at home reading tutoring part 9

Two Wednesdays ago (sorry the holiday is sucking up all my free time); SJ had a great day at school. The whole school watched Ratatouille in the afternoon. The teachers were collecting a few dollars from each student for movie treats such as popcorn and drinks. All the money collected went toward the money going to charity.

When I picked them up at the end of the day, SJ was happily chatting away about the movie and how much he loved the popcorn! And then I reminded him that Mrs. Banks was coming over for another tutoring session. It was as if I sucked all the happiness out of him. "Why? I already had tutoring this week," he said. "Well, you won't have any tutoring over the break, so we are getting it in now," I told him. "That is not fair," he said. Maybe it isn't, but he was having tutoring anyway.

Mrs. Banks arrived at her normal time and she had her daughter, Abigail, with her. Her daughter is in college studying to be a Special Education teacher. She also used to babysit for us, so SJ was familiar with her. Even though he knew her, he was still VERY DIFFICULT! He was refusing to come downstairs. My husband had to remind him that he would lose some privileges if he didn’t listen.

Once he was downstairs, he showed Abigail around the theater room and then they got to work. I had a Christmas work party that evening, so I am guessing at the order they did things in. My husband did tell me Mrs. Banks said he was slow to get started, but he did work for her. By the papers that were left, it appears he did A LOT of work.

I know they began with a reader's theater (I heard them as I was leaving). It was a play called How Santa Got His Job by Stephen Krensky. SJ had selected Narrators 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12 and 14. It was a story about all the odd jobs Santa had to help him become a great Santa Claus. It was a very cute little play.

Next, there was an opened ended paragraph called Santa's Stuck. SJ had to decide how the story ended. This is what was written on the worksheet.

The night was Christmas Eve. I had been asleep for hours when I awoke to hear our cat meowing in alarm. When I found her, I immediately spotted the trouble! There, in our fireplace opening, two red legs with black boots were hanging and thrashing about! When I moved closer I could make out a muffled "Help!" Good grief-Santa was stuck in our chimney! I had to do something fast...

Then SJ had to answer some questions before he decided on the ending.

1.     What's your best idea to get Santa out of the chimney? Pull him out by his feet.

2.     What items (if any) will you need? Your rope. Tie it around his feet.

3.     How long do you expect it will take to get him out? 30 minutes.

4.     Will other family members wake up and help? Mom and Dad will help.

5.     Will Santa give you a reward for rescuing him? What would it be? Yes. A Lego set.

Next, SJ had to write the ending. This is what he wrote.

So, I tried to pull him out by his feet. But it didn't work. So, I used a rope. I tied it to his feet. Mom and Dad helped me. 30 minutes later, Santa popped out. Then, he gave me a gift of Legos.

That was a great technique that Mrs. Banks used to help SJ organize his thoughts. If she had asked him to just start writing, he would have probably resorted to his normal "I don't know" response. He did a nice job on that worksheet.

Then, I found an I Spy type worksheet. SJ had to find the following objects in the picture: rain hat, pick, igloo, number seven, moon, ballet shoes, barbell, necktie, bird and marshmallow. He did very well with this activity.

 

 

Mrs. Banks then moved on to something more difficult. She had SJ choose words for a Mad Lib style worksheet. She had Abigail scribe SJ's answers. For example: verb run, noun shoe, verb past tense puked, adjective yellow, etc. This is the story with SJ's fill in the blank answers.

Hans and the Milky Lake

"Hans," said Mom. "You may go outside to run, but must be careful. You are made of shoe. Stay away from Milky Lake. It will make your toes race and fall off." Hans puked a little. Mom always gave him that story. He didn't really think it was true, though. He did like to play near the clock. He liked to watch the yellow waves seeing up on the shore. Sometimes he would try and skip cups across the surface. Would it really make his toes crumble and fall off?

Hans stood on the green beach and slowly moved closer to the waves. A orange white sign came close and slumped the tip of his toe. It tickled, but his toes did not fall off. Mom was wrong, he thought. He stepped into the next wave and began stamping his feet. It was fun until he saw bits of blue cookie pointing into the lake.

"Oh, no!" said Hans, and he began to rush home, leaving a trail of crumbs behind.

Mom saw him crying and knew what had happened. As soon as his people were dry, she gave him popcorn feet held on with sandwich. They worked as well, but Hans never forgot why they were there.

As you can see, his answers don't always work, but he at least completed the blanks.  It is a little comical too! 

 

The last thing they worked on was a stocking glyph. By answering questions, SJ had to decide the color of the stocking top (green-his stocking is hung over the fireplace), stocking (red-I stay home on Christmas), patch on toe and heel (orange-favorite Christmas song is Frosty the Snowman), number of stars on the stocking (5-favorite character is the Grinch), what color the five snowflakes were around the stocking (light blue-he does not like to wrap presents), what color to trace the stocking (blue-he likes snow) and how many candy canes were coming out of the stocking (4 candy canes-he's on Santa's good list).  The picture below depicts his choices.