Today we started out with the freerice.com site. My tutee really enjoyed this site because he started looking at in a competitive light. Due to him being involved in basketball, he has a natural competition drive. We began reading "Jesse Owens: Fastest Man Alive" by: Carole Boston Weatherford. He seemed highly interested in the book but it was one that he actually selected.
The tutee completed a BEAR spelling assessment today which ended up being pretty helpful. The tutee was with-in word pattern-middle and could use some strengthening in spelling skills. We conducted an attitude survey that allowed up to see how he felt about reading. Reggie doesn't like books or reading much at all, yet doesn't think less of anyone who may enjoy reading. Reggie felt like it was only good for him to read in order to broaden his interest. Reggie doesn't like going to libraries nor does he go on his own time to purchase or check out books from any type of book store. Reggie falls under that external motivation type of attitude and only wants to read to get a reward out of it from an external source. We need to try to direct him to a more internal type of motivation.
Reggie took a reading inventory that let me know what he thought a good reader was. Reggie let me know that a good reader has a larger vocabulary and does not read slow. Reggie actually says he is a good reader and would actually like to just work on comprehending what he reads better. When Reggie reads out loud he reads way too fast, which could be effecting his comprehension. When Reggie encounters a word he doesn't know, he usually skips it or sounds it out.
The last assessment we did was the discovery wheel. We found out that a few of his strengths were money, health, and memory. A couple of his weaknesses were planning and reading. The tutee then finished up the lesson by reading an article about the NBA finals from the Sports Illustrated page, which I can tell her really enjoyed.
I learned that it will be difficult to come up with ways to get Reggie to be interested in reading. He is already about to be n the eight grade and so far he has had a bad experience with reading. I know I must try to help him go in the right direction. I also was able to learn more about my tutee in the areas that need improvements.
Next lesson I teach I plan on trying to continue to build a better relationship with him and reading. This is something that really needs to be focused on because he could acquire so much information if he began enjoying what he was reading. I think he has just a bad taste in his mouth from AR because his school really stresses the program all the way up until high school. I will be trying to get books that meet his interest as well as meet the needs the lesson requires me to teach for the day.
In this class, the goal is word study and not phonics. IF Reggie doesn't have phonics down by now, he needs to learn by the sight word method. That is the way that I and lots of people learned to read so it is not bad. Of course, the best way to learn to read is reading. IF you can get him interested in reading books or articles, (even sports magazines), his reading must improve. Like you said, this is a goal for you to get him back to learning to read for pleasure or purpose.
ReplyDeleteReggie is viewing reading as a race (getting through it as fast as he can), He should view reading as an adventure---- setting up to go on the reading trip (prereading), stopping while reading to enjoy the scenery( metacognition and thinking), and then sharing the pictures with others (writing and discussion). REading should not be an adventure taken alone; it is better when shared with another person.
In the discovery wheel, we discovered that his study skills are poor (planning) and the way he has been successful so far in school is his memory. Thus, you will also have to work on having him learn some great notetaking strategies and learn to use them to study.