Modifications Needed:
The first two hours today, I was working with a select group of students. These students had yet to turn in a guided reading assignment. The group in class was going to spend the hour going over some of the harder questions, in efforts to modify their knowledge. So, my group and I went to the library to hammer out the assignment together. During the second hour, a student who I know to have an IEP, says to me “Mr. Tobey said I could do this with modifications.” I was at a lose.
First he asked if he could have a girl as his partner, I told him sure if it was ok with her. After a few minutes I went to see how he was doing and the paper was blank. I sat down with him and was able to show him how the guided reading assignments worked. We worked together to find the answers. He seemed proud to be able to locate the answer. It was a moment that I was very happy to be a part of.
Prompting the Question:
For the sixth grade classes, the plan was to spend a large amount of time doing a question and answer regarding the dissection done the previous days. This is something the teacher wanted to do in an effort to get them thinking about how to ask questions.
He asked the students to write a question on a post it note, and hand it to me. I liked this method because it forced everyone to ask a question, but also because it gave the teacher the power to manipulate the discussion a bit. For example, three of the classes asked a great question that lead to an amazing discussion. The last class however, did not think of this question, so I just pretended one of the students did anyways by “reading” it from a blank post it note. J
Party in Tobey’s Room
As I am sitting here after school there are four students from the 8th grade classes, who have missing assignments and are close to failing, sitting here with the teacher and I. Thanks to the convenience of the Infinite Campus, the teacher was able to contact parents to ask if the student could stay after class with him. He then was able to locate where the students were, call their teacher in the class they were in, and have them come to his classroom after school.
The teacher explained to me how, instead of telling the students at the beginning of the day they had to work to finish, he chooses to keep them after school. He feels this gives him more of a chance to work with these students, and therefore improving their quality of work. If they had all day to do it, they would probably try to do it in other classes and their work would not have the thought that it would have when they are sitting there doing it with him.