case study #3 - kathy

8/6/2019 Case Study #3 - Kathy

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Case Study #3: Kathleen

(For the sake of privacy, Kathleens last name is omitted.)

1. Description of students physical, linguistic, creative, social, and academic strengths and

weaknesses noted through my personal observations and interactions with her.

Of the early birds, Kathleen is the only student who attended preschool. She began

kindergarten with the late birds, but soon shifted to the morning schedule because of a conflict

with her mamas work. The teachers/administrators are highly accommodating in situations like

these, especially because these circumstances are more frequent in the given community.

Preschool developed Kathleens language and social skills. She has a high capacity for language

learning, demonstrated by the quick regurgitation of ideas. Her ability to learn vocabulary and

use it almost instantly is impressive for a student of her age. For example, in the science

exploration (detailed in the Culturally Responsive Unit), Kathleen acquired the content

vocabulary during front-loading. I asked her to read the first question aloud of which read, How

many seashells are in the jar? She read it fluently, reading the target wordsseashells andjar

with confidence. Though some of her language abilities can be attributed to preschool, her

fluency is most attributed to her older sister who reads with her everyday at home. Moreover,

they play school, a common activity for little girls. In doing so, her sister has instilled the

importance of learning even into her play time. This simple gesture is invaluable to Kathleens

education.

Kathleen is a timid, bright child. Slow to warm up to people, she finds comfort in a few.

She was the first child I met upon arrival to Washington Elementary. I am not accustomed to

reserved children her age, so I found it hard to communicate. When I tried speaking in Spanish,

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little changed. This simple assessment let me to realize that the language barrier was not the

problem, rather the socialization. Little did I know at the time, her language abilities are the

highest in the class. After some time, our interactions became more involved. She would look for

me upon arrival Monday morning to be her surrogate during family reading time. In these

interactions, she demonstrated highly developed error-detecting mechanism. The books followed

predictable sentence patterns, such as: Elephants have feet. The bird has feet. We have feet.

Verb conjugation can be detected if the convention is rehearsed. In this case, Kathleen

recognized an error when she said, The bird have feet. On her own accord, she read the

sentence over again with the accurate conjugation. Moreover, family reading time quickly

became a group affair. Kathleen and friends would gather, we would practice taking turns

reading. Kathleen was quick to assert her knowledge when reading with a group. She often had

to be reminded that other students deserve turns of their own. She takes pride in her language

abilities, but often at the expense of her closest friends.

2. Administered SOLOMS and specific analysis regarding her English language fluency.

In formal/academic setting, Kathleens English-language capacity is average as detailed

by the SOLOM assessment below. However, in comparison with her classmates, she marked

high. In terms of comprehension, she understands most of what is said as demonstrated by her

verbal and nonverbal responses. For example, she is able to follow three-step directions without

much hesitation. This skill both a testament to her language ability and listening maturity. In

terms of fluency, she is often silenced in whole class interactions. It is unclear if this is because

of her timid nature or language limitations. In terms of vocabulary, Kathleen is able to produce

ideas with considerable front-loading. To that end, she rarely generates her own ideas with new

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vocabulary. In terms of pronunciation, Kathleen is fairly easy of understand. However, she is a

culprit of mumbling, which necessitates concentration on the part of the listener. In terms of

grammar, she regurgitates speech patterns that are given to her. This is most rehearsed by reading

the picture books that follow predictable patterns (i.e., Elephants have feet. The bird has feet.

We have feet.).

In non-formal/play settings, Kathleens language capacity is unchanged as detailed by the

SOLOM assessment below. She feels compelled to speak English, restricting her ability to

communicate with flourish. She has been schooled, preschool playing a major role in this

compulsion. Of considerable interest, the group of peers she plays with still use Spanish and

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English interchangeably. She, on the other hand, has acquired enough language skills to rely on

English alone. When her peers comment in Spanish, she replies in English. This skill is

noteworthy because it displays bilingualism. She is not a culprit of code-switching, so her

vocabulary is thus restricted to that in English.

3. Additional assessment or activity completed along with a summary of what it tells me about

the student and how this information is useful to me as a teacher.

