Dear Parents,
I am writing to you to inform you of Jose's progress with reading and writing thus far and hope that we can all work together with him to advance his progress even further throughout the year to insure that he is successful. Also, in general, he is a quiet and shy boy so we need to do what we can to help him feel comfortable in the classroom and comfortable with reading and writing. We need to positively motivate him so that he is not afraid to make mistakes. That's when learning happens - after we've made mistakes!
I have completed a series of assessments with all of the students and Jose has shown that he is struggling. During a reading assessment, I gave him a simple book to read to me. As I listened to him read, I kept track of the words he was reading correctly and the ones that he misread. At first, it was difficult to get him to start reading and when he finally did, he was very quiet and hesitant. Nevertheless, we got through it. Through this assessment I saw that he was able to recognize many high-frequency words, but when he got to unfamiliar words he would stop reading and would say, "I don't know what that word is." He did not try to figure out what it may be and then I encouraged him to keep reading. I believe that Jose needs a lot of help and I will do this by spending time with him with guided reading. This is when I work with a small group of students who are at the same reading level. This small group is comforting for students. I choose a book that they are interested in and one that I know that they will able to read with 90% accuracy. Then I introduce the book to them and we all look at the cover, title, and author. Then I activate the student's background knowledge by going over key vocabulary. I also take them through a picture walk of the book. This is when we look at the illustrations, discuss what we see and make predictions about the story. Finally, I will review with them a few reading strategies that I will encourage them to use while they read. Finally, the students each get a copy of the book and read it independently. If the students are having trouble, then I can help them individually. For example, since Jose has trouble decoding unfamiliar words, I will ask him to look at the individual letters and tell me what sounds they make. Then he can take those sounds and put them all together to try and figure out what the word may be. For example, with the word "red", Jose can sound out each individual letter, r-e-d, and then make all the sounds flow together to figure out that the word on the page is "red". I would encourage you to do the same with him at home so that he has the opportunity to practice more in the comfortable setting of your home. I will send a few books home with him that you can work on together.
When it comes to writing, Jose is also very hesitant and usually only ends up writing his name. After various lessons, I have the students draw a picture that relates to the lesson and then I ask them to write a few words to explain their picture. To help Jose, I will use a "language experience approach". At first, I will do this in small groups to build up his comfort level and then we will transition to do this with the entire class. I will ask Jose to dictate words and sentences about an experience that relates to the lesson and I will write it down. By doing this I will model how written language works by bringing his attention to punctuation, capitalization, etc. But first I will model to him how I can help myself figure out how a word may be spelled by sounding out each letter that I hear as I say it out loud. Then I will ask him to continue writing using that strategy.
I hope that with our guidance and encouragement Jose will become more comfortable with reading and writing and be very successful. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to ask.
Best,
Magdalena Kopacz
I am writing to you to inform you of Jose's progress with reading and writing thus far and hope that we can all work together with him to advance his progress even further throughout the year to insure that he is successful. Also, in general, he is a quiet and shy boy so we need to do what we can to help him feel comfortable in the classroom and comfortable with reading and writing. We need to positively motivate him so that he is not afraid to make mistakes. That's when learning happens - after we've made mistakes!
I have completed a series of assessments with all of the students and Jose has shown that he is struggling. During a reading assessment, I gave him a simple book to read to me. As I listened to him read, I kept track of the words he was reading correctly and the ones that he misread. At first, it was difficult to get him to start reading and when he finally did, he was very quiet and hesitant. Nevertheless, we got through it. Through this assessment I saw that he was able to recognize many high-frequency words, but when he got to unfamiliar words he would stop reading and would say, "I don't know what that word is." He did not try to figure out what it may be and then I encouraged him to keep reading. I believe that Jose needs a lot of help and I will do this by spending time with him with guided reading. This is when I work with a small group of students who are at the same reading level. This small group is comforting for students. I choose a book that they are interested in and one that I know that they will able to read with 90% accuracy. Then I introduce the book to them and we all look at the cover, title, and author. Then I activate the student's background knowledge by going over key vocabulary. I also take them through a picture walk of the book. This is when we look at the illustrations, discuss what we see and make predictions about the story. Finally, I will review with them a few reading strategies that I will encourage them to use while they read. Finally, the students each get a copy of the book and read it independently. If the students are having trouble, then I can help them individually. For example, since Jose has trouble decoding unfamiliar words, I will ask him to look at the individual letters and tell me what sounds they make. Then he can take those sounds and put them all together to try and figure out what the word may be. For example, with the word "red", Jose can sound out each individual letter, r-e-d, and then make all the sounds flow together to figure out that the word on the page is "red". I would encourage you to do the same with him at home so that he has the opportunity to practice more in the comfortable setting of your home. I will send a few books home with him that you can work on together.
When it comes to writing, Jose is also very hesitant and usually only ends up writing his name. After various lessons, I have the students draw a picture that relates to the lesson and then I ask them to write a few words to explain their picture. To help Jose, I will use a "language experience approach". At first, I will do this in small groups to build up his comfort level and then we will transition to do this with the entire class. I will ask Jose to dictate words and sentences about an experience that relates to the lesson and I will write it down. By doing this I will model how written language works by bringing his attention to punctuation, capitalization, etc. But first I will model to him how I can help myself figure out how a word may be spelled by sounding out each letter that I hear as I say it out loud. Then I will ask him to continue writing using that strategy.
I hope that with our guidance and encouragement Jose will become more comfortable with reading and writing and be very successful. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to ask.
Best,
Magdalena Kopacz
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