Holly WrightTTE 319

Home Interaction Combined Assignment

Growing up, my mother was always very involved in our education, especially in the early

years (elementary school ages). When we got older and into High School, my mother was still

involved but showed her involvement in different ways. I would say that he involvement was

more behind the scenes than actually in the class or on field trips. My dad was not involved in

our school lives. He came to watch our performances and things like that, maybe to a conference

or two. However, I think as the grandchildren started to come, he realized how much he missed

out. He went back to our high school and began to do a lot of volunteering for the marching

band (we were very involved in the music program in the high school).

I guess that it is a very safe generalization that we grew up privileged. We had two parents

who loved us very much. A loving home that always had food, and supplies that we needed,

phones, gas, cars, you name it we pretty much had it. Money was never really obvious to us

growing up, we never had a concept of it as children, it seemed to “grow on trees”. We lived in a

nice neighborhood, green grass, friendly neighbors, a safe place where we could go outside alone

without the fear of being hurt. To this day, I moved back home so I could continue my

education. My children are now having the opportunity to grow up in the neighborhood I did,

with the same type of security.

The family that I had the opportunity to visit with is a Russian family. I had met mom

once before our home interaction, and had the opportunity to speak with her. She was really

interested and very confused about the purpose of these home interactions, and was also a little

nervous. We spoke for a while about the things that we as students would be learning from

coming into her home, and how we could use this new information to help inform our instruction

in the classroom. She found this very interesting and said that she was really looking forward to

having us come over.

I feel that because I had the opportunity to talk to her before hand, I knew that I would be

able to understand her, and there would not be a language barrier that would make things

awkward. One thing I did think would happen would be that both the mother and father would

be there to talk. At my visits last semester, the father in the family did most of the talking while

the mother sat quietly and rolled her eyes. This did not happen, the father was actually in the

back room working on homework, and came out to introduce himself. We talked for a little bit

and then he returned to the back of the house to continue his homework.

I also assumed that they would have lived in a house. When I pulled into the complex, I

saw a bunch or run down apartments and thought differently. I instantly thought that they were

renting these apartments. As I began to walk around the outside of the complex looking for their

unit number, I noticed a lot of for sale signs hanging on windows. I then began to think that

maybe these weren’t apartments but more of a condo setting in which someone could buy the

property instead of renting it. This was correct, later during the home interaction the mother very

proudly stated that they owned their house.

Ray is a very smart boy especially for his home language being Russian. I had assumed

that upon entering their household I would see a lot of educational materials to back up the

reason as to how he was able to learn so quickly. This was a big misconception. We learned that

Ray had the appetite for knowledge and he learned things on his own. He even taught himself to

speak English by watching cartoons on the TV.

Upon arriving at the house, I was completely shocked and amazed at all the information I

had learned about this particular family. I was unaware of what was happening in the household

as far as Ray’s academics and kindergarten readiness, and what his language abilities were.

Much to my surprise the only language spoken in the household was Russian, and his exposure

to English happens from TV, and school.

It was interesting that when entering their household, the TV was turned on to the PBS

channel. A channel mom knows to be educational programming for children with great shows

on it. I can only assume that this must have been the shows he watched while learning English.

Ray would go back forth between watching TV and interacting with Anna and myself during the

home interaction. Ray and Anna are in the same classroom, and have had time to build a

relationship together. However things are a little different with myself. I feel that I need to work

a little more at building a relationship with Ray because we are not in the same class. I saw that

he sat next to Anna, and interacted with Anna, and mom talked with me more than she did with

Anna.

There was one thing that really surprised me that I had no idea. We found out that Ray’s

father was in school and will be graduating in December of this year. He did tell us what his

major was in, and I want to say that it had to do with mechanics, not exactly sure. He was in the

middle of doing homework when we came over to interact with the family, and he was really

busy and did not have much time to talk with us.