The interests inventory pictured below was created by Kathleen, but details facts about

me. The activity was created to evaluate her ability to dialogue and record the responses

appropriately. The order of events were as follows: (1) trace partners hand, (2) ask given

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questions, and (3) record responses. The questions were generated by me, but it was the students

job to inquire to their partner. The questions were as follows:

(1) What is your favorite book?

(2) How many siblings do you have?(3) What is your favorite color?

(4) What is your favorite animal?

(5) What is your favorite holiday?

Similar activities often encourage a sense of all about me. In dialoging and recording with a

partner, the sense is rather all about we. First, the product assesses the student on his ability to

organize the given information. I modeled how to do so by recording my partners responses, one

on each finger (angled vertically).

Kathleen has demonstrated

attention to detail. She was

compelled to make hers look like

the model. Moreover, her product

demonstrates an understanding of

letter/word formation. She was

able to write in straight lines even

though lines were not given to

her. More than language ability,

this demonstrates perceptive

understanding (of utmost

importance in art). She did not feel the need to complete tracing by artificially drawing the

heel of the hand. This simple omission tells me that she understood the difference between

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tracing and drawingthough this understanding was not explicit in the activitys objectives, I

find this a valuable point to be made.

4. Any additional documents or activities and how they were or were not useful to me in

determining her strengths and weaknesses.

With the teachers direction, I implemented a whole class instructional lesson in thestudents writing journal. At the start of every journal entry, the students write the date in a

sentence. The format is consistent and is modeled by the teacher. Second, the class generates one

sentence collaboratively. In this case, the class butterflies hatched out of their crysallis over the

weekend. The students had the opportunity to observe and talk about the event amongst

themselves. The collaborative sentence was generated and written on the whiteboard for the

students to copy. Then, the students had to generate one sentence on their own with the prompt,

They are... Kathys writing sample (below) demonstrates an understanding of letter formation

and word distinction. She adds the appropriate spaces between words and completes each

sentence with a period. Her self-generated sentence is short, but demonstrates an understanding

of phonemes. (See next page).

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Today is Monday, May 2, 2011. The butterflies came out of the crysallis. They are cute.

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The following are document copiesfrom Kathleens cumulative files and are

intended for my personal use only. The

initial identification (to the left) details

his scores on the California English

Language Development Test (CELDT).

The purpose of the test is to identify new

students who are ELs, monitor student

progress, and help decide when students

are fully proficient in academic English.

Kathleen was assessed before she entered

kindergarten, providing the school

information for placement. Though she

scored similarly to her early bird

counterparts, the next assessment

demonstrates a very different

understanding of language.

The second document (below) details Kathleens basic phonics skills, ability to read onesyllable words, and oral blending. In the Basic Phonics Skills Test (BPST), she was able to match

the letter with its sound with a high rate of accuracy. In a few instances, she recognized the letter

as something it was not. For example, when shown the letter C, she responded with the name of

the letter S. Similarly, she confused the letterjwith the letter g. These confusions are not

surprising when looking at the similarity in letter shapes (C-S, j-g). Her abilities in the latter part

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of the assessment far exceeds that of her early bird counterparts. She was able to accurately

read a string of one syllable words and blend sounds orally to arrive at the said noun. She

correctly responded all but once, demonstrating that her letter recognition, word distinction, and

phonemic awareness had been well-acquired at the time of the assessment.

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5. List of instructional recommendations that I would make to the teacher to address the needs

and strengths of the student.

Kathleen needs encouragement to be independent in her writing. The teacher-directed

format of the writing journals is of little benefit to her, especially with respect to her high

levels of phonemic awareness. She has demonstrated ability to copy. Far more important

is her ability to generate and record her own thoughts.

Kathleen needs to be involved with children of her same (or higher) level of language

capacity. Next year, her mamas work schedule should not conflict because she will be

going to school for a full day. She will benefit from the challenge of keeping up

academically and linguistically in such classroom.

Kathleen would benefit from arts education. Her attention to detail could be well-used in

the visual arts in which observation skills are of great importance.

Kathleen needs to be encouraged to speak/think in Spanish. The teacher can create

pockets of instruction in which Spanish is the language of choice. By doing so,

Kathleens high level language capacity is fostered in both languages.

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case study #3 - kathy

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