Light bulb moment...
Today I had a ‘light bulb’ moment concerning one of my students and solved a mini mystery. Woot!
I’ve been teaching GED classes this week while the regular teacher is gone. It’s been an interesting and surprisingly fun week! A little over a week ago, a new student named *Dave entered our program. He’s in his early 20’s, and seems really nice. He has a daughter whom he loves to bits, and he works hard in class. He’s a white guy, but he’s a little bit ‘gangster’ too. He’s a former dropout, been arrested for a few things, and is covered in tattoos, but he wants to get his life back on track so he can support his family.
This week, I noticed an odd thing about him. Whenever I was teaching he wanted to be in class, but when they had independent study, he wanted to go off and work alone. He didn’t want to work on the computers in our classroom; he always wanted to go the computer lab. If the computer lab was busy, he worked in an empty classroom. But he always came back for the lectures, right on time. I thought that was strange, but I also know that our classroom can get loud, so I assumed that maybe he wasn’t able to concentrate in a room full of people. I’m not the regular teacher, and I figured the ‘work alone’ strategy was working for him, so I wasn’t going to hassle him about it.
On Tuesday and Wednesday we did an in-class reading of the short story “The Cat” by E.A. Poe. I knew it would be *way* above my students reading level so I decided to read it to them (as they read along on their own copy) and I would pick out difficult vocabulary words for us to discuss. I didn’t let them look up the meaning of the words, the point was to try and discover the meaning of the word by using the context clues around it. (A skill they’ll need for the GED) After the first few words, the class jumped right in and started to get the hang of it.
During the class discussions, I noticed that Dave seemed really good at picking up the meanings of the unknown words. Not only was he was able to ‘get’ the meaning of the word, he was able to describe why he thought the word had a certain meaning. (A rarity among my students.) I also noticed that (for the most part) he didn’t look at his copy of the story. He wasn’t looking at the story, but he was listening to everything. Later in the day, his file was on my desk, so I reviewed his reading scores and discovered that he had a little less than a second grade reading level.
Hmmm... So the new guy could barely read... but he had great listening skills, and I could tell that he was a really smart cookie. Imagine how his life could change if he could just read! So, determined to help him learn to read, I sat down and began to design an individual educational plan for him.
Today, he happened to be using a computer in our classroom. After shooting him with a marshmallow from my new mini-catapult, (Thank you “Siege the Day!”) I sat down beside him to see what he was working on. He was frustrated because he had taken a skills test on ‘capitalization’ and had gotten grade of 18%. He was trying to figure out how to re-start the test. We figured it out, and I stayed to get him started working on the first two questions. I read the directions explaining the capitalization rules aloud, and he would read the sentence that needed to be corrected. As he read aloud, he got most of the words wrong. It was like he’d read the first letter and then guess what the rest of the word was. So I took over reading the sentences as well. After that he could answer the questions correctly every time. The more he got correct, the happier he became. But he couldn’t just listen to me, he *had* to look at the screen to judge if a word was capitalized or not. As the questions passed, and he began concentrating on reading the letters, he inched closer and closer to the screen. Pretty soon, his face was an *inch* away from the screen and he was still squinting. A lot.
GLASSES!! He needs GLASSES!! THAT’S why he was hanging out alone; he didn’t want anyone to see him while he was working on the computer! That’s why he can’t read, he can’t *see* anything! Imagine how much he could do, how far he could go if he could only see! Imagine how his life could change! Why have no teachers noticed this before?
I don’t think he’s realized that I’ve figured out his secret. I was slightly behind and to the side of him while we were working. Plus, he was so happy to be getting the answers right, that I don’t think he was paying attention to anything else.
But tomorrow I’m on a mission. I’m going to contact my sources and find an organization that helps people to get free glasses. I’m going to get it all set up and then I’ll talk to Dave about it. Hopefully he’ll be willing to get a pair and hopefully, he’ll wear them. Like I said, he’s kind of gangster, and his image seems to mean a lot to him.
It could really change his life. I’ve got my fingers crossed! If you’re reading this, please cross your fingers too!
