History of My Name

Did you know…

• Amanda means “lovable”?
• Smith means “to hit”?
• there are 622,921 Amandas in the United States?
• there are 2,716,346 Smiths in the United States?
• Smith is the most popular last name in the United States?
• there are 5,487 people named Amanda Smith in the United States?

What does your name mean?  How does it rank compared to other names in the United States?  To find out more go to http://www.behindthename.com and/or http://www.howmanyofme.com/search/.

Week 5 Observation

November 23

What have you seen in language arts/reading instruction?

This week has been completely different.  There are only two days of school before the children are out for their Thanksgiving break.  Instead of focusing on routine work, the students have spent their time working with activities that are related to their holiday vacation.  My problem with this is that there is not a lot of learning going on.  Learning can be fun and went about differently on special occasions, but there still needs to be learning.  Our teacher was told to slow up on her reading because she is so far ahead of the other first grade teachers.

What have you taught in your internship?

There has not been an opportunity for us to teach anything in our class.  We are given the opportunity to grade papers as the students work, we review what the students are doing, we ask questions as the teacher teaches and works with the students, but the floor is never turned over to us.  We were given a lot of stuff to do today including laminating, cutting, tracing, and looking on as the students worked through their activities.

Comment on any interesting things that you have noticed about your school, the teachers, the students, or the curriculum.

Every teacher in a given grade is usually doing the same things.  All the work put up outside the classroom is the same from each grade.  It is interesting, but it would be fun to know the teachers had some creativity about them as well and were able to make their class fun and different.  This week has been enjoyable but rather boring for us to sit back and watch without the need for a lot of help.  I have enjoyed seeing all the parent volunteers that come in and read with the children individually of the mornings.

Post any questions that you have about teaching/learning.

How is it acceptable to spend two whole days away from education doing crafty things without a lot of knowledge behind them?  Then again, shouldn’t learning be fun every day?

Creating Fluent Readers

1. What are three dimensions of fluency?  How can you assess each dimension?
   1. Accuracy in Word Decoding—Calculate the number of words a child can decode accurately at grade level.
   2. Automatic Processing—Calculate the child’s reading rate.
   3. Prosodic Reading—Listen to a child read a grade level passage and judge the quality of the reading using a rubric that scores a student on the elements of expression and volume, phrasing, smoothness, and pace.
2. Rasinski refers to fluency as a “bridge” between decoding and comprehension.  What does he mean by the “bridge” metaphor?
   1. It would be difficult for a child to get to one without the other.  There are ways around using decoding for comprehension and tying comprehension to decoding.  However, it is easier to put the two together and a lot quicker.
3. What instructional methods does Rasinski suggest for students with difficulties in automatic and prosodic reading?
   1. Assisted readings and repeated readings
4. Multidemisional Fluency Scale (MFS) is used to measure prosodic quality of oral reading.  List components of the MFS and describe what each refers to.
   1. Expression and Volume—reads words with fluency and as if they come natural in conversation with expression.
   2. Phrasing—gives attention to expression and reads in segments with good phrasing.
   3. Smoothness—uses self-correction quickly when has difficulty with words but continues on to next word or words with only a lot of breaks.
   4. Pace—maintains an appropriate rate as reads throughout passage; normal conversation rate.

Week 4 Observation

November 16 and 18

What have you seen in language arts/reading instruction?

This week has been amazing.  The teacher even came to us to say she loves the Open Court curriculum and we should hope we get to work with it.  Forest Hill is the only school in Morganton that uses it and they have the best test scores with the highest reading ability.  This is so interesting to me.  I do not like it at all.  Again this week the students have had to focus on the cards as opposed to the letters on the cards.  I was astonished when the teacher as the students to tell her which card sound started a word.  I cannot remember the exact word, but it started with the same sound as “ship”.  A student raised her hand and said “s-h”.  The teacher then was not satisfied but clarified by asking what card that wanted to hear “the shell card”.  WHO CARES!!?  What difference will this make in the future?  The girl had already given the more correct answer!  I hope all the teachers do not do the students this way.  If they do, when they get out of school, the students are going to be saying “that sounds like the shell card” and expect everyone to know what they are talking about as opposed to saying it sounds like “s-h”.  This in my opinion is very discouraging.  I have also been looking at the schools grades for EOGs.  They do have high scores, but this does not make a lot of sense to me after seeing some of the scores they have received on the tests we have given.  The only thing I can figure is that the teachers teach to the tests.  They give the students what they need to do the best they can at the time, but a lot of it is not taught as a life lesson.  Otherwise, I do not understand at all how they have such high grades.

