at home reading tutoring part 24

This past Monday was SJ's weekly tutoring session.  I don't know what happened at school today, but he was in a great mood.  When we got home from school, I had Bob go retrieve the neighbor kids I watch and SJ jumped on his 3DS.  He happily played with the one kindergartner until Mrs. Banks arrived.  I was expecting the same whiny behavior we usually gets when she arrives.  Fortunately, the good mood continued and he happily came downstairs.  Mrs. Banks said the happy mood continued throughout the whole session and he was an extremely hard worker.  Yeah!

They started the session with a Reader's Theater called "Is Your Mama a Llama?" by Deborah Guarino.  SJ chose 5 characters to read (Narrator 1, Lloyd the llama, Dave the bat, Fred the swan and Clyde the seal).  Lloyd questions the characters to see who's mama is a llama.  In the end, it is his mama who is a llama.  SJ found the play quite entertaining. 

Next, they read a packet on the history of Mother's Day.  Mrs. Banks said that SJ did much better on this packet than he did on the one last week.  She said initially he wanted to guess at the answers, but she encouraged him to go back into the story and find the answers.  That is a great strategy for him to use.  He often forgets to do that in school, because he is too concerned with being the first one done.  I am glad she insisted he do that. 

Then they worked on a passage about Mother's Day.  SJ was excited that this passage mentioned a similar fact from the previous packet they worked on.  After he was finished reading it, he had to answer four questions about the passage.  Mrs. Banks said he did very well with this activity.

She had SJ work on an I Spy type activity next.  He had to look at the picture and answer questions about the picture.  She said he had some difficulty with it, but with her redirection he was able to answer the 15 questions correctly.  These were some of the questions. 

1. What holiday is it?  Mother's Day 
2. What time of the day is it?  morning
3. What do you think the children are making?  pancakes
4. What are you going to do on Mother's Day?  I will make lunch.

For question 2, SJ wanted to answer the specific time 7:15, but Mrs. Banks wanted him to focus on the part of the day.  She had him look for other clues in the story and he changed his answer to morning.  See the I Spy type picture below.

 

Mrs. Banks then had SJ fill in words for a Mad Lib style story.  Here are his words and the completed story. 

 

                                                           adjective                           fun

                                                           noun, job                           police officer

                                                           noun, plural                       houses

                                                           adjective                            happy

                                                           body part, plural                arms

                                                           verb                                   love

                                                           verb, past tense                  hated

                                                           your least favorite subject reading

                                                           your teacher's name           Mrs. Valentine

                                                           name of person in class     Jacob

                                                           color                                   pink

                                                           adjective                            glad

                                                           noun                                  garden

                                                           verb                                   respect

                                                           your name                         SJ

 

My dear fun mother,

 

I'm glad you're my mom.  You are a good police officer.  You always smell like houses.  Your smile is as happy as the sun.  I can see love in your arms!  When I love up, I want to be just like you.

Here is a poem that I hated.  I wrote it during reading class!  Don't worry, Mrs. Valentine didn't catch me.  My friend Jacob helped me write it. 

Roses are pink.

Peaches are glad.

My mom is great.

She deserves garden!

Respect a happy Mother's Day!

 

Love,

SJ

 

The last thing they worked on was a Mother's Day glyph.  SJ decided the color of the boy's hair (brown-I take wonderful care of our family), the color of the girl's hair (red-he likes to give me a card), the color of the boy's clothes (blue-he enjoys watching television with me), the color of the girl's clothes (pink-he helps me everyday), the color of the title (red-he gives himself a 3 on how well he is behaved), the color of the children's eyes (green-I am an excellent "cooker") and to circle the boy, since he is a boy.  See the completed glyph.