*For Zeek* Case Study Paper
Fieldwork Journal Week 3
Introduction/Agenda:
I was back at Knob Hill Elementary this week. On the agenda for January 31st, 2019, Mrs. Peterson had her normal schedule going with reading rotations and word builders when I walked in. However, today they began with a GoNoodle program which is a tool used by the school and Mrs. Peterson that is educational and fun for the students. Every time I have observed the students getting ready for a GoNoodle activity they always get very animated and excited. This activity was on the whiteboard when I walked in and students were able to touch and interact with it on the board. Mrs. Peterson would call the students up one by one to use the word application which has words that it speaks out loud by an electronic voice, letter by letter, and the kids unscramble and spell the words out when it is their turn. After the GoNoodle activity, it was time for reading rotations/groups where the students break into different reading stations which have different work/activities at each of them. One of them is in a group with Mrs. Peterson for closer, individualized attention.
Individual Student Interactions:
I sat down with June, an EL learning student from Japan to practice her reading and pronunciations. When reading, we had to go over the letter “e” and the sounds it makes. After some practice, June started to recognize the sound of “e” correctly when reading through a full sentence. She struggled with the word “sports” and mistook the “o” for an “i” and read it as the word “spritz”. She also had a hard time with “ch-il” combination in the world “children”. When reading the beginning of the sentence “This is my house.”, she struggles with “th” in the word “this”, she says it with a “d” instead of “th” as “dis” but does not put a lot of effort or annunciation on the “d” sound. I chose a few words and practiced sounding out the “th” with her and told her to stick out/use her tongue when trying to pronounce it. She did a lot better practicing with her tongue protruding forward between her teeth this time. June has a lot of spelling issues as well and has a hard time forming sentences that make sense. I also noticed she struggles with suffixes on verbs to make them action verbs. For example, she did not know how to take the word “walk” and make it into “walk-ing”.
I sat down with Mrs. Peterson, Grant and Sophia, another ELL student and we read a book about the wind. The two students were asked to point out words in the story that make the “ow” sound as in the word, “how”. This “ow” sound is a spelling pattern that they are studying for the week. According to Mrs. Peterson, Grant and Sophia were both test for Special Ed, Sophia did not qualify but Grant did, however he has a high IQ.
Mispronounced vowel sounds:
· June: Ru/instead of rul, dʌ/instead of ði, sɪts/instead of sɛt, ˈhɔˌkaɪ/ instead of ˈhɑki, oʊ/ instead of ʌ, kʌ/ instead of ʧ, kɪn/ instead of kæn, hoʊ/ instead of haʊ, oʊʌld/ instead of oʊld
· Other Students: ɛl/ instead of ɔl, toʊt/ instead of tɔt, kwɛstʌn/ instead of ˈkwɛsʧən
Mispronounced consonant sounds:
· June: ʧʌldrɪŋ and ʧɜrdrən/ instead of ˈʧɪldrən, ˈsɪtəsənz/ instead of ˈsɪtəzənz, ʃwip/ instead of swip
· Other students: ˈfaɪ/ instead of flaɪ, noʊdeɪz/ instead of ˈnaʊədeɪz
Speaking habits:
Most of the ELL students had similar issues with pronouncing “th” sound in words because they were not using their tongue primarily when trying to say it. When reading, a lot of them would leave letters out of words, making them an entire new word all together. For example, June was reading “The duck was swimming” as “The duke was swimming”. When trying to turn the word “walk” into “walking”, she would say the suffix, “king”, first and leave out “walk” entirely. Another student, Grant, would say “no-days” and leave out the “w” from the word, “nowadays”.
Reflection: