- Section One: General Information
- Interview:
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Name: Jamal
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Grade: 7th grade
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Age: 12 years old
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Family: 4th child of 6
siblings
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School background: transferred from
Hillsman Middle School this year.
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He reads about 2 hours a day
everyday and finishes a book/week.
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Favorite Genre: Sci-fi
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Favorite Book: The Harry Potter
series, Percy Jackson series.
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He usually checks out books from the
school library; he usually checks out one book a week.
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He’s not involved in any
extra-curricular activities, but he is taking Family/Consumer Science, P.E.,
and Spanish for his Connections.
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He prefers reading to writing.
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His family doesn’t read as much as
he does, but his family reads a little bit.
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Favorite Subject: Social Studies
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Favorite Teacher: Ms. Barr (ELA
teacher, “because she is fun and plays cool videos”)
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Least Favorite Subject: Mathematics
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Least Favorite Teacher: (not
comfortable answering)
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He likes to and often does read any
kind of texts like cereal box, prescriptions, milk carton, etc.
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Why do you like reading? “I just
like to read.”
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Why do you not like writing? “Because
I’m bad at writing.”
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Do you see any connection between
those books that you read outside of class and stuff that we read within ELA
classes? “how the background is in the future?” –it seems that he either didn’t
have any distinguishing line established between books outside of class and
those inside of class or had hard time making the connection between the two.
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What do you think can make your ELA
class more interesting and engaging? “more activities like games and stuff.”
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I asked him some questions about the
writing assessment he had to do last week, and I asked him what about writing
he thinks is the most difficult because he did very poorly on it—barely a
paragraph. “I think I get distracted
easily” by people around him.
- Observation:
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The student is larger in size
compared to the other average middle school students, and he is a bit
overweight.
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He is very quiet and usually shows
calm, or a bit unmotivated, attitude in class.
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He enjoys interacting with students
who approach him friendly and smoothly, but he seems to lack confidence in
approaching other people first.
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He just transferred to BHL from
Hillsman this year, so I think he is still in the process of getting used to
the school and making friends.
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On his record from 6th
grade, he scored 900 out of 930 on the CRCT.
However, I haven’t been seeing the same level of writing proficiency on
his writing assignments.
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I’ve seen him eating lunch alone at
the cafeteria on the reward day, which means that students can sit wherever
they want with their friends.
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Despite his usual calm attitude, he
was once with the principal all day for hitting somebody he doesn’t even know
because the kid wanted to play with his pencil box without his permission.
2.
Investigate the Literacy Background
and Current Literacy practices of student.
- · An event involving your student that gives us insight into your student’s attitudes towards reading
: I was walking down the hall way to the buses after the
classes were all finished, and Jamal came up to me and asked “did you know
Humpty Dumpty was an egg?” And, he told me that he found out about it from
reading milk cartons that morning.
- · An event involving your student that gives us insight into your student’s attitudes toward writing
: This would be just about every
class period where he needs to do some kind of, or any kind of, writing. He would be very much engaged in class
activity which has to do with reading, but he would be completely disengaged
and unmotivated to follow any instruction if that activity has to do with
writing regardless of the amount of writing.
- · Data collected that revealed information about the student’s literacy background/past experiences, literacy attitudes
: 6th grade CRCT score
(900/930); his writing assessment (his sentences); observations (he is ALWAYS
reading or carrying a book in his hand)
- Current ability to relate to literacy and learning in and out of school
- Assessment of this student’s current reading abilities and struggles
- Assessment of this student’s current writing abilities and struggles
- Assessment of how reading and writing transact with one other for this student
: Based on his
writing assessment (prompt: school uniform choices), there seems to be a
distinct gap between his reading level and his writing level. He seems to be able to understand the writing
prompt, but he struggles with coming up with his own ideas and examples and
organizing them effectively.
Based on his ‘Body
Biography’ activity in which he had to describe how/what a character’s each
body part symbolizes and support his symbolisms with textual evidence, it seems
that he understood the story of the book, The Giver, but he didn’t finish the
activity because there was much writing he had to do. He drew the character, and he spent most of
the class period drawing, picturing the character, and just chattering with a
friend who sits next to him.
3.
Revelations and Recommendations
- · For reading
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how the student’s reading level is
reflected through his/her activities
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the teacher needs to not only
encourage students to read inside and outside of class but also teach them how
to read/analyze/close-read what they read because reading a lot doesn’t seem to
guarantee a depth of reading comprehension.
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For students who already enjoy
reading, but probably only for their own pleasure, I think it is important to
explain why it’s important to close-read and it might be even difficult to
engage those kinds of students because they might be disengaged in the reading
activities for being engaged in reading on their own.
- · For Writing
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Reading and Writing do not transact
automatically. Reading would greatly
help Writing, but they require different teachings.
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Writing lessons for Jamal- teaching
writing for low-level writers; building confidence as writer.
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I wonder how these avid reader
students feel about standardized writings since they have seen various types of
writing through books.
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Do teachers need to emphasize
different types of writing depending on their students’ literacy
culture/background?
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