Michaela Bulger

ITE 325
September 30, 2018
Child Study
The two students I chose to focus on for my child study are in the developing

proficiency. They are both in the tier three group for RTI math and reading. Student B is eight

years old and enjoys giving hugs and smiling. Throughout the day, she comes and gives my

mentor teacher and I many hugs. Student B struggles in both reading and math. In reading, she

switches some of her letters. She also mentioned that she doesn’t get along with her older

sister at home. One struggle in class is to keep her engaged. She puts her head down often

during lessons and looks tired and bored. When the lessons involve getting up and coming to

write on the board she is more engaged and paying attention.

The second student, Student K, is nine years old. She enjoys talking story with everyone

and sharing about herself. One of her strengths in class is that she has the potential to do good

in school. She just needs a little guidance from the teacher but once she figures it out, she is

independent. She often sits in her seat doing nothing and when I encourage her to try, she just

tells me it’s hard. When I work with her to solve the first problem, I see that she does

understand and she is able to continue the rest on her own. Her struggle this school year is her

home life. There is a situation going on between her parents that are affecting her and her twin

brother. She is in PSAP which is a counseling she goes to every Monday to talk about how she

is feeling.

To determine student’s placements, my mentor teacher said they use the i-Ready

diagnostics. Below is a picture of the diagnostic at the beginning of the year. Diagnostic A is for

Student K, and diagnostic B is for Student B. Student K is at grade 1 level for numbers and
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operations, algebra and algebraic thinking, measurement and data, geometry, and as an

overall. Student B is at grade 1 level for numbers and operations, and measurement and data,

but is at a grade 2 level for algebra and algebraic thinking, geometry, and her overall. To

determine their placing, my mentor teacher also mentioned that the teachers get a form from

their previous teachers stating what overall group they were in that grade.
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Diagnostic A

Diagnostic B
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The student sample below is a test from Student K. The students learned about

multiplication by drawing groups then using repeated addition. The test below shows the

number of groups and the amount in each group and the students were to create the equation

and solve. In example 1 below, Student K received a well below on her first try. For the top

portion of the test, I was able to see that when she is given the visual of the groups, she is able

to find the total but she struggles with creating the equation. It looks as if she is mistaking the

multiplication equation for addition because the two numbers she writes adds up to the

solution. For the next portion when she is not given the visuals but just the numbers, she is

able to create the correct equation but again she adds the numbers rather than multiplying.

After correcting and looking over the tests, my mentor teacher decided to have the

students retake it. During recess, a few students stayed in and my mentor teacher reviewed

the topics with them and answered any questions they had. After this review, they retook the

test. As it shows in example 2, Student K made great progress after receiving more assistance

in a smaller group. There were a few mistakes she still made the same but I can see she now

understand more of creating the equation. She was still able to get the correct answer, and this

time she was able to correctly place how many cents were in each group.
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Example 1
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Example 2
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Example 3 is a picture of Student K’s workbook pages that she completed after a lesson.

This lesson was on reading time on a clock and knowing how many minutes past the hour it is,

and how many minutes to the next hour. The top portion of the workbook pages below, step

in, we completed as a class. The students complete their workbook pages independently and

when they are finished, my mentor teacher and I check it by circling anything that is wrong so

they can retry. I can see that Student K was following along in the class discussion and

completing her own workbook pages. On her first try, she had many questions incorrect. On

the first page, I could see that she understands, she just got confused when writing the time in

the digital clock. I can see that she thought she had to write the time of the minutes to

sentence. For part 3 on the second page, I could see that she got them all wrong, but it was

because she wasn’t paying attention to the words. She was to write the minutes to the next

hour, but what she did was took the time given and placed the numbers in the boxes. She was

able to self-correct these problems after I explained to read it carefully. The biggest thing I

noticed besides reading the directions carefully, was that when reading a clock, she gets

confused on the hour when it is close to being the next hour. For example, in 2a and 2c, the

hour hand is really close to becoming the next hour. She got confused and wrote that as the

hour past. I walked through the 2a with her individually, and she was able to understand and

self-correct 2c.
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Example 3
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Example 3 cont.
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Example 4 is a recent lesson on multiplying by two. Students were given an array and

they were to write a twos multiplication fact and the turnaround fact, and they were also

taught doubling. In the step up problems, I can see that Student K was able to get that there

are two rows in each array and she was able to find the total for each, but her number

representing the amount going across was incorrect. The number she wrote was always the

same as the number she got as her solution. When she was already given the equation, she

was able to correctly solve and match it with its turnaround fact. In the step ahead section, she

did fairly well. The numbers on the left were to go in a machine and come out doubled. She

was about to find the out number correctly for each, but what she struggled with was finding

the in number. This would require halving which is more difficult but her answers were very

close. She did not have time to correct her work for this lesson but we reviewed it quickly and

she was able to verbally tell me the correct equation.

