Field Placement

Reflection on Learning

This semester my field placement took place at a K-6 public school in mid-town Toronto. There, I had the opportunity to work with students in mainstream classes and students in the Deaf and Hard of Hearing (DHH) program. I also worked with students who had certain periods in the resource room for literacy support. Through working with students with diverse learning profiles, I gained confidence and skills supporting literacy, numeracy, and task completion. I built on my ASL vocabulary and had the opportunity to work with a medically fragile student. I also got to practice building rapport with students with diverse personalities, including some who didn’t want my help. I learned how to navigate the complex social world of teachers and staff in such a large school. What I observed reaffirmed the importance of treating everyone with respect and dignity. Overall, I was well-received and had a great learning experience.

SMART Goal 1

SMART Goal 1: Evidence of learning

SMART Goal 2

SMART Goal 2: Evidence of learning

My SMART Goal was to learn and try three strategies to support students who lack interest in reading, however the 9-year-old student who sparked my curiosity actually turned out to need glasses. In Challenging Behaviour and Discipline, we learned that part of the role of the EA is as a behaviour detective, and that sometimes there’s a physical cause for a behaviour we may consider challenging (Fitzgibbon, 2020a.). In this case, the student was physically not able to see the paper and whiteboard clearly enough to tell the difference between letters or tell what she was writing. This difficulty resulted in her appearing disconnected and apathetic about reading and writing. The new challenge became, encouraging her to bring her glasses to school.

In any case, I did learn three strategies to support students who lack interest in reading. In Teaching and Learning Strategies, we learned about strategies to use before reading to prepare students to engage with the text. One of these strategies was using an anticipation guide, a worksheet that you prepare for the student and discuss with them prior to reading. In an anticipation guide the student is presented with true or false statements about the text, and they get to guess what the answers will be. The anticipation guide can be used as a group activity, as a think-pair-share activity, or with individual students. The goal is to provoke their curiosity and motivate them to read the text with purpose to find out if they were right or not. After reading, the student reviews the guide and notes the evidence from the text. This method is helpful for motivating students to read (Fitzgibbon, 2020b.).

Another important method to encourage hesitant readers is to explicitly teach new vocabulary (Fitzgibbon, 2020b.). Imagine struggling to decode a word only to find it unfamiliar and unrewarding to read. By letting students know what new words to expect in the text, we can scaffold the reading task and make it more achievable. Teaching vocabulary directly has also been shown to improve retention; students retain 20-25% of words learned incidentally, but 40% or words they’ve been intentionally taught the meaning of (Fitzgibbon, 2020b.). If students know the meanings of new words going into a reading task, they’ll be more confident in their ability to succeed (Fitzgibbon, 2020b.).

The third strategy I will discuss is Literature Circles, which can be thought of as a mini book-club. Students work together to choose a text they will all read, and each student is given a job in the Literature Circle. The jobs are Discussion Director, Literary Luminary, Vocabulary Enricher, and Checker (Storm Fink, n.d.). After reading, the students discuss the text in groups and hold one another accountable for doing their jobs. This strategy is helpful for students who are socially motivated, because they will be motivated to get the reading done, prepare to share, and do their job well (Storm Fink, n.d.). When I first learned about this strategy, this student came to mind right away. She loves to chat about anything and everything, so Literature Circles might be a way to get her interested in reading and telling others what she read. She may even remember her glasses in order to participate!

This resource class is using UFLI as a literacy strategy, with little to no variation. I think these three strategies could be implemented alongside UFLI to improve interest in reading and motivation in class. I haven’t had the chance to work with these students in a few weeks, but if I do see them this week, I plan to prepare an anticipation guide to use before reading the next UFLI story. I think they would enjoy it and get a lot out of it!

References

Fitzgibbon, A. (2020a.). CBOnline_Module 1 Video Transcript [lecture transcript]. https://slate.sheridancollege.ca/d2l/home

Fitzgibbon, A. (2020b.). TLOnline_Module 10 Video Transcript [lecture transcript]. https://slate.sheridancollege.ca/d2l/home

Storm Fink, L. (n.d.). Literature Circles: Getting Started. NCTE. https://www.readwritethink.org/classroom-resources/lesson-plans/literature-circles-getting-started

Accepting Feedback

I’ve been fortunate to have received a lot of positive feedback this semester. I do have a story to share about receiving more challenging feedback, however. So, the resource room is where I spend my mornings and check in throughout the afternoon. The door is to be locked when nobody is in there to protect confidential information and personal belongings. On two occasions I forgot to close the door behind me. The first time, I thought I’d be right back, but I got distracted, and the second time I just fully forgot. The first time, the resource teacher gently reminded me why it’s important to close the door, but the second time she seemed angry. She said, “you didn’t close the door!”, and I was genuinely confused for a moment because I had no memory of if I had or not, so I said “no?”. I know now that that came across as deceitful. She went to check in the office to see if the other person with a key had gone in, but they hadn’t. Personally, I can get a bit activated if I feel accused or if I anger or disappointed someone, so I took a few deep breaths and prepared to answer calmly and accept responsibility. She said, “you left it open”, and I said, “I honestly don’t remember, but I must have, and I’m so sorry. I know it’s important.” She said I didn’t have to apologize, but I could tell she was still concerned about it. I vowed to myself to never do that again, and I never did.