There were some things that I learned in the house that completely surprised me that I

would have never guessed. When we sat down to eat the pizza, I had assumed it was a frozen

pizza that was store bought and plopped into the oven. I was wrong, mom had handmade the

dough, and cut all the ingredients and made the entire pizza from scratch that day. Mom has

shown a great deal of knowledge in the forms of cooking and baking. She told us that she was

basically self taught once she was married and had her son. Then there was purpose and the

tradition for cooking was relevant to her family.

I think that this would be amazing to bring into the classroom. How often to do actually

see a family make everything from scratch, watch every single ingredient that goes into food,

and to know the exact caloric amount that is in the food. I could definitely see using this funds

of knowledge in the classroom to help with instruction, and I do believe that not only will Ray

benefit from this, but a lot of the other children in the classroom would too.

There was also another funds of knowledge that was present in the household. This was

presented through Ray’s father in the form of chess playing. He is a champion chess player, and

began teaching Ray to play chess at a very young age. Ray even said that chess is a hard game to

play. Thinking about chess there are so many different mathematical elements that are present as

well as predicting skills that a child would use. This would be a really fun way to incorporate

these different elements into the classroom. It would also be really neat for Ray to be able to

help be the teacher in the classroom, and help his friends learn how to play chess.

When we introduced the Grandparents backpack mom was interested in getting all the

information just right. She was really concerned about getting the right answers. Anna and I

expressed numerous times that there was no right or wrong way to interact with this backpack.

We explained that the importance of the backpack was to help create stories between the family,

stories that they could tell us, and stories that we could tell them. We proceeded to show them

the journal they could draw or write in to explain what they did with the backpack.

When we took out the camera, Ray became very interested, took the camera and walked

away. He did not even ask for directions, it always amazes me to see how well kids are able to

handle technology without assistance. It was neat listening and watching him play with the

camera, as he took pictures of himself and the TV. I am looking forward to our next home

interaction so we can share out pictures, tell our stories, hear their stories as well as see what they

have done with the backpack.

September 17, 2013 Home Interaction 1

Anna said “You’re going to get your 220 site words real soon.”

“Yes yes yes. His goals are 20 site words. 20 20 20” (moving hands in downward motion as if aligned with a piece of paper) mom replied

“Wait, his goals are 20?” Holly asked

“Yes!” mom exclaimed

“Wow!” Holly said

“I notice that with his practice, it used to be everyday everyday everyday. But now he almost everyday but he got it on Saturday. He does good practicing those two days and he just remembers that.” Mom said

“Well we talked to his… well we went to observe one of his ELD class, we talked to his teacher a little bit, and she was like yeah he picked up most of his English from watching TV, and stuff that you only speak Russian at home.” Anna said

“We never taught him English never, we only speak Russian, and the only way to learn Englsh is to watch cartoons, or sometimes kids outside, but we didn’t go outside a lot. So it was cartoons, and last year it was a year in preschool.” Mom said

“What preschool did he go to?” Holly asked

“You know there is a church, and then a preschool. St. Paul’s Acadamey. It’s a very good preschool. He knew his alphabet before preschool. And you know when he was graduating, the teacher from preschool told me he was ready, he’s doing really good. Wow!, With his spelling and his alphabet. I think she was just telling me that.” Mom explained

Ray walks up with a bag of happy faces that he gets for doing well in kindergarten. Mrs. Aho’s class does this form of rewards for good behavior, my class with Mrs. Payton does not. Ray showed Anna his bag full of cards.

“I know what these are.” Anna said to Ray

‘I don’t know what they are?” Holly said

“These are great student cards. And we have a lot of them. Until now we have 3 frowns.” Mom said

“4 frowns” Ray corrected her

“3 frowns because today Mrs. Aho tore it up.” Mom answered back

“Yeah I think one of them didn’t count as a frown. Was it because of the library book?” Anna put in

“We had OMA today and normaly he focuses a lot but today he wasn’t focusing a lot. Im telling him please when its OMA time to please focus. When someone is talking to please ignore and listening, but its hard for kids sometimes.” Mom explained

Anna and Ray count the cards

“With site words do you just go over them, or do you do more with them?” Holly asked mom

“Yes and we do flash cards, and play games. I put 5 of them out and I say show me there, had. It’s kind of like him teaching me. I act like a student and he is helping me, but its like he is repeating it. He is waiting for Monday for his testing because he gets a prize after his testing.” Mom answered

Ray brings another bag over to the table to show Anna, while his mother is talking. He tells Anna “I have a game, a good game to play.”

