I had recently blogged about having concerns that the child I am tutoring would not gain much knowledge in the short time we have had together. When giving my student her pre-tests I thought that we had little to cover – she only missed the long /o/ words. As I started making lesson plans and working with her, I noticed that we had more to learn that I thought. She was able to blend phonemes well when I gave her the sounds, however, when it was time to read on her own -- she rushed through it, looking at pictures, and never really looked at each phoneme within a word. I was stuck -- I took running records, I used letterbox lessons, and I tried my best to give her the feedback and practice that she needed, but she kept giving up due to frustration. It was my idea then to start from the very beginning with short /a/, moving through all short vowels and then to the long vowels in order to review each phoneme and catch all of her reading problems. When she looked at the short /a/ book, she almost laughed -- it was too easy for her, but she got it; she knew every word. From then on, I could see her boost of confidence and we moved on fairly quickly in order to really find the problem sounds. Although I could see a change in her reading ability, I was extremely nervous to see the results of her post tests. As it turns out...
I made a difference!! She hardly missed more than a handful of answers in the entire post test, and is reading with more fluency than I could have ever imagined. This was such a boost in confidence for her...and for me as well -- I can teach!! I know that she will never remember me 10 years down the road, but i know that I will be remembering this experience for a long time. I was able to look at a situation in which a child was frustrated and assess what needed to happen in order for her to make progress. I am just so excited that she has made leaps and bounds from the first day we met! I can say that I made a difference!