What have you taught in your internship?

There has not been an opportunity for us to teach anything in our class.  We are given the opportunity to grade papers as the students work, we review what the students are doing, we ask questions as the teacher teaches and works with the students, but the floor is never turned over to us.

Comment on any interesting things that you have noticed about your school, the teachers, the students, or the curriculum.

The students write and read their journals aloud.  I find it interesting that there are some children that the teacher makes read their own journal and then there are those that the teacher reads for.  If the students write their own journals, they should be able to read them.  They would be more able to do this if the teacher would let them use some of their invented spelling.  If the students could not read it then, the teacher should still be able to figure out what they are talking about if they have the sounds correct.  Also, every student needs the opportunity to share for themselves.  It makes them feel better about what they are doing.  I also feel like it is important to give praise to the students who are always doing well so they do not feel like they need to do bad to get noticed when they do something good.  Everyone is good at something and it should be pointed out.

Post any questions that you have about teaching/learning.

How is this okay when there is a state required curriculum that includes all of these subjects?  Why is it so important to teach to the tests?  How can the tests be altered so they are for life learning as opposed to memorization and test taking skills?

Week 3 Observation

November 9

What have you seen in language arts/reading instruction?

The teacher continues to work in the same fashion.  The students know what to do next, but it is too predictable in my opinion.  There is never anything different.  The teacher holds up a new card and gives a hand signal with the sound.  Then the students must listen to the teacher read a segment that has the sound over and over again where they must make the new motions with the sound.  Then, during class, the students must refer to the card as opposed to the letters or their sounds.  (Do NOT like this curriculum!) 

Boys that are advanced are still working on the computers.  They did have to finish their morning work before they went to the computers which includes writing spelling words in planner, writing words three times each on another piece of paper, and then reading a short passage and responding to a sheet of questions on the reading with complete sentences. 

There is also journal time every morning which takes up a lot of time.  The kids must write about their weekend on Mondays.  The rest of the week, there are a variety of topics.  The teacher grades very harshly on these papers.  For first graders, they should not spell every word correctly.  She does not allow their papers to have any mistakes regardless of the words they are spelling.  We have been allowed to grade these, but she grades behind us.  There are always more mistakes than we mark.  It is not that we do not see the mistakes, but they do have all the sounds.  Some words they are going to get wrong.  Very aggervating!

What have you taught in your internship?

There has not been an opportunity for us to teach anything in our class.  We are given the opportunity to grade papers as the students work, we review what the students are doing, we ask questions as the teacher teaches and works with the students, but the floor is never turned over to us.

Comment on any interesting things that you have noticed about your school, the teachers, the students, or the curriculum.

The students appear to want to please their teachers.  They listen well and really perk up when someone gets upset with them.  The students also tend to get in trouble for things I feel are minor, but the larger things slip through the cracks. 

For instance, the children must always be quiet and sit on their bottoms in the floor, but the chair can be sat in any way they desire.  The work the students do must be perfectly neat and perfectly spelled, but who cares about math? 

It is also very interesting to me that we are there most of the day, and science, social studies, and health have never been taught.  I know they are on schedules, but considering we leave at two and the students are at recess when we leave, there is no way there is time to do math, social students, health, science, snack, and book bag packing before the end of the day.  How is this okay when there is a state required curriculum that includes all of these subjects?

Post any questions that you have about teaching/learning.

How is this okay when there is a state required curriculum that includes all of these subjects?

Week 2 Observation

November 2 and 4

What have you seen in language arts/reading instruction?

There are two children that are above and beyond the rest of the class in their reading.  During reading, they spend their time on the computer playing games that are not reading focused at all.  The teacher does not spend any time observing them or working with them.  I do not feel like she knows what they are doing while she is working with the other students. 

Reading seems to be the most important subject in this class.  The students work through dictation and reading during math time.  The students sit in a circle in the floor and learn new sounds using Open Court Curriculum.  They are currently learning blends and diagraphs.  They then read a book aloud together in a circle in the floor that has words that are focused on their new sound.  Sometimes there is only one book while other days there are three books.  The students must lay their book on the floor and finger point to the words they are reading as they go.  For the most part, all of the students are engaged and focused.  There was a child that was called out because she wanted to look at the pictures before she started reading.  The teacher wanted her to immediately focus on the words without allowing them to use their imagination to figure out what might be happening.  The students are supposed to take each of their books home and read them five times each at home so they can learn the new sight words within that book as they learn the new sounds. (Sounds to me like memorization!)