“Oh, what’s this?” Anna asked

“That’s from Russia. My mom sent it to him. And we do teach him Russian. We have a Russian alphabet book. Let me go and get it.” Mom said

Ray and Anna are playing the game. He hands Anna 3 cards, and pulls out a piece. I say wasp, and you put it like this. He places the card on top of the picture (a Russian picture version of bingo).

“Okay, so kind of like a Bingo type game?” Anna said

“Yeah, you have to fill the whole thing up like this, you win.” Ray said to Anna

“So when you play, do you say the words in English or in Russian?” Holly asked Ray

“You can say English or Russian.” Ray said

“What do you do when you play?” Holly asked

“I say Russian” Ray said

“How many cards do you do at once?” Holly asked

“Do we each get one, or how many do we each get?” Anna asked

Mom brought out 2 different work books that she does with Ray. “This one is in Russian here. We have been working on this one (pointing to the one in English) it’s for Kindergarten. It has the Alphabet and all this stuff. He loved this. My husband bought it from Costco.”

“I know they are very interactive.” Holly said

Mom sits back down at the table. “You usually play this game with numbers; you call it Bingo here right? We call it Lotto in Russia”

“How do you spell it?” Holly asked

“I think it’s spelled ‘Lotto’. This one is different, he has to pronounce the name, whether it is a pig, a cow, a chicken.” His mother said

“Does he play it both in English and Russian?” Holly asked

“No he usually plays it in Russian, but now he speaks English a lot.” Mom said

Anna and Ray played this game for a little while mom showed me around the house.

“We have some souvenirs from Russia, would you like to see them?” mom asked

“Sure” Holly replied

Mom opens up their glass china cabinets and brings out nesting dolls. She twists it open, and it makes a really loud speaking sound.

“I don’t like that noise.” Ray said

Everyone laughs

“When you open them there are more inside each one. You see that small one right there?”Mom said pointing to the small one

“Oh I do it is really small.” Holly said

“Now his grandfather is coming?” Holly asked

“Yeah tomorrow. He is in Los Angeles and he will be coming tomorrow.” Mom replied

“Is he your father?” Holly asked

“Yes he is my dad. Its tradition to collect Elephants in Russia. So my mother always is collecting elephants. I think they are cute.” Mom said as she showed Holly the elephants in the cabinet

“Do the mean or symbolize anything?” Holly asked

“I have no idea. I think it symbolizes something good, and she just love it. I think that 98% are from Moscow.” Mom said

“I like the details on them.” Holly said as she pointed to the details on the elephants

“I see that you have a lot of William Shakespeare.” Holly said

“Yeah they are my husband he brought them here. He loves to read. He also has books here in Russian. He hopes that when Ray gets older that he can read them too.” Mom said

“So Ray can speak Russian. Is he able to read anything in Russian?” Holly asked

“Right now? No, no. Because the letters. I don’t want to push a lot and rush because his English I don’t want to confuse him. I will start to do it, and work with him on it. She pointed out that there were similar looking letters in English and Russian but that they were not the same.” Mom said

“Holly told me your husband was a chess champion.” Anna said

“Yes. He is in college now and graduating in December. He is busy day and night.” Mom said

“Yes we understand.” Anna and Holly both said

Ray suggests to Anna that they play chess. “I am really good at chess.”

“I am just learning how to play chess.” Anna said

“It is really hard. You have to learn it.” Ray said to Anna

Dad comes out to introduce himself.

“He is playing chess, but not as much now.” Mom said

“I had a family that I had home interactions with last semester. The father was also a champion chess player, but he was from Sri Lanka. Because he was a champion chess player the United States allowed him to get citizenship because of this. Was this the same for you?” Holly said to the father

“No, no. I had family here. I came with my mother. It was like a family reunion that we came out for. Her sister lived here, and because my mother was moving out here and I was her son, I was allowed to come too. As a chess player I like it. I try to incorporate it into my everyday life. Like teaching kids and playing tournaments.” Dad said

Anna and Ray are setting up the chess game on the table.

“I am going back to do my homework. You feel like you are at home.” Dad said, and he left the room

“Thanks” Anna and Holly said

“Please have some pizza. It’s hot.” Mom said, as she handed out plates with pizza on it

“Thank you.” Holly and Anna said

“Let me give you some napkins so we can start” Mom said

“Do you want some pizza?” Holly asked

“Oh I will. I think I burned it.” Mom said

“I’m not sure that it’s cold enough but if you want to please try this one too. Here I can take this (picked up the books she was showing us earlier).” Mom said

We were handed juice. “Let Ms. Erickson eat” Mom said to Ray

“Chess, he practicing”… Ray comes to his mother’s side and talks to her in Russian, she answers back in Russian.

“I am going to move it back. I will put it back later.” Mom said to Ray

We begin eating our pizza and drinking our juice.

“So how long have you guys lived here.” Holly asked

“Me like 7 years. My husband since 96 when they moved here.” Mom said

“Why did you decide to come?” Holly asked

“Me well I got married. We met in Moscow when he was visiting his brother and we got married. I had to move to the United States. But all my relatives live is Moscow Russia. But my go parents live in Los Angeles. Sometimes we get to see them maybe once or twice a year.” Mom said

Mom and Ray talk back and forth in Russian for a little bit. Then Ray walked into the kitchen and got three straws. He brought them out and handed one to Anna and myself.

“Do you like being in the United States or is it hard?” Anna asked

“Yes I do, but it is hard. You know my family and friends are all there, I don’t know. The years are better now, but the first few years were hard. Life changes sometimes.” Mom said

Ray notices that he and Anna have the same colored straws.

“But I like the United States. I like my new life here. I’m happy my child is going here it’s a good place.” Mom said

“Do you have a dual citizenship?” Holly asked

“Yes I do.” Mom said

“Does Ray have one?” Holly asked

“No he has a US citizenship.” Mom said

“Does he go back to Moscow to visit?” Anna asked

“Yes he does. I made him a visa, a Russian Visa for him.” Mom said

“My mom’s dad is coming.” Ray said to Anna

“Are you excited for that?” Anna asked

“Actually he is your grandpa.” Mom said to Ray. Everyone laughs

“He is going to go on your field trip isn’t he?” Anna asked

“I’m not sure because of the 12 hour trip, and I don’t know about high blood pressure. I don’t know if he can do it?” mom said

“Where’s the field trip to?” Holly asked

“Apple Annies” Mom and Anna said

I then shared the experiences that I had had when visiting Apple Annies.

“And then they will go to ice cream something.” Mom said

“Oh that’s next week Cold Stone are you going on that one.” Anna said

“I don’t know I might just send him on that one.” Mom said

“I’m going on that one. They are going to make their own Sundaes. They are going to see how the ice cream turns from a liquid to a solid which goes along with the unit they are learning about.” Anna said

“And then they get to taste it.” Mom said

“We have a nice pool and Jacuzzi here. Actually it’s a really nice place. We own this place here we are not renters. You complex is like a park. When he was born, I was walking with him here every day. I like it and it’s safe for kids to play here. I’m still watching him though I don’t like him to go outside alone.” Mom explained

The conversation continues as we finish our pizza. We talk about parent teacher conferences coming up and she can expect to have happen.

“It’s a more Armenian tradition it could be Russian. But it’s tradition to offer company something to eat. So I tried to make something you like, like pizza.” Mom explained

“What type of foods to do normally eat, is it traditional?” Holly asked

“Yes, we eat traditional Russian food like soups and stuff. Have you heard of a soup named (not sure how to spell it). First of all you boil it with some meat, and you add beats, carrots, cabbage, parsley, tomato paste, and then its very good. The smells and all of it together its really good. We do love lamb. Sometimes my husband does this kabob, we like ravioli, its different in Russian, because here its mostly with cheese. But here I home make everything, the dough, everything. Its not just bought from the store. (Referring to the pizza we were eating)” Mom said

“So did you learn that from your mother? Or is this something that you have always enjoyed to do and you self taught?” Holly asked

“I never did it before. I never like to cook, but here I have a family, a child and a husband. It’s a tradition to cook at home, like homemade food. And I do this and I like it. If I don’t know how to do this I call my mother in law, look on the internet, watch TV. So yes I made the dough. So when you are ready in about 10 minutes we can try this chocolate pudding I made. I hope you like it. It is very light, made from milk, cow, chocolate. You put it together and put it in the fridge, its actually like not liquid anymore. I heard it from my friend and it’s also homemade. WE do homemade food 100%. So I cook a lot” Mom said

“Does Ray help cook?” Anna asked

“Yes he helps to cook. I also teach him that this is good, this is good for your health, this is natural, no chemicals, nothing. And anytime we buy anything for him, like cookies we always read the ingredients, yellow 5. I have no idea what is it. It’s scary if you read the ingredients. I never buy bakeries it’s scary. Scary stuff. I would rather find a recipe for oatmeal raisin cookies and bake them from scratch. See this recipe doesn’t have that many calories, it’s very nice. It’s good to find some nice stuff to cook that’s easy, nice, and good to cook. I think I found it from a magazine. Yes a guilt free recipe. I don’t know if you are worried about calories or not, but we can try it right now if you want?” Mom said

“Sure” Anna said

“Yeah sounds great.” Holly said

Mom went into the kitchen to get the chocolate pudding. We then introduced the backpack we brought. We explained that we picked out this backpack because it had to do with grandparents, and his grandfather was coming to town.

Holly WrightTTE 319

Photo Book Reflection

Upon arriving at the house for our second home interaction, we were surprised to hear that

the camera did not work. Not only was the family confused about it not working but we were

confused about it not working as well. I took a look at the camera to see what the problem could

have been, and figured out that the batteries had died. This was interesting because they were

brand new batteries, oh well, next time I will remember to give them an extra pair of batteries.

However when I got home, and put new batteries in the camera I did notice that there were only

a few pictures on there. I am not sure why this was.

After finding this information out, the mother told us that she went ahead and used her cell

phone to take pictures. I wasn’t sure if Ralph had taken any pictures, or if it was just her that

took all the pictures? When reviewing the pictures, and hearing that mom did most of the talking

it was pretty clear to me that she was the one who took the pictures and was able to connect to

the pictures and tell the story. When hearing this information, and seeing that Ralph didn’t really

respond Anna and I did our best to bring him in and get him interested.

Anna was at the computer uploading and sorting through different photos, and we were all

surrounding her. Thinking back now, maybe this was too many people for him and it could have

been a little more personal, and maybe he would have been more involved in the picking of the

pictures for the story. However, this wasn’t the case so we did our best with the situation at

hand. The mother was able to tell use many different stories about the pictures that she took with

her cell phone, but Ralph really didn’t communicate too many ideas to the pictures on his own.

We found it difficult to have Ralph pick and choose different pictures to put in the book

for a few different reasons. Some of them being: there were so many pictures to choose from, he

didn’t take any of the pictures and he didn’t have the opportunity to actually look through them

(Anna scrolled through them really quickly, and not in any particular order, it was confusing for

me to follow). I tried my best to have him come closer by setting up a chair right next to Anna,

ask open ended questions in regards to the pictures that she made bigger on her computer screen.

Some attempts worked, and some did not.

The pictures that ended up being chosen were pictures that we knew he showed some

interest towards, either from this home interaction or from previous home interactions, from the

mothers stories, or from information we have been told through observations in class. As I sit

here, I am trying my best to think positively about this experience, but I am finding it very hard.

I feel completely frustrated about it. If we could go back and do it again, maybe we should have

done the pictures first, maybe that would have helped him be more involved, and given him the

opportunity to look through them for the entire home visit.

Once we finally picked out the pictures that we were going to put in the books we were

able to put the book together using what Ralph told us about the pictures, or what his mother told

us about. When writing the book, we wanted to make sure that we included language that Ralph

would be able to read the book. There are many site words included in the book that Ralph

would be able to recognize and read, as well as the text and pictures matching one another.

When we come back for our third home interaction, I will have very little expectations,

but not in a negative way. I am not sure if he will be into reading the book in a way that he can

connect to the book, or if he will just read the words to read the words because that is what he is

supposed to do. I am almost wondering if it would be better if Anna and I were to have him read

it once at home with her, and then maybe once at school with me? I feel that if I go into the

house not expecting anything then I will leave with so much more information instead of

disappointment.

Guided Reading Lesson

Your Name: Anna Erikson, Holly Wright

Theme/ Content Area: Guided Reading

Date: November 4th

Age Group: 5

Estimated time needed: 20 Minutes

Objective:

The student will read a photo book using photos he took in order to practice reading sight words.

The Student will read a photo book that has a built in pattern in order to practice recognizing simple patterns in texts.

Connection to Standards:

Lesson Sequence

Introduction/ anticipatory Set:

Have Ralph choose a place to sit in his house where he feels comfortable reading Introduce the book to him and show him that it is the book he helped us with the last

time we visited him

Modeling:

Simply show him it works just like a normal book and he flips the pages the same way and everything.

Guided Practice

Sit down in the chosen spot to read the book “Ralph’s Book” Have Ralph read the book and introduce strategies when necessary as stated in the

objectives like text to picture connections and more if needed

Closure

Talk to Ralph about the book and ask if he liked it Ask Ralph if there is anything else he would want to add to the book to represent things

that he likes

Assessment

To assess this lesson I will see how well Ralph does reading the book and will see what strategies he uses to figure out words he does not know.

Also Ralph reading the book will be recorded so I can go back and look at it if needed.

Modifications

ELL Strategies

The book that Holly and I made has a lot of supports to support Ralph including:o Using Ralph’s words to create the storyo Ralph’s pictureso Using an “I like” pattern in the book

Holly WrightTTE 319

Home Visit 3Photo Book Reflection

I was a little nervous about this home visit, mainly because I had not seen the whole book put

together yet. So the first time I saw the book put together, was when Ralph saw the book put together

too. It was a very interesting process working together as a pair with Anna on this project. We had very

different ideas, but I let her take the lead because she sees Ralph more often than I do because she has

him in her class, and I do not have him in my class. She has more opportunities to have daily

interactions, and see how much knowledge in reading he is capable of.

When we got there, Ralph seemed more excited to see his book than he was to make the book,

which was relieving. I wanted to make sure that he was going to feel completely comfortable when

reading the book with us, so I asked him here he thought he would be most comfortable and would

enjoy reading to us. He said that he wanted to read over on the rug in front of the couch. When we all

went over to the couch and sat on the floor, I felt comfortable, and we turned on the IPad to begin

recording, and played a little to make things seem a little less frightening.

The whole reading process I feel went pretty smoothly. Ralph was able to read the book with

about 90% accuracy. The book was written in a way that he would recognize the pattern quickly, and he

did. He was able to read “I like” quickly and pick up on this patter on every single page. The book had so

many great strategies to make it easy and great for him to read that it gave him the confidence and the

success that he needed in order to read it. The pictures matched pretty closely the sentences that

appeared on the pages. It is interesting to watch the video, versus being there. I can actually see what

he is doing, instead of just listening to what he was doing. It was neat to watch him read the words “I

like” and then look up at the pictures, look down at the words, look back at the picture, down at the

word and begin to sound it out. I could see him using so many different strategies to figure out what the

word was on the page that he didn’t know. There were a few words that he didn’t know, and so we did

step in and help him figure out different strategies to use to find out what the word was.

When we finished reading the book, I asked him a few questions about if he could add anything

else what would it be and why. It was a really interesting conversation that we had with Ralph. One of

the reasons why I wanted to ask him these questions was because I felt that the pictures we got in the

first place were not his work and he couldn’t really relate to them. So when he said that he would add a

page that said “I like lizards because …” I was really impressed for many reasons. He was able to

continue the book using the same format that the book was written in, using the same repetition “I

like”. He also added another idea and said, “I like games.” When I asked him what games he liked, he

responded that he liked Wild Kratts video games. I feel that he really understood the purpose of reading

the book, and he was able to show us this by adding verbally two extra pages to the book using his own

interests (even though we didn’t have a picture for them). This was the most eye opening part for me

during the home visit.

Holly WrightTTE 319

Photo Book Reflection

Upon arriving at the house for our second home interaction, we were surprised to hear that

the camera did not work. Not only was the family confused about it not working but we were

confused about it not working as well. I took a look at the camera to see what the problem could

have been, and figured out that the batteries had died. This was interesting because they were

brand new batteries, oh well, next time I will remember to give them an extra pair of batteries.

However when I got home, and put new batteries in the camera I did notice that there were only

a few pictures on there. I am not sure why this was.

After finding this information out, the mother told us that she went ahead and used her cell

phone to take pictures. I wasn’t sure if Ralph had taken any pictures, or if it was just her that

took all the pictures? When reviewing the pictures, and hearing that mom did most of the talking

it was pretty clear to me that she was the one who took the pictures and was able to connect to

the pictures and tell the story. When hearing this information, and seeing that Ralph didn’t really

respond Anna and I did our best to bring him in and get him interested.

Anna was at the computer uploading and sorting through different photos, and we were all

surrounding her. Thinking back now, maybe this was too many people for him and it could have

been a little more personal, and maybe he would have been more involved in the picking of the

pictures for the story. However, this wasn’t the case so we did our best with the situation at

hand. The mother was able to tell use many different stories about the pictures that she took with

her cell phone, but Ralph really didn’t communicate too many ideas to the pictures on his own.

We found it difficult to have Ralph pick and choose different pictures to put in the book

for a few different reasons. Some of them being: there were so many pictures to choose from, he

didn’t take any of the pictures and he didn’t have the opportunity to actually look through them

(Anna scrolled through them really quickly, and not in any particular order, it was confusing for

me to follow). I tried my best to have him come closer by setting up a chair right next to Anna,

ask open ended questions in regards to the pictures that she made bigger on her computer screen.

Some attempts worked, and some did not.

The pictures that ended up being chosen were pictures that we knew he showed some

interest towards, either from this home interaction or from previous home interactions, from the

mothers stories, or from information we have been told through observations in class. As I sit

here, I am trying my best to think positively about this experience, but I am finding it very hard.

I feel completely frustrated about it. If we could go back and do it again, maybe we should have

done the pictures first, maybe that would have helped him be more involved, and given him the

opportunity to look through them for the entire home visit.

Once we finally picked out the pictures that we were going to put in the books we were

able to put the book together using what Ralph told us about the pictures, or what his mother told

us about. When writing the book, we wanted to make sure that we included language that Ralph

would be able to read the book. There are many site words included in the book that Ralph

would be able to recognize and read, as well as the text and pictures matching one another.

When we come back for our third home interaction, I will have very little expectations,

but not in a negative way. I am not sure if he will be into reading the book in a way that he can

connect to the book, or if he will just read the words to read the words because that is what he is

supposed to do. I am almost wondering if it would be better if Anna and I were to have him read

it once at home with her, and then maybe once at school with me? I feel that if I go into the

house not expecting anything then I will leave with so much more information instead of

disappointment.

Writing Samples