Samantha's Spot

Sometimes when you meet a student and have the opportunity to work with them, you begin to think that you have a "big picture" of who they are.  You think.  You observe their actions, you listen to their words, and you read their writing.  You imagine different ways to support them and feel genuinely motivated to help them as best you can.   But, can you ever really know the "big picture?"  A particular student that I am working with is in second grade, and this is her second year in an English speaking classroom.  She struggles with math, she struggles with English Language Arts, she struggles with every thing.  When I'm helping her write sentences, I notice she has to refer to the alphabet  chart on her desk because she doesn't know the alphabet well.  This makes me cringe; it makes my heart clench.  How can I help this student write sentences, when she doesn't even have a grasp on the alphabet?   Slowly, I'm beginning to see just how fa

I had another "aha" moment today that made me think and smile.  I was working with a student who was struggling with decoding words and sounding them out.  Suddenly, I began singing the words, or better put, enunciating words and syllables in a sing-songy voice.  The student looked at me and giggled.  But I took notice that the next time she came across the same word in a reading passage, she said it correctly, then repeated the word in the same sing-songy voice.  I tried my best not to smile or make too big of a deal, but on the inside I was.  The reason this specific instance caught my attention so much is because my 3 year old daughter also says everything in song!  She sings about brushing her teeth, eating her dinner, princesses, etc. Most likely, I sang that word and other words with my student out of mere habit, but it happened to help her.

As a mother of two young children, on a normal day, I am lucky if I can look at my CNN app on my phone and catch up with the rest of the world.  I even find myself seeking and looking at news updates on Facebook.  How could this be?  I remember when I would wake up early in the morning, before anyone else, and walk to the end of the drive way to pick up the morning newspaper.   I loved it!  I loved being the first one to open up the newspaper and feel the rough print on my hands, smell the pungent and dingy scent.  Nowadays, I would assume most people get their daily news on their phone or tablet, using different apps.  I wish I could travel back in time and relive a day before this modern technology.  I would like to experience once again waiting for the newspaper to be delivered.  I want to slowly and carefully remove the rubber band holding the newspaper together and gently unfold the pages. I could spend hours poring over each page. 

I'm finding it difficult to find the right words today.  Most of my emotions and insights have been like an infectious disease lately.  I'm afraid if I share anymore of them, I will only spread it further.  All I can say is that I feel change coming.  It's coming on like dew from a slow-forming morning fog.  It's coming on like that of cooler weather in the fall.  But fall is predictable, and the outcomes of change are not.

I recently had an experience that left  me with a wondering sadness.  As an adult, it's easier to look back in the past and understand things in hindsight.  I think as children we often take for granted things that not everyone has or experiences that not everyone has had.  I had an awesome mother and an awesome father.  They both instilled in me a hunger for education and learning.  More specifically, my mother always fostered a love of reading.  As I became an adult, we often read similar books or shared books.  I, in Texas, would call my mother in Alabama and talk for hours about different books we read and what books we should read next.  Last week, I spent some time with some young children in their classroom.  I became awkwardly aware that many of these children didn't have a lot of experience with books or reading.  Now, I asked myself, "Am I expecting too much?"  I think that because of my childhood and schooling I just expected students to be similar to mysel