My 7th Week.

This week there was no intervention because the kids were being assessed. I was very excited, because I wanted to see how much my kids had improved. But then Ms. Pretty told us that we were going to be assessing different kids, because our kids were most likely already assessed by the teachers. This bummed me out a bit, but felt a little better after she told us we could see how our kids did before we left the school for the day.
Ms. Pretty gave us a sheet with simple directions on how to assess the students. It basically said to read each section carefully, pronounce the correct sounds, make it clear to the student what you are asking, repeat directions over again if it is not understood, and not to tell the child whether or not he/she got the answer right/wrong. Each student was placed in a category i.e. rhyming, identification/categorization, blending. And that was the section that the student starts off with during the assessment, after you are finished with that section, you must cover the next two categories before you end. If however, the child gets a 4/5 or a 5/5 in the next two categories, then continue on with the next category, and don't stop until the child receives a 3/5 in a category. If the child finishes the whole packet with a grade of 4/5 or 5/5 on every section, then that child would be moving to phonics because they are on the brink of learning how to read.
I went to my usual room, (room 24) and asked the teacher which students still needed assessing. She gave me two folders, the first one was named Robert. I pulled Robert from his activity at the art table and brought him to a quiet corner in the room. Robert was working on his Rhyming, so I started off with that section, asking him different questions and marking which ones he got right and which ones he got wrong. He did very well, and i moved onto the next section. Before I knew it, Robert was already on the back of the page! I was so excited, I thought that Robert was going to finish all the sections with either a 4/5 or 5/5 but the second to last section Robert received a 3/5 and thats when I was obligated to stop. I was very impressed with Robert and wanted to know who his tutor was, I know whoever it is would be so proud of him for doing such a good job on all of the sections.
The next person I had was Jose, and he was also working on rhyming. Unfortunately, Jose didn't do as well as Robert did but he did achieve a 5/5 on the section he was working on (rhyming). The next two sections I had to have him assessed in he received a 3/5 so I stopped after the required sections.
After that, I went back to the room where all the reading buddies meet and talked about my experience with the other tutors. They had similar responses, some of their kids did well and some of them didn't. The files on my kids weren't in the teachers room so I have to wait until next week to see how they scored. Ms.Pretty came in and asked if I could assess one more student because she was running behind and I said that it was fine.
It was a girl named Roxie, she was on the blending section. Roxie did very well in her section and the next two sections so I moved onto the next section after that. That is where Roxie didn't do as well and only received a 2/5 so thats when I stopped. I gave the folder back to the teacher. All the students in the classroom kept asking me when they were going to get turns and be assessed by me but I told them that it wasn't up to me, and that if I could, I'd like to assess all of them. They were all very cute and I didn't even want to leave that day, I was having a great time with all the one on one sessions I had. I went back to the room and had my papers signed before I made my way back to RIC.
Ms. Pretty reminded us that we didn't have intervention next week because the studnets would be on spring break. I now have to wait 2 weeks to see how my kids did. I'll be waiting, I'm hoping they did as well as I know they all can. =)