Lauren Madison
1:35-3:10
Sequence of Events
Students came into the classroom and began to work on their daily journals per usual, Alex and I had previously talked about one specific student who used to be in the honors classes but has stopped applying himself and is more in the lower percentile with his grade average. We discussed how this student was smart but lacked motivation and so I decided in the next class I'd focus on getting this student to do his work. So when class began I pulled up a seat at his table and handed him one of the formatted sheets for journals and told him that he and I would spend the week working together in class.
Elaboration of One or Two Significant Events
I sat down with this student and initially, he was unwilling to work with me and kept joking around with his friends. I sat and got his friends on task and said we could all do our work together. Once his friends were focused on me and following along he had no distractions and had to participate in the group. He still kind of dragged his feet at this point and so I told him that if he worked with me one on one and came up with his own ideas and answers I would write them down for him. For some reason, this motivated him the most, he got excited and immediately started working with me. He gave me the answers he wanted to be written down and actually ended up helping his friends with their work as well and as he continued to do this I realized even though he doesn't seem to be paying much attention and hasn't submitted anything for the class he is at the same level of understanding if not higher than his peers. It caught me off guard because while I know he's intelligent I wasn't expecting him to immediately be able to answer the different questions provided and be able to be the one to help his peers when he hasn't even opened the novel in class. Throughout the week he began to look for me in class and when other students began joining our group and pulling my attention or I'd walk around to check in on others he'd wave me down or call my name and tell people that he was working with Ms.Madison or I was helping him now and not them. I think compared to what I wrote about last week, with this student being the one who has been demonstrating some sexist behavior throughout the semester, it shows a lot of growth in how we treat each other now and I think the level of respect we have has grown throughout the week as we continued to work on journals and class work together. As the week went on I also noticed he seemed much more concerned with the quality of his answers and getting the assurance that they were correct.
Analysis of Episode
I think that this student hasn't had any real motivation or interest in his future because when we were working in groups one day he explained he doesn't think he's going to live past thirty. I know he has had a rough upbringing and he has made it clear he is no stranger to illegal substances, I think he has just fallen down the wrong path and has lost his motivation to get off that path and kind of accepted it as what it is. Bleicher's classes all require her attention to be everywhere at once and prevent her from being able to work one on one with students because the second her back is turned the class starts creating chaos. So students like this one who need someone to sit beside them and motivate them are often flying under the radar and I think that maybe he just needed someone to be sitting beside him and holding him accountable.