Monday, November 10, 2008

Easy as ABC

Azul is desperate to be a C reader. He's an Arabic speaker who arrived in our school (and the U.S.) late last year. He is adorable and obviously bright; the only thing holding him back in school is the fact that, well, he doesn't speak English (although he's learning!).

So he's reading on a level B, but he is anxious to be a C. So anxious, in fact, that he checks in with me about it every time he encouters me. See, I've been doing running records this past week, and sadly, Azul is not ready to read C books. He's got a good number of sight words, and his comprehension is pretty good ("Why do you think Mom painted all those things?" I asked him, and he responded brightly, "Because it's Halloween!"), but he needs to work on his decoding and his vocabulary. When I broke the news to him -- that he would be staying a B reader -- he gave me the most exaggerated lower lip I've ever seen on a child (and that's saying a lot). As consolation, I told him he could put one C book in his book baggie.

Now, every time he sees me, he asks me whether he can be a C reader. I'll pass his class in the hallway on their way to lunch, and he'll call out, "Hi Miss Brave! Today me C? Now I C?" And I can't help it: he cracks me up. Now that he knows I find him irresistible (he knows how cute he is), I think he does it on purpose to make me laugh. "No C today. Still B," he'll say sadly to his teacher as he returns to the line.

It's nice to have such a motivated student in my group. I'm looking forward to our guided reading group -- at level C, of course!

1 comment:

Cassy said...

Hey there - I totally hear you. I've been teaching bilingual kids in NJ for 18 years now, and it feels like every year we teach less and less, and test more, and more. Kids like Azul need way better than that. Any way, hang in there.

By the way, he gets ESL, right?