Lanie

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Reflection One: Yesterday I had my first tutoring session with Mira. I had her read sight words to me to see what types of words were really hard for her. The the words seemed to be the most difficult for her to sound out so for the next session I will bring in more of those words to work on. I also had her read books aloud to me. We worked out a system that if she sounded out the word twice and couldn't figure it out I would tell her. This proved to be very effective since after the first couple of pages she was reading by herself with the words she knew and I had told her. Another activity we did was writing her name and abc's to see how her letter formation was. She did very well with that so her main area of work will be with reading. For our next session she is going to bring in a reading game her parents bought her for her nintendo DS and we are going to work on it together. I thought this would be a nice way to intrigue her since she really wants to play the game but doesn't have the skills yet.

Hi Lanie!

I apologize for misspelling your name. It should all be fixed, now. :) Dr. Crumpler shared with me that you and Mira Mae hit it off wonderfully. It sounds as if you are off to a great start. I look forward to hearing more about your successes in future tutoring sessions.

Best, Natalie

Reflection two October 27, 2010

Mira had to cancel her session the week before since she went out of town and then missed her make up session on Tuesday. So currently She has missed two sessions but we are going to try and make them up. In today's session Natalie came to do some sight words with Mira since she is to young for a running record. She also helped Mira make a mad lib which she was able to bring home to her parents. After that I had Mira read a book to me and we worked out a system where she would sound out the words and try to guess and if she didn't get it I would say the word. For our next session I am going to bring in a journal for Mira to keep track of the words she knows which will continue to build and while it builds improve her confidence.

Reflection three November 2, 2010

Once again Mira missed her makeup session so she has missed three sessions and today would be the third session that she has attended. Today we did our usual warm up with me reading her a book and then having her go over sight words. After that Mira brought out her DS reading game so that I could help her play it. The game consists of words popping up on the screen and the reader must match them to the correct picture, reading a story and then saying if a certain word makes sense or not, and many other things. The other games were to hard for Mira so we stayed with just those two. After about 15mins of the game we stopped so Mira could read to me. We chose an easy story with many of the sight words she knew. She read very well and was so excited after wards that she started to jump around. We calmed down and then re focused on her journal of words and put the new ones she learned today in it. Mira had to leave a few minutes early today since she had gymnastics and I will be meeting with her again tomorrow.

Reflection four: November 3, 2010 Mira Mae didn't come today and has rescheduled for next week. This will be the fourth time she has missed and therefore I have only met with her three times.

Hi Lanie,

This is very disappointing as I know you very much look forward to spending instructional time with Mira. :( I will discuss with Mira's mother if she is planning on attending the tutoring session in the spring, encouraging her to pick a day that will not lead to disruptions in the schedule.

Thanks, Natalie

Reflection five and six : November 9, 2010 and November 10, 2010

Today I introduced to Mira the idea of making book with all the words she knows. After she has written them in the book she will then draw a picture to help her remember the word. At the end I will help her write sentences to go along with the picture she has drawn and will then give it to her to give to her parents. Mira has said that she would like to give it to them as a Christmas present. We worked on getting the book together for most of our session and then read a book together at the end. Mira is beginning to read the books more by herself now to which is very impressive.

Today Mira and I finished making her books and working on the words she still has difficulty with. She has about 60 words that i would like her to have memorized before the end of these sessions. The words are ones that she will find when she is reading books and are root words of many other words she will see. If she has the basic understanding of what these words are and look like then when she encounters a bigger word it will be easier for her to figure it out. Today I let mira pick out the books she wanted to read and she picked the ones I would have picked for her. She seems to know her level of reading which is a very good skill. She also read the whole book to me only asking for help a couple of times. Her reading seems to be improving immensely.

Reflection seven: November 17, 2010

Today Mira and I did a lesson on how to use context clues to figure out a word and also how to use words she already knows to figure out a new word. This lesson seemed to go over very well with Mira and she caught on very quickly. TO begin the lesson I taught Mira what she was to do and then did some guided practice with her before allowing her to do it by herself. I gave her a book and let her figure out the words while I made notes so we could go over them when we were done. She did very well and only got a few words wrong showing this lesson really helped her.

Reflection eight: December 1, 2010

Today Mira and I worked on finishing up her book so she could have it done in time for the last session. She wanted to have it done so that she could give it to her parents as a Christmas present. Out of the 60 words I wanted her to have memorized she has all but two down. In the next lesson we are going to try and get these two then put them in the book to finish it and let her take it home.

Reflection nine: December 8,2010 Today Mira and I finished her book along with get all 60 words she need memorized. I went over them all one last time with her and she got them all correct even if she did hesitate she would sound it out and then say it. I also had preselected texts at Mira's letter for her to read aloud. She read them by herself with only a couple of mistakes and was very excited. She kept saying "I can read" and would then continue reading. It was very nice to see that she was so excited to read on her own and know I helped her. This may have been my last lesson with Mira since she has something going on next wed so I am waiting to hear from her parents.