What have you taught in your internship?

There has not been an opportunity for us to teach anything in our class.  We are given the opportunity to grade papers as the students work, we review what the students are doing, we ask questions as the teacher teaches and works with the students, but the floor is never turned over to us.

Comment on any interesting things that you have noticed about your school, the teachers, the students, or the curriculum.

The teachers seem to really enjoy Open Court Curriculum, but I do not!  The teacher uses the basal constantly and seems to be more focused on the students learning the cards than the sounds and the letters that make the sounds they are working with.  The students move very quickly.  If the students do not get it, the teacher does not have time to slow down and see what is going on.  She must move on so they do not run out of time.

Post any questions that you have about teaching/learning.

Week 1 Observation

October 28, 2009

As I walked into the classroom, I was amazed at the class size and the lack of teacher assistance.  There was one teacher to 17 students.  There are 4 ELLs, 2 foster children, and 1 boy with Cerebral Palsy included within those 17.  This is not an easy teaching environment for any teacher!

The students were taking their first math test ever.  It lasted for an hour and a half.  The teacher went through every single problem with the students one at a time making sure to read the problem with them.  She wanted to make sure they had the same answers.  We were to walk around and let them know if they should look at something again or flip their paper if they were finished with a problem.  This was not really a true testing situation.

After the test, the students took a bathroom and water break.  During their break, there was a fire drill.  It was amazing to see how quickly and quietly the students filed out of the classroom and onto the playground.  They did not ask to play!  They just stood their in a line waiting to be told they could reenter the building.  I was amazed!

When we returned to the classroom, there were three children who were doing more advanced work than all the other children.  They were allowed to play on the computer while the other students worked together in a circle in the floor.  The teacher used a basal, but the students only had paper books that went along with what she had in her basal. 

During lunch, the boy with Cerebral Palsy fell down.  He only wanted help getting up but then was ready to go again on his own.  He did not want any help.  He fell so easy as I guess he has done this many times.  It was if he had practiced how to fall to avoid getting hurt.  He was fine and continued on with his day.

After lunch, the students were in a lot of trouble.  However, I felt like they were being better than most students their age are.  Art was shortly after lunch.  They all were in trouble for talking too much during Art.  This was disappointing.  They did not have fun in art because they were constantly in trouble.

We left during recess.  The students were playing on the playground equipment outside with all the other first grade students.  They were having a blast running around and going wild!

(15)Prince Cinders

 Title: Prince Cinders

Author: Babette Cole

Illustrator: Babette Cole

Published: 1987

ISBN#: 0-698-11554-6

Reading Level: 4-8 years

About: Funny read-aloud about a prince who is tiny.  He has three brothers who are all big and hairy–and typical for princes.  The bigger brothers always went out to parties with pretty princesses.  One day a dirty fairy falls down the chimney and turns him into a big hairy monkey.  At midnight he turns back into himself and runs out of his pants.  The princess who was frightened by the monkey found Prince Cinders and married him.  The fairy turned the brothers into house fairies.

Classroom: Compare/Contrast with traditional Cinderella.  Discuss what was important to Prince Cinder and what was important to Cinderella.  Discuss self-image and how it can very from what others see.

(14)Alphabet Soup

 Title: Alphabet Soup

Author: Kate Banks

Illustrator: Peter Sis

Published: 1988

ISBN#:0-679-86723-6

Reading Level: 1st and 2nd grade

About: A little boy is not interested in eating his soup.   He takes letters from his soup to make words he builds his story on.  He begins to make up a story that comes to life as he eats his soup until it is all gone.

Classroom: After students have read this book, give them a bowl with a lot of letters.  Let them make up a story based on the words they find.  This will work with spelling, vocabulary, and imagination.

(13)Chimps Don’t Wear Glasses

 Title: Chimps Don’t Wear Glasses

Author: Laura Numeroff

Illustrator: Joe Mathieu

Published: 1995

ISBN#: 0-590-96974-9

Reading Level: 4-8 years

About: As we go through school, students are often told “That isn’t real!” or “Could that really happen?”  The idea is it is important to allow students to use their imaginations.  We all have our own dreams/ideas so we should express them in our own ways.

 Classroom: Start off using orally because some larger words but also lots of repetition.  Use to have kids write own story or describe a place they have been or would like to go–real or not!