The Learning Academy is a private elementary school that provides students (grades second to sixth) the opportunity to learn techniques, by way of the Orton-Gillingham (OG) Approach, that will better assist them through their lifelong journey with their reading disability. Dyslexia is very hard to diagnose, but many of the students at this school are assumed to have this reading hindrance. Reading difficulties begin to arise and become recognizable in the first grade, which is why this outstanding school does not start until grade two.

 

Classroom Observation

I arrived at The Learning Academy at 7:40am in order to ask Mrs. William about my future fluency lesson and to ask her about Hannah’s progress thus far (the results can be found on the “Case Study Background” Tab). I had a solid twenty minutes in which I was able to discuss the general idea of the lesson and to look at Hannah’s recently taken Woodlook Reading Mastery Test. The students arrived before 8:00am, however, they all got their individual baskets and either worked on coloring pages or on previous unfinished assignments. Around 8:10am, Mrs. William began her day with OG instruction. OG happens in the same format each day and every day, however, today, Mrs. William incorporated a game with the puzzle word section. “Let us show the girls how to do a fun game. Come and stand in a circle kids,” Mrs. William said. The students all stood and formed a circle on the carpet. Mrs. William gave a puzzle word, or Tier Two words (words that can be used in various settings/areas), and each student had to say each letter that makes up the word (i.e. Hannah says ‘b’, Cooper says ‘e’, etc.). As this is happening, one minute on the timer is counting down. A student can either be out of the game if they miss a letter or if they have the ball in their hand when the timer goes off. As soon as the word is finished, Mrs. William gives the group a new word to spell. When a student did not know the next letter in the word, Mrs. William gave them a hint. A student, Cooper, did not know the next letter after ‘b’ in the word “because.” Mrs. William said, “It is a vowel.” From that point Cooper said all of the vowels and was able to pick the next letter in the word. When the final two students were left, neither of the students wanted to hold the ball so the ball was held by both of the students. After this rendition of “Hot Potato,” the students continued their OG with “Alien Words.” Mrs. William presented the students with a slide with various vowels in a mixed order. The students had to say the sound as fast as they could. For example, one slide said, “A, E, A, A, I, U.”

 

Mrs. William had a raspy voice today, and she said she was feeling ill the previous night. I helped her out with a portion of OG. She gave me her clipboard with two sentences and six families/blends/diagraphs. I had to read the sentences separately and read each twice. The first time I read the sentence slowly, and on the second time the students said the sentence with me while tapping the words out. Mrs. William informed me that this helps the student’s double check their work. When the students had their sentences written down on their whiteboard, I called a student up to write the whole sentence on the Smart Board. If any of the other students saw a mistake, they were able to come up and correct the sentence until the correct one was up on the board (correctness with spelling and punctuation matters). Many of the errors came with spelling errors on large puzzle words. I also had to say various sounds (i.e. ink) and the students had to write the sound combination on their whiteboards and then show it to me. This gave me the opportunity to check for struggling students and assist them individually at that moment. One specific student I had to help a lot was, Chelsea. Chelsea is new to The Learning Academy and has recently been medicated due to behavioral issues. Chelsea had problems with her blends.

 

At the end of this, I had the chance to work individually with my case study student. Once that was done, the students were dismissed for recess and my day came to an end.

 

 

Classroom Reflection

I really enjoyed taking action at The Learning Academy because I was able to experience part of OG from a teacher’s perspective. It is one thing to observe it, but it is another thing to experience it first-hand. I was a little nervous, though, as I did not know how fast or slow I should read the sentences, and I did not know if the sounds I was saying were right. I have never been taught phonics or phonemic awareness the same way the students at The Learning Academy are. I often feel like they know more about it than I do. I still struggle with open and closed syllables because I was never taught their meaning in a word- I was told how to say the word and then expected to memorize it. I was never given the opportunity to break it down, and I feel like the students are teaching me more than I am teaching them. I would like to have more hands on experience with saying the fragmented parts of a word. I know that these students struggle with sound-letter recognition and I do not want to mess up their path any more. However, Mrs. William said I did great which boosted my confidence.

 

I also enjoyed the “Hot Potato” game. However, I am concerned that the hints may be “too much.” In the mind of the student’s, this is a game and they know that Mrs. William will give the hint, they will guess the right letter by process of elimination, and they will be able to pass the ball on and increase their chances of winning. If I were in place of the teacher, I probably would not give the student’s any hints as I want them to figure it out for themselves rather than relying on me.

 

I also learned the difference between ‘a’ and ‘an’ when used in a sentence. All of the students wrote ‘a’ in one of the sentences I read instead of the correct word, ‘an.’ Mrs. William taught them, and me, that when the next word starts with a vowel, it has to be ‘an.’ Mrs. William is not only a Learning Academy teacher, but my own mentor and college educator whether she knows it or not. She has taught me so much in the few short weeks I have been in her classroom. Her stories and rule tricks are one of a kind.

