Reflection+6




 * Reflection for March 27th and 29th**

This week was light on the work front. There weren’t many tasks that we still needed to accomplish in terms of the checklist because we had finished the Storykit before I left for our spring break two weeks before. This left Miguel with a week of time on his own to work on the Storykit and make any changes or additions that he thought would make the Storykit more interesting, better, or just more colorful. So, on Tuesday we reviewed the Storykit and I asked him to show me any changes that he made. He did not make any changes. In terms of productive action, Miguel showed the Storykit to his teacher, Mrs. Roscioli, and we got her overall approval of the project. With that, we knew that we didn’t need to necessarily add anything more. For the rest of the time on Tuesday we explored GoogleEarth and looked at various places like Curtis Strange, Disney World’s Magic Kingdom, downtown Chicago, and even my house. On Thursday, we were a little more productive. On Thursday I had the rubric to share with Miguel, so we went over the requirements for the project and what he would be graded on. After we went over the last two areas of the rubric, which involved the actual presentation, I had Miguel read his story to a fellow Carthage student, Ashley. We went over the important parts of being loud and talking with enthusiasm. Miguel had a cold, so he said that for practicing, he couldn’t be too loud. The other half of the class time, we did work for me, recording more video and me taking pictures. At the end of the hour we found out what day we will be presenting. Miguel will share his story on the Tuesday after his spring break, the 17th.

Miguel and I were able to have some good, collaborative discussions this week. As we reviewed the rubric for what actually needs to be in the Storykit, we talked about what areas could be improved. Miguel also did a really good of keeping eith me, in terms of focus, when I introduced and went over the overall project rubric. The rubric included aspects like being prepared to begin working, working hard, and being motivated. We ran into a challenge because I have found that Miguel is rarely ready for me when I arrive and it is a real struggle to get his to abandon playing games on the iPad in favor of actual work on Storykit, or listening to me. One of the challenges is that when I read the rubric and asked him, does he fel like he is ready to work when I arrive, he was very sure of his “yes.” For that reason, I am, not sure if he was trying to be funny, or really was unaware of how he actually behaves.

I think that the best support that you can give a student, or in this case a buddy, are the tools that they need to succeed. The biggest tools this week that I used for Miguel were the rubrics. Not only did we read through them, but also I broke down each heading into easier to understand wording. Additionally, I think I was firm yet supportive while guiding him through the motions this week, because he was especially distracted and distractible.

When we have our next time together, there will be people presenting their Storykits. During these presentations, I will ask Miguel to 1) work on his listening skills and being a good, respectful audience member and 2) to be thinking about the rubric and what tricks he can pick up from these speakers. If someone does especially well and Miguel likes the way that he/she performed, Miguel can attempt to emulate that. I am happy that we aren’t going first so that Miguel can pick up those tips, but I hope he doesn’t forget about his story over spring break and he comes back not remembering how to speak well.