Today was a great last meeting, well for now, with Buddy E. When we came in he has his usual smile on his face, I bet he was anticipating the fun things we had planned for him. First we looked at his journal that he had out. I really liked that that teacher had journals for the students and that they wrote in them every Monday after the weekend. When they do a “weekend” journal entry the teacher gives them a piece of paper to glue in that says “over the weekend I…”. Most of Buddy E’s journal entries were just illustrations but he had great stories to add to his pictures. On another page he had talked about their trip to the farm. He had drawn a barn, cow, pig, and cat and wrote in the appropriate label for each of those things. His most recent journal entry was the Monday after Halloween so he of course wanted to talk about trick-or-treating. This was his first entry that he had a nice illustration but also finished the sentence saying he went trick-or-treating using inventive spelling. He was really good at figuring out the begging sounds and some of the ending sounds however it was a little difficult to read what he had wrote. However, it was great to see his progression through the journal from the first journal entry to his last. I am sure when we see him again later in the year I will be even more impressed by his progress.
After we chatted about his journal we moved on to reading Sheep in a Jeep. My partner and I decided to read a rhyming book so that he could see the rhyming being used in context. While we read he jumped in a couple of time to rhyme or to add some commentary to the pictures.
Next we did a game where Buddy E had to create words. He had to take one letter and an ending sound to form the word. It was interesting because he made several different words using the ending “old” and even after his third word created with this ending he was not able to pronounce it. However, he was trying to say the nonsense word “nold” so maybe that was part of the trouble, it was not a word he was familiar with because when he spelled the word “sold” next he got that really quick.
As a teacher in training, I try to keep my eye out for great tips or ideas to use in the classroom; I found the journal writing that this teacher encourages, a great idea. After long weekends of excitement and separation from fellow classmates, it gives students a great opportunity to share their excitement without a roomful of potential chaos. In addition students are encouraged to write and draw their ideas freely; the only expectation is that their journal is about their weekend. We live in a day and age where we need to encourage our students to use their personal interests to help motivate their learning. Journaling about personal experiences is a great way to encourage writing.
ReplyDeleteJournaling, as we are learning, aids us as the teacher and the students as individuals. It provides us with one more means of assessment and a means which is not stressful to students. Most importantly they help us get to know the students as individuals. Journals like portfolios show weakness which can be corrected and strengths or newly developing skills (including the correction of former weakness). For the student journals provide motivation (expressing what happened over the weekend), opportunity for connection and integration of learning, and opportunity to connect with the teacher. Thanks for sharing your experience with your buddy and his success through journaling.
ReplyDeleteStephanie,
ReplyDeleteWhat I find so interesting about the journals (the one you explained as well as the one our buddy had done)is that the students are free to fill them out how ever they would like. If the students want to write usings words they can do this and if they woud rather darw pictures, this is fine too! I think that it is important for studnets to have power over their work. When I asked my reading buddy about one of her pages in her journal, she told me that "sometimes it is easier to write words and sometimes its easier to draw things" (Ruby). Also, I completely agree with you, Jamie, and Sam about the importance of journaling. What a great way for students to be able to tell the important aspects of their lives through their own words!
Thanks!
Taryn