3/18 Field

This past Wednesday, the first grade class I have been observing truly stole my heart away. The day was like every other day I've been in their class but the students just seemed so happy and so much more excited to have me and my field partner in their classroom. The morning began with a review of morning work and then the morning meeting. After morning meeting, the students went back to their desks and began to read their story of the week aloud, one student per sentence. It's interesting to listen to the students because it becomes painfully obvious which students are not confident in their reading skills while others are overly confident. After the readings, students went into their literacy groups and, like I usually do, I worked with the students in the literacy games station. I had noticed that some students were struggling with their spelling words this week so I opted to play a spelling review game where they wrote their spelling word on a small whiteboard and I kept "score" on my board, charting every word they spelled correctly. This was a spinoff of the review game the students played earlier during morning meeting called "Sparkle" where the teacher says a spelling word from the weekly spelling list and students spell the word, one letter per child, until the word is spelled. The students stand up after they say their letter. The last person (after the word is finished - no letter for them to say) says "Sparkle" and students sit down. The students really enjoyed my little board game...until the weakest speller in the class rotated in. I knew this student would be frustrated with my game and, shortly after I explained the game, he was already discouraged and annoyed with the idea. I suggested he help create a new version and he said that he would like to play "Sparkle" again. We played Sparkle and I worked hard to make sure he felt confident spelling the letters he could hear; this means I would either begin with him, if the word started with a strong sound, or end with him if it ended with a clear sound (like r or d). I wanted to make sure he felt comfortable and included. I am happy to say that he walked away with a smile and I walked away with an idea of how I can help him with his letter-sound correspondence.