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Example 4
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Example 4 cont.
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The student sample below is a test from Student B. The students learned about

multiplication by drawing groups then using repeated addition. The test below shows the

number of groups and the amount in each group and the students were to create the equation

and solve. In example 1 below, Student B received a meets proficiency on her first try.

Although she received a good grade for this test, my mentor teacher accidentally called her

name when naming people who needed to retake. I chose to use this sample still because it

shows how she made progress from her first and second try. On her first try, she was able to

create the correct equation to match a picture and solve. What she struggled with was the

word problems that didn’t have a visual. She created her own drawing of the picture, but she

was not able to correctly represent the question in a visual. Rather than having 10 groups of 5,

she created a group of 5 and a group of 10 then added it to get her solution.

When looking at example 2, she received a meets expectation. After having more of a

review which included writing on the white board and having it as a competition, she was able

to gain more information from this. This shows how if she is engaged, she does better. She

was able to fix her mistakes from her first try and get each question correct.
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Example 1
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Example 2
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Example 3 shows Student B’s work in her workbook after the lesson on reading time as

past and to the hour. As a class, we completed the step in problem at the top of page one. I

can see that she didn’t write the answers that we came up with as a class. She may not have

been following along, which could be because she was not engaged in the lesson. When

looking over her work, I noticed she struggled with the same thing as Student K. When the

hour hand was close to the next hour, she mistaken it and wrote it for the minutes past. When

the hour hand was more in the middle of the two hours, she was able to read it correctly. I

worked with her one on one and told her that if she is unsure where the hour hand it, to extend

it like she was doing for the minute hand. She was able to do this and see her mistakes. I also

noticed that she struggled with finding the minutes to the next hour on a digit clock. She uses

jumps on the analog clock to help her find the minutes to the next hour, so she struggled when

she was not able to draw the jumps on this clock.

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Example 3
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Example 3 cont.
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Example 4 is Student B’s workbook pages after the multiplying by two and doubling

lesson. After looking over this lesson, I noticed that Student B did very well on this lesson. She

filled in the step in portion of the lesson which showed she was paying attention to the whole

class discussion. She was able to get almost everything correct. Her only mistake in this lesson

was the solution for one problem. She created the correct equation, but when solving she was

incorrect. She said she counted the visual to get her answer so I had her recount aloud for me.

When she recounted, she was able to get the correct answer and fix her mistake. She also

missed the part on question three that said to match the equation with its turnaround fact, but

once she saw that direction she completed it correctly. She did great on the step ahead

problems and was able to get both the in and out for doubling and multiplying by two.
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Example 4
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Example 4 cont.
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The student sample below is from a student in the meets proficiency level, one above

Student K and B. In this sample, the student was able to get most of the questions correctly.

Two questions she got wrong look as if she just did the math wrong. I can see that she may

have had to do the math mentally because she wasn’t able to visually see the clock and the

hands on it. Other than the wrong math, it seems as though this student understood the lesson

and can identify minutes past, and minutes to an hour.

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The student sample below is from a student in the well below category. When

correcting her work, she had many errors, which are all the red circles. After seeing that there

were this many errors, I decided to pull her to the side and work one on one with her. I had to

walk through each problem with her until she understood. One mistake that I noticed in her

work was the when she was trying to find out the minutes to the next hour, she counted from

the minutes hand all the way around to the hour hand rather than stopping at the 12 on the

clock. After working with her through each problem she was able to fix her mistakes but I’m

not sure if she would be able to complete the assignment on her own.
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Both Student K and Student B are very smart. They often participate in class discussions

and enjoy sharing answers when they know it. These two students are both in the developing

proficiency placement but I believe their needs are so different. For Student K, my

recommendation in helping her is to just encourage her to try. When monitoring the

classroom, she just needs to be checked on once or twice so she can ensure she is doing it

correctly then she will be able to complete the assignment. Student K follows along during

lessons and raises her hand for many questions, but during independent work she can easily get

distracted. Encouraging her to start her work and telling her how she does know it, motivates

her to complete her work.

For Student B, my recommendation in helping her is to make lessons more hands on

and active for the students. I noticed that when lessons only consist of lectures and calling on

students to answer questions, Student B is disengaged. This leads her to putting her head

down and not listening to the lesson. When the lessons involve coming up to the board or

working with hands on objects in groups, she is more engaged and participating. Another

recommendation is to call on her to share when she gets detached from the lesson. This is

when she is not paying attention even though it is an important concept for her to understand.

This allows her to refocus on the lesson. I believe during independent work, she doesn’t need

more one on one assistance, she just needs to find that motivation to complete her work.

If the student’s are unable to find motivation on their own, this may affect them in the

future. Their teachers aren’t going to always stop and encourage them to start. For Student B,

she needs to understand that all the lessons are important and that she should be paying

attention to each, not only the ones that she wants.