Case Study Report: Student Background

The student Ive chosen to observe is a 1st grader at Lynwood

Elementary in Novato. Joshua is an English Language Learner whose
first language is Spanish. He has been coming to Lynwood since preschool, therefore this year is the beginning of his 3rd year in school.
Joshuas parents are both immigrants but he was born in the United
States. While Ive only gotten to read with Joshua once, so far, I can tell
he is a very motivated reader. Although he was the lowest level of
reader out of the 5 1st graders I read with, Joshua was the most excited
and willing to read and really take the extra time to sound out each
individual word. One word that kept popping up that Joshua kept
having trouble with was and. I found it interesting that he could
sound it out and get the word then come across it 5 words later and
totally forget what word it was.
Another problem he faced while reading was being able to
successfully sound out a word, and even able to repeat the word, but
when asked to describe what the word was, hed have trouble and
wouldnt truly know what the word was until I said the word with no
accent opposed to him sounding it out and reading it with an accent
Assessment Analysis
I had some trouble analyzing the various assessments I gave to
Joshua because I found my results varied with each assessment given.
For example, when I talked with Joshua, he always expressed a passion
for reading and really seemed to enjoy my time reading with him, often
asking to read more pages than required. However his Elementary
Reading Attitude Survey was all over the board for example he chose
the last Garfield when asked, How do you feel about reading for fun at
home? But chose the first, most excited Garfield when asked, How do
you feel about spending free time reading a book? These polar
opposite answers to these two similar questions made me question the
rest of my findings.
The 1st grade IRI was also extremely difficult for him. After
struggling with the first couple words I decided to read him the story to
assess his comprehension skills after seeing the level of reading was
too difficult for him. I myself thought the story was difficult to follow so
I wasnt surprised when Joshua struggled to answer the comprehension
questions correctly. He did a much better job when it came to the
running record Baby Bear and the Big Fish. The text was much easier
for him to read and I think the illustrations that went with the text only
furthered his understanding of the story.
I started him out with List 3 of the Fry Words. He struggled with
other more and write. After he read all of List 3 I asked him to
read List 2 for me in which he struggled with were and there which
led me to have him read List 1 which he was able to read all the way

through successfully. I think Joshua does better reading words within a

story because than from a list of words because he is able to guess a
word that makes sense opposed to solely rely on sounding it out. The
words that he did struggle with in List 2 and 3 do not follow traditional
phonemic rules.
Case Study Report: Initial Description of Interactions
While Joshua may not be the best student academically, his
positive attitude and great personality make him a pleasure to work
with and to have in the classroom. While social on the playground hes
never one of the students thats on the rug talking to friends and
goofing off. Most of the time he is sitting, listening and ready to learn.
Occasionally he will yell out a question, answer or story without waiting
to be called on but I think this goes to show his overall excitement that
he has for school and learning. He has definitely improved in all
subjects since the beginning of the year, the most notable
improvement being in reading. While I think the fact that English is his
second language still affects his reading, the list of sight words he is
able to recognize has grown tremendously and he never gets
discouraged when trying to read.
Joshua enjoys picture talking the stories that are too hard for
him to read. There are many books in the classroom library that arent
1st grade level that the teacher has read to the class. I had Joshua
read one of these books to me about Halloween. While he may have
been able to read some of the words on each page, Joshua chose to
stick with his own summaries, which I actually enjoyed more that
having him struggle to read the story.
When I read him a literature book I found he was able to identify
the characters and answer simple conceptual questions however I also
noticed that while there were some vocabulary words within the
passage I read that he did not know, he did not ask me what the words
meant or stop me to ask me to describe these words to him. It wasnt
until I stopped him and asked him what certain words meant until I
received the blank stare that showed me he hadnt understood the
word.
When read a passage from his social studies book, Joshua was
able to identify the very main basic idea but failed to remember any of
the specific details that had been read to him. Even after I prompted
him with questions in attempts to have him recall that section of the
reading he simply spat out random answers. I appreciated him still
trying to answer the question despite him having no clue what the
actual answer was.
Joshua was able to understand the vocabulary when I read him
certain questions from his math workbook. I think these words such as
explain, and describe came easy to him because they have been
working on problems like the ones read to him for a while now. When it

came to solving the word problems however he had some trouble. I

attributed this to his poor math skills and not his reading
comprehension skills however both could be contributing to his math
struggles.
Instructional Plan
Because my time with my case study student is limited to an
hour in the class room a week with my one-on-one time limited to 10
minutes of reading the book the student has already been assigned I
do not have an opportunity to incorporate much of an instructional
plan with my student, however working with my student has given me
the opportunity to learn and grow so when I do have students of my
own I am able to create more individualized instructional plans to
provide each student with the support they need to become successful
students who are not only capable of reading, but actually enjoy
reading.
If I were allowed to implement an instructional plan for Joshua, I
would focus on incorporating vocabulary, comprehension, writing and
speaking and listening. Because his phonemic awareness is one of his
strengths I wouldnt spend too much time focusing on that so as to
give the student more one on one support in areas he struggles more
in. Being an English Language Learner, Joshua could use some extra
scaffolding when it comes to some of the vocabulary words that he is
able to read and recognize but has trouble defining the word on his
own. To help him widen his vocabulary I would pick out words from any
book he was going to read before hand and go over the meaning of the
words BEFORE he came across the word while reading. This vocabulary
prep would also assist in his comprehension.
One example of something I would definitely implement in my
classroom that I have seen in some classrooms is a daily journal. The
students daily journal is something they can write in once they are
done with their work. The students are allowed to write about anything
and it is great practice for students who are just learning how to write
and spell. I think Joshua could really benefit from a daily journal
because it would allow him to get that writing practice in while also
giving him the freedom to write about anything. Ive also seen teachers
put a list of words that students might want to use but may have a
hard time spelling in the journals as a sort of cheat sheet. While I
think it is important to teach students to try to sound out words on
their own (during the Lesson Study at Mark Day School I saw a student
write she was thankful for Mie mom which I thought was so cute and
clever to see her acknowledge my rhymes with pie so clearly it
should be spelt that way), often times having these extra set of spelled
out words can encourage students to not be afraid to write more and
keep on writing.

Lastly, I would have Joshua practice reading aloud and listening

to himself read. I think this would really benefit him because often
times he would sound out a word perfectly but he wouldnt be able to
successfully identify it and say it until he heard me repeat what he had
already said. I think the pipe phones used at Mark Day School would be
a great tool for Joshua to have because they would allow him to
simultaneously practice reading aloud and allow him to listen to
himself read.