On September 21, I met with Raiyaan, a student who had come to me the previous week requesting that I tutor him. I had spoken with him on numerous occasions in the past and had a pretty good gauge on his needs assessment. He speaks very carefully and clearly without many issues. He told me that where he personally feels he needs most improvement is in reading. He proceeded to pull out a book that he had taken it upon himself to read for pleasure, "To Kill a Mockingbird." I must admit I was quite impressed with his selection. He had only just begun reading it, still only on the first chapter. We pulled an excerpt from a passage he had already read which gave him some difficulty. We worked on the words he didn't know, and I guided him step by step into using context clues to first gain an implicit meaning of the word and had him give me his estimated definition. (He had little difficulty understanding the overall meaning of each paragraph.) With some words like: diminish, I provided him with a few tricks to remember and apply in the future. I pointed out that many words that begin with dim- in English mean "to lessen, or make less." I gave the example of the verb "to dim" as in "to dim the lights." He instantly understood the connection and excitedly replied "Because there is less light, you have made them softer. Like to diminish is to make smaller."
I then realized that to someone who knows little of America's history, especially in terms of racism, the strength and meaning of the book might get lost in translation. Thus, I decided to provide him with schema and we discussed racism in the south back in the time that the book takes place. He was worried that I would give away the story and I assured him that it is necessary to understand the history to appreciate the book fully. I was careful not to give away any spoilers. I plan to bring in a couple separate, short reading exercises for our next session and also continue to work on the book.
No comments:
Post a Comment