8-30-12 Activities/Reflection

Field Notes 8-30-12

Goals: edit typed piece

           teach IVAN CAPP

           Phrase or sentence?

           Make a sentence

*Read a book on religion and service

         *Has to write a report about service

*Talked about iPads and religion

*Read birthday piece out loud (from printed copy)

        *Found places to add periods

        *Added a sentence about Lex Cath beating Trinity in football on a Friday--found a  logical place to sequence.

*Discussed how he’s watching all of his favorite teams beat their rivals

*“What is easier--typing or writing?”

        *“Right now writing, but once I get used to the iPad, that will be easy since typing  on a computer is easy.

*Direct Instruction on types of words: IVAN CAPP

         *A complete sentence MUST have a verb AND noun or pronoun

*He asked what the different was between linking and helping verbs.

*A helping verb is usually a smaller, “to be” verb that helps a bigger  action verb.

*Phrase or Sentence?

*Sorted cards into 2 piles--phrases and sentences from Book 6, his  current Barton place

*1 questionable phrase--Jake began.

*Make a sentence

*Single words are written on index cards. His task is to simply create a sentence. Asked if he can use all the cards--May not be possible to use ALL cards, but use as many as you can to make a complete sentence that makes sense.

*The citizen bravely decided to publicize their furious proposal.

*Talked about comma placement--he said it goes wherever there’s a pause. I explained that’s kind of true.

*I changed the order by putting “bravely” first. Gave general rule that if a sentence doesn’t start with who/what phrase or noun, put a comma.

**Look up linking verbs.Last week, more significant changes were made, so hopefully those acronyms and purposes are getting internalized and keep going that direction.


Reflection:
In addition to reviewing ARMS and CUPS, I introduced my friend, IVAN CAPP. Ivan helps us remember the parts of speech. I hope to actually get by the store for poster board and printer ink to make some visual aids so I have pictures to post here. They are the best part of blogs. Maybe I'm biased though, since I mostly read home decor blogs.  Anyway, my student enjoyed trying name all the parts of speech. I explained knowing the parts of speech are important because they help us build and expand sentences, which in turn can be expanded into paragraphs, and eventually essays (though I'm sure my project will be long over by that point).

We also did several activities. One I called Phrase or Sentence? I tried to make it like a game. My student had to read a group of words written on an index card, which I corresponded to the Barton level s/he is currently working in. You know, to give more experience with the reading/spelling rules of the level and to relate tutoring to more authentic activities. After the student read the group of words s/he had to decide if it was a complete sentence or a phrase. The criteria for a complete sentence was a noun or pronoun and a verb. S/He did great getting all but one right, but the one s/he missed was tricky, so I wasn't too surprised. It also lead into an interesting discussion of verbs and types of verbs--action, linking, helping.

The other "game" we played was called Make a Sentence. I gave the student a set of cards with single words written on them (again, corresponding to the level of Barton) and told him/her to use the words and make a complete sentence. It could be as long or short as s/he wanted, but there were slightly more words than would make sense. I also used this as an introduction to punctuation, as I also made small cards for periods and commas. We rearranged the words to make different sentences and I think s/he actually enjoyed that.

I explained before we began that the activities were building blocks for later work. Before we could create exciting sentences and paragraphs, we needed to make sure the basics down. I also related it to Level 1 of Barton, and s/he seemed to understand the connection.

Whew! We packed a lot in our session. My student seemed to enjoy the activities though, especially since we talked about similar things s/he knew from school, but done in a more exciting and interesting way--yet another blessing of working one on one with my students.