(*Name changed to protect the innocent.)
I’ve been teaching GED classes this week while the regular teacher is gone. It’s been an interesting and surprisingly fun week! A little over a week ago, a new student named *Dave entered our program. He’s in his early 20’s, and seems really nice. He has a daughter whom he loves to bits, and he works hard in class. He’s a white guy, but he’s a little bit ‘gangster’ too. He’s a former dropout, been arrested for a few things, and is covered in tattoos, but he wants to get his life back on track so he can support his family.
This week, I noticed an odd thing about him. Whenever I was teaching he wanted to be in class, but when they had independent study, he wanted to go off and work alone. He didn’t want to work on the computers in our classroom; he always wanted to go the computer lab. If the computer lab was busy, he worked in an empty classroom. But he always came back for the lectures, right on time. I thought that was strange, but I also know that our classroom can get loud, so I assumed that maybe he wasn’t able to concentrate in a room full of people. I’m not the regular teacher, and I figured the ‘work alone’ strategy was working for him, so I wasn’t going to hassle him about it.
On Tuesday and Wednesday we did an in-class reading of the short story “The Cat” by E.A. Poe. I knew it would be *way* above my students reading level so I decided to read it to them (as they read along on their own copy) and I would pick out difficult vocabulary words for us to discuss. I didn’t let them look up the meaning of the words, the point was to try and discover the meaning of the word by using the context clues around it. (A skill they’ll need for the GED) After the first few words, the class jumped right in and started to get the hang of it.
During the class discussions, I noticed that Dave seemed really good at picking up the meanings of the unknown words. Not only was he was able to ‘get’ the meaning of the word, he was able to describe why he thought the word had a certain meaning. (A rarity among my students.) I also noticed that (for the most part) he didn’t look at his copy of the story. He wasn’t looking at the story, but he was listening to everything. Later in the day, his file was on my desk, so I reviewed his reading scores and discovered that he had a little less than a second grade reading level.
Hmmm... So the new guy could barely read... but he had great listening skills, and I could tell that he was a really smart cookie. Imagine how his life could change if he could just read! So, determined to help him learn to read, I sat down and began to design an individual educational plan for him.
Today, he happened to be using a computer in our classroom. After shooting him with a marshmallow from my new mini-catapult, (Thank you “Siege the Day!”) I sat down beside him to see what he was working on. He was frustrated because he had taken a skills test on ‘capitalization’ and had gotten grade of 18%. He was trying to figure out how to re-start the test. We figured it out, and I stayed to get him started working on the first two questions. I read the directions explaining the capitalization rules aloud, and he would read the sentence that needed to be corrected. As he read aloud, he got most of the words wrong. It was like he’d read the first letter and then guess what the rest of the word was. So I took over reading the sentences as well. After that he could answer the questions correctly every time. The more he got correct, the happier he became. But he couldn’t just listen to me, he *had* to look at the screen to judge if a word was capitalized or not. As the questions passed, and he began concentrating on reading the letters, he inched closer and closer to the screen. Pretty soon, his face was an *inch* away from the screen and he was still squinting. A lot.
GLASSES!! He needs GLASSES!! THAT’S why he was hanging out alone; he didn’t want anyone to see him while he was working on the computer! That’s why he can’t read, he can’t *see* anything! Imagine how much he could do, how far he could go if he could only see! Imagine how his life could change! Why have no teachers noticed this before?
I don’t think he’s realized that I’ve figured out his secret. I was slightly behind and to the side of him while we were working. Plus, he was so happy to be getting the answers right, that I don’t think he was paying attention to anything else.
But tomorrow I’m on a mission. I’m going to contact my sources and find an organization that helps people to get free glasses. I’m going to get it all set up and then I’ll talk to Dave about it. Hopefully he’ll be willing to get a pair and hopefully, he’ll wear them. Like I said, he’s kind of gangster, and his image seems to mean a lot to him.
It could really change his life. I’ve got my fingers crossed! If you’re reading this, please cross your fingers too!
(*Name changed to protect the innocent.)