Week 4 noticing Blog

Today during literature study I introduced the lesson, re-visited what we discussed last week and instructed them on what we were going to do today. My class has been working on being a good reader and the skills that are required to be a good reader. We have been making three column charts in our literacy notebooks in which they write where (page number) who (characters) and what happened in the story. When it was first introduced we had them write down something for each page or paragraph (depending on if it was a book or a book typed up on a piece of paper). This way they understood that they should frequently check with themselves what they were reading and constantly be asking what is going on and who is the narrator or author talking about. Since today was a wrap up on the lesson I made sure to ask them why the chart was necessary, why each column was crucial to have and what they should be discussing with there buddy's as they fill in their charts.

After I gave the instructions they dispersed throughout the classroom with their buddy to a place where they could read the book together and fill in their charts. I went to the two students who are both at a lower level in reading and comprehension. It was very interesting to see how well they worked together and helped each other out. The girl is a stronger reader however, she gets distracted very easily and does not comprehend what she is reading as she just reads the words and does not process the information. Her partner who was a boy, helped them stay on task and by her reading it aloud to him he was able to do a better job of comprehending the story and helping her think about what she just read aloud. It shocked me that although they were both on a low level, together they had a high productivity rate and did a great job reading a majority of the text. Although they did not finish they still were able to get pretty far and keep up with the rest of the class, which rarely happens for these two.

After the lesson was over the students went to Mandarin I reflected on my job explaining the lesson and how the lesson went overall with my mentor. I explained to her how impressed I was by these two students and I was curious how she knew to put these two kids together. She told me she partnered the kids based on their levels. She tried to make sure that every student was partnered with someone who was equivalent to themselves. She then explained to me that the lower students will be more willing to make mistakes and try harder if they are with someone on the same level rather than with someone who is higher than them. When the lower student is placed with someone high they are more likely to just let them take charge and it is also hindering the higher level student as they have to slow their pace and may not improve their skills in the given task. This really opened my eyes and the more I reflected on the partners that I observed I realized what she was saying made sense and really proved to be true for this class. With that said, this was probably one of the most successful partner activities I have ever seen as all my classes back in Lansing were never cooperative, helpful to one another or were not paired up well so they could not even complete part of their given work.