Friday, January 15, 2016

Anne - TS #4

Date/Time:  Thursday, January 14, 2016, 6:00-7:00
Location:  Hecht House
Topic/Skills:  Spiders:  Reading and discovery
Teacher Presentation:  When I observed the tutoring session with this student last week, I picked up on his noticing an article on spiders in his Scholastic magazine.  I followed this lead to construct a reading and discovery lesson on spiders.  We started with a questionnaire:  What do you already know about spiders?  It turned out that the student knew quite a lot!  I then asked him to read an article about spiders written by an elementary school teacher and to verify his answers with the text.  Next, looked up YouTube videos on spiders and watched several while discussing more about spiders.  The students knowledge increased during our conversation.  Finally, I introduced the student to Charlotte’s Web, and we agreed to start reading this at our next session.
Feedback provided to tutee:  The student did a good job of reading and finding the answers to the pre-reading questions.  He was very curious and led the choosing of videos to watch.  He is a strong reader, and his conversational ability is well developed.  He made a few pronunciation and grammatical errors which I corrected by saying them for him to repeat.

Lessons learned:  I was surprised the student knew so much about spiders to begin with, so I was glad to have extra material. We got into the topic of venomous spiders, and the student seemed a bit apprehensive.  We found material that stated there are only two kinds of venomous spiders in Florida, and I assured the student that spiders don't attack people unless they are provoked, and that these spiders tend to live where no one is likely to go.  I also let the parent know we'd talked about this.   I didn't want to breed any nightmares!

 I think Charlotte’s Web is probably written below his reading ability, however there are important themes in the story to discuss including friendship and loyalty.  The book also addresses death and grief in an age-appropriate way. 

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