Kayla Harrison

Lesson 6: October 6, 2015

School Reading Problems
Dr. Madden
Reflection #3
Objective

Dawson will be able to identify third grade

sight words while playing a sight word
game.

Teaching Strategy
Fluency
I wanted to use the Dolch sight words for
third grade to test Dawsons ability to read
the sight words he should know, as a
current third grader. I also wanted to use
the second grade words as a review
because he should be used to seeing and
reading those words in the text that he
reads. I wanted to do something with sight
words this week because Dawson had been
reading at a first grade level, but is slowly
moving toward more difficult second grade
texts. I wanted to see if he knew any sight
words from third grade that would help
him to begin reading and understanding
more complex texts. During our reading in
previous sessions, we have worked on
stopping at challenging vocabulary and
trying to find the definition. Some of those
words were sight words, so I wanted to
measure his knowledge and understanding
of sight words for his actual grade level.

Outcomes
(Descriptive evidence objective was met)
After modeling how the game would work
and providing an example, Dawson picked
a card out of the bucket. At first, Dawson
was picking out words from the second
grade list. The second grade words he
correctly identified were their, sit,
fast. The only second grade sight word
he struggled with was wash. At first, he
pronounced wash as if it had a long a
sound. I asked him to look again at the
word and see if he could tell me how to
say it. After about a minute or two,
Dawson pronounced it with the correct
short a sound.
In the time that we had left for this section,
Dawson was able to correctly identify the
words small, clean, and hold. At the
beginning of tutoring, Dawson was
showing difficulty when pronouncing
words and writing words that contained
alternative vowel pairs, such as ea.
During one of our previous sessions, we

taught Dawson about when to use the ea

vowel pair and what it sounds like. When
he correctly pronounced the word clean,
he showed improvement in using
alternative vowel pairs.
Comprehension

Dawson will be able to read a short

informational text on the Tyrannosaurus
Rex and be able to correctly answer
comprehension questions about the text.

We began by asking Dawson about nonfiction to determine how much schema he

had on the genre. We proceeded to ask
him if he knew anything about dinosaurs
and the Tyrannosaurus Rex.
During the reading, we stopped Dawson at
certain points and asked him to tell us one
fact that he learned thus far. The facts he
gave were recorded, and then he moved on
to the next section.
After the reading, Dawson was instructed
to answer the comprehension questions in
relation to the text he had just read.

To start off, Dawson showed frustration

when reading the word Tyrannosaurus.
He kept asking if he could just read it as TRex. After modeling how to say the word,
he rushed through it and did not correctly
pronounce the word. He became flustered
and put his hands on the sides of his
forehead. We moved further on and told
him to begin reading the text. As he began
reading, he kept repeating, I already know
this! Can we move on? We informed
Dawson of the importance of reading
informational text and noted that the
purpose of this activity was for him to be
able to pull information from the text to
answer the questions. He said, If I
already know all the facts, cant I just
answer the questions without reading it?
Once Dawson had finished reading the
text, he answered the questions. All, but
the last one, were answered correctly. He
noted that all dinosaurs had sharp teeth,
although the text says otherwise.
*A thought that has occurred after the
lesson: would Dawson have learned the
importance of using text to find answers to
questions if we had let him answer them
before reading? What if we asked him to
read the text after answering the questions
to check if he was correct, and have him
correct the answers if they were incorrect?

Also, we need to think of another way to

go about informal text because he seemed
very uninterested and he knew
everything about the subject we picked.
I wish that I had prepared myself a little
better for this section of the lesson because
I know that he is an active child, and I feel
that the lesson did not fit his personality
type and his learning style.
Writing

Dawson will demonstrate the ability to

brainstorm using several techniques
learned in previous sessions.

First, I asked Dawson if he had knowledge

of transition words, such as first, next,
last, and finally.

Dawson will demonstrate the ability to

write a how-to utilizing the how-to
worksheet provided.

Then, I modeled my own how-to

worksheet using transition words. I began
by providing my topic: How To Make a
Peanut Butter and Jelly Sandwich. I began
by completing the boxes for the first and
second steps. Then, I asked Dawson what
he thought would come next. We did the
next two boxes together.
I asked Dawson what he might like to do
for his How-To. Once he chose a topic, he
began brainstorming the steps of the topic
he chose.

Dawson had substantial knowledge of

transition words and what they are used
for. Dawson was able to help me complete
my worksheet using his schema in relation
to making a peanut butter and jelly
sandwich.
When it was his turn to brainstorm,
Dawson began verbalizing ideas. I
reminded him that since it was his first
how-to project with us and we are limited
with time, we were going to do a shorter
how-to. He brought up the idea of writing
a how-to for the newsletter.
Dawsons ideas ranged from Minecraft
building to playing soccer, but he settled
on How To Build a Bridge in Minecraft.
Rachael asked him to go through all the
steps aloud first, before writing them
down. As he went through the steps,
Rachael recorded the simple ideas from
each step. We repeated the steps back to
him, and once he agreed that it was
accurate, he began writing the steps on his
worksheet.
Because of time restraints, we had to pause
the activity until next session. We will
continue to have Dawson plan out and
write his How-To.
*I realized that Dawson likes to talk a lot,

which takes up quite a lot of our time

during the session. I need to figure out a
way to have him turn the conversation
toward the activity or to pause the
conversation until after the session is
finished. Also, Dawson was complaining
about writing with pencils and asked for
markers instead, however, he has to write
with pencils at school. Im not sure if I
should offer markers as writing utensils or
have him continue to use pencils, even
though he verbalizes discontent with using
them.
Word Study
After instruction and review, Dawson will To begin the lesson, Rachael asked
be able to identify the sound of ou and
Dawson to spell a few words on his
ow words, as well as complete a sort of
personal whiteboard. The words were:
ou and ow words. He will also be able house, crown, town, proud, ground, and
to use them in a sentence.
growl. Once Dawson had spelled a word,
Rachael wrote it on the board exactly as he
had. Then, once he was finished. She
circled the words that he spelled correctly.
She explained that all these words had a
common sound, but that sound was spelled
differently: using -ow and -ou. She wrote
the correct spellings above the words and
explained to Dawson that words that
contain the -ow and -ou sound and end in
nd or se will use -ou. When the word
contains the same sound, but ends in an l
or n, the spelling uses -ow.
Dawson was instructed to complete a word

Dawson was only able to correctly spell

one out of six words that contained the
-ou/-ow sound. The only word he spelled
correctly was town. When Rachael
explained and modeled how each word
was spelled, Dawson reacted with, Well,
you should have told me we were learning
-ou and -ow words! I would have gotten
them correct. He showed frustration
through the tone in his voice.
When Dawson read the words from the
sort, he was able to read them all correctly.
He sorted them all in the correct
categories. Once he was finished, he
confirmed that he had learned what we
wanted him to. He explained, I put these
words in the -ou category because they
have -ou in them, but they also end in -nd

sort, but first he was asked to read all of

the words that were being used for the sort.
He completed the sort and, at the end, was
asked to explain his reasoning for sorting
the words that way.

and -se. Some words will be hard, like you

said, but this one (proud) is one I have to
learn. I put these words in -ow because
they end in -l and -n. Some of them will
be hard to learn, too, like towel.
*Due to time restraints, Dawson was
unable to complete sentences for these
word patterns, but this will be continued
into a future session.

Evidence from Lesson 6

Brainstorming How-To (dictated by Rachael)

How-To Worksheet (completed by Dawson)

OU/OW Word Practice

OU/OW Word Sort (completed)