Final Reflection

Summary

               I was given the opportunity to tutor a struggling 5^th grade reader for three weeks. In order to reflect on my lesson planning, my teaching, and the student’s performance and progress I created this blog that includes a summary of each time I met with her.

 When I first started with Margaret three weeks ago, I was not sure what kind of a student or reader she was. Within the first week I completed a running record with Margaret and was able to learn that she was a fairly fluent reader but really struggled with pinpointing the main idea and showing comprehension of what she was reading. This told me that I would need to work on finding the main idea with Margaret which is a comprehension strategy. From Margaret’s interest inventory I learned that she enjoyed learning about animals. I had her fill out a motivation survey which told me that she really enjoyed reading inside and outside of school but was not too thrilled to answer questions about her reading. This might be explained by the fact that she has trouble comprehending what she reads so answering questions would be difficult. The most helpful pre-assessment I did was the spelling inventory because it showed me that Margaret needed to work on the long vowel “a” spelling pattern and long vowel “o” spelling pattern.

In the Future

Since I was able to see that Margaret did not really struggle with fluency, the main focus in her future should be comprehension, particularly finding the main idea. One thing her classroom teacher might continue to work on with her is using the 5-finger retell method to help Margaret identify the main points of a story. This can be a quick and easy strategy that Margaret could do independently or with her teacher for everything that she reads. Another thing Margaret’s classroom teacher could do to support her needs is to continue practicing identifying and using the long vowel patterns. Word sorts and word study are a good way to give Margaret exposure to the patterns that she has been struggling with. Once she is able to master those patterns she can move onto working on the next level of the spelling inventory. There are many things that Margaret can do at home to continue to develop her comprehension skills. Margaret’s parents can help her by having her read every night. The more Margaret reads, the more background knowledge she will gain and the better she will be able to comprehend. Another thing her parents can do is give Margaret many opportunities to retell what she is reading. This is an easy way to see if Margaret is retaining what she is reading and able to identify the main idea. Margaret is not a lost cause and could really benefit from lots of exposure and practice.

What I Learned

               I have learned so much from this experience even though it was a short opportunity. I know that one-on-one is a lot different than teaching a whole class but I learned a lot of valuable things about creating lessons for one students’ needs. It was not always easy to know what activities would best benefit Margaret’s needs but I learned how repeated meetings with Margaret really gave me a good idea about what she was struggling with and what she needed the most help with. I also learned a lot about lesson planning. It’s important to make sure that the activities and assessment line up with the objective that I want the student to meet. Also writing two lesson plans a week was a lot more than I have ever had to do so that was something new that I learned. One of the most important things that I learned was how repeated exposure to strategies is the best way to ensure growth in struggling areas. Since I was able to work with Margaret one-on-one in the areas that she struggled with twice a week she really made gains in those specific areas. This tutoring was a really fun and great learning experience for me as a teacher and for Margaret.