Friends and Peers

This week MayZin and I worked on reading graphs and slope-intercept form. I struggled helping her this week, mostly because she had a hard time understanding the relationship between x and y values along with fractions and decimals. These past few weeks I have started noticing a gap in MayZin’s mathematical learning. She is working on learning to write equations, but she has a hard time working with fractions converting decimals to fractions. This is a problem in foundations of algebra because fractions are a huge portion of algebra. I believe this is why she is struggling with slope-intercept form, because an understanding of fractions is important to find the slope of a line.

MayZin was much more motivated in her classes this week, especially her reading class. I had mentioned in earlier posts it is often difficult to get her to focus on her reading plus work. Earlier in the semester I noticed that she would become distracted during reading plus. This week, however, she started reading plus as soon as class started. She even asked some of her classmates to be quiet so that she could focus on what she was reading. I believe this change is mostly because progress reports were recently sent out. She seems to be trying harder these past few weeks. I wonder if this is because she was unhappy with these grades. I believe that she is trying to finish the school year on a stronger note, and she is headed in the right direction.

MayZin seems to spend a fair amount of time with her friends. Every week I ask her what she has planned for the weekend, and after some suggestions she often tells me she will probably hang out with her friends. She spends a lot of time socializing with her friends before class as well. Theorist Harry Stack Sullivan believed there were four positive aspects to intimate friendships. These four aspects developed higher self-esteem in adolescents (Arnett,2013). These four aspects are informational support, instrumental support, companionship support, and esteem support. I have noticed MayZin’s friends offer all four. When she is not in school her friends will text what she missed. They will also work together in class, helping each other with vocabulary worksheets. MayZin spends much of her time between classes with her friends showing that they rely on each other for company during structured social time. Finally, I often see them supporting each other through their successes. When someone gets a good grade they congratulate each other. If they didn’t do as well as they hoped they encourage each other to work harder.

Since we were working on graphs again this week I worked on MayZin’s reading level with her again this week.. According to the WIDA can do descriptors the ability to “evaluate usefulness of data or information supported visually or graphically” (Gottlieb, M., Cranley, M. E., & Cammilleri, A., 2007) is not attained until level 4. She struggled with reading the graphs that she was asked to work with again this week. I mostly worked with her on deciding which variable is the independent variable, and which variable is the dependent variable. From there I asked her leading questions until she was able to figure out the the x-value is the independent variable, and the y-value is the dependent variable, and why they are like this.

Media

Today MayZin had the chance to work on her complex assessment today in her math class. The complex assessment theme she was assigned is finding evidence of an afterlife. I mostly looked at her presentation and tried looking for different articles she may be able to use. When I asked her about her assessment she didn’t sound too enthusiastic about it. She moved around in slides and articles quite a bit. I had a hard time trying to figure out what exactly she was trying to do. When I continued to ask her about it she gave me short answers. In all there was not much I was able to help MayZin with today.

            I didn’t have any new assumptions this week, but I did notice a change in MayZin’s academic attitude in her reading class. In previous posts I have stated that I have assumed MayZin seems to not have a strong motivation in her classes. This week, in her reading class, I noticed that she focused on her reading plus work more this week, and she participated better in class. This could have been a push to do better before break, or maybe she was ready to start working harder in her classes. I also know that progress reports had been sent out a few weeks ago. She could have not been pleased with her progress report grades, and she may now be pushing to end the year in good standing.

            MayZin is surrounded by technology all day long. Winooski has a 1:1 tech initiative. This means that every student in the high school has a laptop that they use regularly throughout the day. The two classes that I follow MayZin in uses technology. Her Math class is an independent learning classroom, so she completes and turns her homework in all on her computer. This has positive and negative effects on MayZin and her classmates I have noticed. One of the positive effects the 1:1 initiative has is students are able to work at their own pace. This helps MayZin’s understanding, because she is able to work on a unit until she thoroughly understands it. MayZin also has access to the Internet when she does not understand a concept. However, I have noticed that MayZin and her peers take advantage of technology in the classroom. Many of them will use the computers to watch YouTube videos and search through their social media feeds. They also use their cell phones an excessive amount during class time. I have noticed many of MayZin’s peers’ texting when they should be working on reading plus work. There are many positives to the 1:1 technology initiative, but I also have seen that it needs to be better regulated, because many students are abusing it.

            I continued to work on MayZin’s reading level with her this week. I noticed that she can read graphs well, but taking information and making a graph with it is difficult for her. According to the WIDA can do descriptors the ability to “evaluate usefulness of data or information supported visually or graphically” (Gottlieb, M., Cranley, M. E., & Cammilleri, A., 2007) is not attained until level 4. This could very well be why she has a hard time to create her own graphs. This week she was asked to make a graph of her own with two related variables of her choosing. I tried to give her examples, some of them including her favorite sport soccer, but she still struggled to create a graph herself. She also struggled with solving a question where she was given information and then had to draw a graph with that information. I could see that she could not decipher what information is important and what isn’t. I believe this is because of her reading level, because after many guiding questions and explanations she was finally able to draw the graph.

Works Cited:

Gottlieb, M., Cranley, M. E., & Cammilleri, A. (2007). WIDA English language proficiency standards and resource guide. Madison, WI: Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System.