 

 

Case Study Observations

Hannah arrived at The Learning Academy before 8:00am. While she waited on Mrs. William to begin the day, she drew on her whiteboard. Mrs. William begins each day with OG instruction. Hannah continued her pattern of not participating during this time. As I circled the room, I watched her focus on the slide, lay her hand on the table yet not mutter a sound. I went up to Hannah and said, “Do you want to say them aloud?’ Hannah shook her head with a response of ‘no.’ However, she partook in the spelling game, but was the third student to be out because she misspelled, ‘eight.’ Hannah added an extra ‘e’ at the end. Hannah took a seat at her desk, but whispered each letter of the remaining words in the game. The students were presented words in which they had to spell. Hannah spelled fishstick as fishsticik, bandit as addition, and sizzle as sisisl. During the reading of the sentences, Hannah was the only student to get one of the sentences fully correct. I told Hannah how proud I was of her. Based on her teacher input form, she needs help with confidence. Once I complimented her work a couple of times, she was able to come up and write the sentence on the Smart Board; she even corrected a student’s sentence. Hannah tends to help Chelsea, the new student, a lot during class time.

 

After OG instruction and snack time, I pulled Hannah aside for roughly twenty minutes. Last week I administered a spelling inventory, but only did half because she missed six or more in close proximity to each other. This week, I planned an activity based on her scores, administered the second half of the inventory, did OG flashcards, and read a book. I was unable to determine a precise level because I stopped half way through. I wanted to ensure that Hannah knew her sound-letter relationships so I made “Alphabet Bingo” which can be found below. I drew multiple letters from a bag and said the sound. We played against each other, but I waited to put down my chip marker until Hannah did hers first. We played two rounds- one at the beginning and one at the end of the twenty minute session. Hannah received a score of five out of five on the first round, and she received a four out of five on the second (Hannah put down ‘e’ instead of ‘i,’ and I had to remind her of ‘edge’ versus ‘itch’ as presented in OG). Next, Hannah and I did some OG flashcards. I asked Hannah why she did not participate in class during OG and she said, “I don’t know.” I then asked, “Do you feel overwhelmed?” She responded with, “Yes.” From that point I asked if she would rather do it in a quiet setting with me, and she responded with a ‘yes’ again. I was able to determine that Hannah has difficulties with her long vowels, consonant ‘cle’ words, and diagraphs. Hannah’s spelling inventory can be found below. Hannah got one out of ten words correct. After our second round of bingo, I read Hannah a book about cats (her favorite animal).

 

After my time with Hannah, she was able to go back to her seat and finish OG with Mrs. William for a short time until recess came.

 

 

Case Study Reflection

The last couple of weeks I have noticed that Hannah does not participate during OG as she should be. Hannah should be tracing and saying the letters/word so that it becomes part of her memory. Based on her responses to my questions, I can infer that Hannah feels very overwhelmed in the setting in which this instruction takes place. I can see why based on my observations. Hannah clearly has reading difficulties and needs time to think about what she is doing and going to say. Being new to the school does not help her situation. By the time she thinks about it, her peers have already shouted out the answers and have moved on to the next slide. I am worried that her confidence in this classroom setting has been more detrimental than positive. It is my goal to do a little bit of OG with her in private as I can. I want to get her confidence, knowledge, and skills up as I can so that she can feel more comfortable with participating. In a sense, I am her tutor. I need to get her caught up with the rest of the class when it comes to OG. My compliments appeared to boost Hannah’s confidence, and I was pleased to see her get up and take action with the sentences. I want to see more of this come from Hannah because then her confidence will hopefully translate onto paper.

 

Based on Hannah’s scores with “Alphabet Bing,” she has mastered her sound and letter relationships. However, I will test her knowledge on ‘e’ and ‘i’ next week with an activity. After I regraded her spelling inventory, I have determined that Hannah falls under the middle diagraphs stage. My goal is start here next week with an activity. I am wondering what will be too much for her. She also needs help with long vowels, but I do not want to overwhelm her with too many activities in one twenty minute time span. Yet, I want to help her as much as I can while I am with her. I read to Hannah because she still seems to be distant towards me. I pulled a book from the classroom library based on her interests- she likes cats and enjoys being read to. At the end of the time with her, Hannah seemed hesitant to want to go back to her seat. I promised her that we would do another fun game next week. My goal is to get Hannah to read with me- going from echo, to choral, buddy, and then independent reading. In my opinion, students need to be read to multiple times every day. Not only is it a bonding experience, but a modeling one as well. Hannah needs to see that reading independently can be fun, and that it should be done in a proper manner through questioning, accuracy, rate, and expression.