control or comparison groups. The authors found small positive impacts on achievement, especially the reading achievement of younger students (grades K-2) and the math achievement of older students (grades 9-12). The ways students were grouped for learning activities had an effect in reading. One-on-one tutoring generated the greatest impact on achievement. The duration and intensity of programs increased their effectiveness – to a point. Programs that lasted between 45 and 210 hours for the school year were associated with the largest gains. Other common program features associated with reading achievement were attendance, staff quality, and a well-defined curriculum. Remediation, tutoring or mentoring, and active learning were most closely related to achievement in mathematics.
Homework help. Cosden and associates’ (2001) review of the literature on after-school programs that focused specifically on homework assistance found promising outcomes among elementary and early middle school students. Many programs documented test score gains among participating students. Those that did not nevertheless realized related benefits, such as improved school engagement, academic confidence, study skills and protection against the “academic backsliding” that often occurs as at-risk youth progress through school.
Indeed, the findings of both Schinke and associates’ (2000) evaluation of Project Learn and Zaff and Redd’s (2001) review of the literature confirm the program outcome model on which Power Hour is based, suggesting the program is on the right track to promoting student outcomes like attendance, educational engagement, test scores and academic achievement. Furthermore, Power Hour sites that are able to offer consistent, high-quality tutoring to their participants can expect to demonstrate even larger impacts on student engagement and achievement.
Theoretical Basis
All of BGCA’s Education programs, including Power Hour, are designed to build the academic and social-emotional skills that enable youth to reach the Education Core Program Area’s goal for them, which is to become effective, engaged learners who are on track to graduate with a plan for the future. In order to successfully learn and work, young people need to build not only academic skills, but social-emotional skills as well. Social-emotional skills help youth build healthy relationships with themselves and others, recognize and manage emotions, and solve problems. Power Hour specifically focuses on the following social-emotional skills: communication, collaboration, identifying and solving problems, planning and carrying out investigations, evaluating, perseverance, and recognizing strengths.
Power Hour Logic Model
Power Hour was designed to help youth achieve the following short-term, intermediate and long-term outcomes:
Objectives
All youth will be effective, engaged learners whoare on track to graduate with a plan forthe future.
Short-Term Outcomes (0 to 3 months)
Youth participate in active, skill-buildinglearning and receive support and mentoringto complement and reinforce what they learnin school.
Intermediate Outcomes (3 to 6 months)
Youth both reinforce and remediate schoolconcepts, and become more effective learnersas they practice targeted academic and social-emotionalskills.
Intermediate Outcomes (12 months or more)
School attendance, behavior and courseprogression demonstrate that youth are on trackto graduate with a plan for the future.
Activity 1
