Change for Kids

So we’re finally back…after such a longgggggg break. I was a little anxious going back because I knew it had been a long time and I was worried that my tutee may have forgotten a lot of the work. However, how wrong was I! Not only did he remember the words we went over last year, but he improved! I was so happy to see that, it really made my day to know that this work is not in vain and these kids are really coming out with something. After going over the sight words we did some little worksheets…very dull, he ran through that in two seconds. So I let him pick out a book to read. He read it and then we drew pictures and made up a few sentences for it. That was around the time Mr. Medina et al came so my tutee was a little nervous but he pulled through. After they left we finished up what we were drawing and showed each other. He actually helped me with mine so I let him keep that for himself and I took the other one to put in his folder. I’m really happy that there was improvement, it makes these sessions ever more worthwhile. I should be getting one more child next week, hopefully things continue to get better

I was definitely eager and excited to go back to the school this new year. I knew the girls would get happy to see me. It feels good knowing that they appreciate and enjoy the time we share together. This week I only tutored one girl though, because the other girl I had is being tutored on Wednesdays now. I won’t have her anymore. I was a little down about this, since we already had an established relationship, but on the other hand it means that one more child can get my help. I went over the sight words with her and I was very pleased that she got most of them correct. After, I was reading a story and this was when our advisors from school visited us. I noticed the change in my girl immediately. She got shy and put her head down. She asked who these people were, so I explained to her. She was a bit uncomfortable, so I told her that she shouldn’t be shy, because they just wanted to say hi and were nice people. After this she changed her attitude and wasn’t afraid to talk to them. I liked the fact that our advisors came because I feel it made the kids feel special and important. There are people who care about their learning, apart from their teacher or even myself. She surprised me when she asked for my help in her spelling. I remember once before, it was as if she didn’t want to write about the story. She was “rebellious” because she wrote something wrong and I told her it was incorrect. She gave up then and I had to persuade her to write about the story, but this time it was different. She told me that she wasn’t sure and needed my help. She wrote most of the two sentences on her own sounding out the letters.

I was very impressed with my students today. I haven’t seen them in over a month, but they were still able to get through most of the “sight words” without much difficulty. I am really starting to see the improvement. They know all the words on the short lost, so I will only focus on the long high frequency word list. After that they did three worksheet rather quickly. Then we took turns reading “A Baby Sister for Frances.” I also noticed that their reading skills are improving. After we finished reading the story, my students drew pictures of their favorite scenes and wrote a few sentences about their pictures.