Tutoring Reflection 7

    Today was a pretty good day. I actually learned quite a bit from the book we read about the invention of basketball. This was a very high interest book for my tutee as he loves basketball. I can't believe how much has changed since the time it was first invented. It was a fun experience talking with him about differences and what we would have kept the same or what we are glad they changed. He was able to explore on a website over the guy who actually created it, Edwin Wyckoff. That was fun trying to figure out how to say between the two of us.  :) We contined to add pages to his picture dictionary that he has been working on. He really enjoys doing those because he is able to draw it out, which helps him remember. This just hit me...duhhh because he is so visual. Sometimes I think my brain is lacking oxygen. haha. We took one of the vocab words and created a wordle. I let him select the word and he chose philosophy. I have placed it here so that you may be able to see. He had a pretty good time with it and actually made one for basketball but didn't save it :(  I am glad he actually went on his own and created one, it was pretty awesome and I wish I would have been able to show you that one.
      Once again we focused on the sticky notes. We worked on summarizing what we just read and how to take better  notes on the sticky pads. He was a lot more active in the process today and we came up with a lot of the same main points, so we are either right or wrong together :). I was surprised on how well he answered the Bloom's questions because these were a little more difficult and the book wasn't exactly short but he did a great job answering them. I could tell he really enjoyed deciding what rules he would keep from back then and which ones he would keep out. He had a reason to back up every single one that dealt with him personally. The student continued to work on their story and it is really shaping into quite the masterpiece. It involves a prince and a dentist. I will let your imagination run wild.
      I learned that although you may have setup procedures for the student like a routine, they still need guidance at times in order to stay on track. It is best to focus on two specific objectives rather than a cloud of topics that can sometimes confuse the student. It is easy to get side tracked but when specific goals are set it helps keep things in order. This is also what I'd like to work on for the next lesson. I just need to be a little more organized with the goal I am trying to get the student to meet. I just find myself finding all these teaching moments, when I could actual focus on what I was suppose to. I am not saying I won't take advantage of the teaching moments but I think I could work on limiting how many times I get side tracked from something else.