Anne - TS #11

TS #11 – Anne

Date/Time:  Thursday, January 28, 2016, 6:00-7:00

Location:  Hecht House

Topic/Skills:  Reading comprehension; using quotation marks

Teacher Presentation:  We started the session by talking about his recent experience at a sleepover.  He recounted what he had done with relative ease.  This student reads fluidly, but does not comprehend all that he reads.  We started reading Charlotte’s Web, a children’s book that is deceptively easy.  It is full of “hearty” vocabulary, idioms, and turns of phrase (“do him in”).   We talked about the title and the cover picture to figure out what the story was about (a spider who spins a web, a girl, a pig and other animals).  The student then read out loud.  I stopped him after almost every paragraph to ask questions about word meaning and what was happening:  What is a “runt”?  Why does Mr. Avery want to kill the pig?  What does Fern say? etc.  Do you think it was a good idea to let her keep the pig?  Why? The student had some difficulty answering some of these questions.  However, he began to consult the text, rereading where necessary.  After reading the first chapter, we worked on summarizing the sequence of events.  The student’s recall was pretty good after all the checking we did during the reading.  The student asked to see a video about the story, and we watched a 2 minute clip of the principle event in the first chapter.  After the reading, we worked on punctuation in dialogs (punctuation marks).  This was a review for the student who accurately punctuated sentences on a worksheet.  We then talked about how punctuation helps expression in reading.  The student tends to read “flatly,” streaming through the words without appropriate pauses and emphasis.  I asked him to read a paragraph according to punctuation, and he was able to do so. 

Feedback provided to tutee:  I helped the student define words he did not know.  We corrected his punctuation worksheet together.  When he missed a word in reading, I asked him to read it again “just to be sure.”  The student was able to self-correct.  I modeled reading with expression, and he followed well.

Lessons learned:   I enjoyed this lesson very much, and I hope he did, too. (His response to whether he liked the book was, “It’s ok.”  I’m taking that as a positive response!)  I will continue to work with this material.