Alexis Nagley 3/5/13 ELD.

307 Rich Oral Assessment The Purpose of the oral assessment was to see how William would communicate with me and his classmates while in school. This assessment would see what vocabulary he knew to explain the story and also see what he was able to recall from his reading. This assessment was also to see how William acted when he was interacting with his classmates. I wanted to see what type of student William was and how well he articulated his feeling and ideas with the other students around him during the school day. Overall William is an outgoing five year old. He loves to interact with his class mates and is never shy when interacting with his classmates during his free time. He is eager to learn and is very laid back when asked to do things for h s teacher. I thought it would be interesting to complete my assessment on him because while he is out going in his free time I was not sure how he was during learning. I wanted to be able to observe him in both settings to see how he communicated not only when asking questions but also when he was he was in his natural setting without any pressures. William was also listed as being average in testing and his reading. I thought it would be interesting to observe what West Windsor considered a normal level student. While observing the whole class I saw that Mrs. Miller focuses a lot on allowing her students to talk and encouraging her students to share their thoughts to the class. Every day after reading a book in class, Mrs. Miller always prompts her students to talk by asking them questions like, what happened in the book we just read? and Can you tell me one thing that

happened in the book? While looking on my check sheet I realized she was trying to get her students to retell events and express their comprehension about the book they just read. Having students answer these questions out loud allows them to practice on talking and explaining them orally which is an important thing to learn at this age. Mrs. Miller explained that this is a very critical thing that students need to learn. I also thought along with this having students see the question Mrs. Miller is asking allows them when they are reading individually to ask themselves the same questions. During free time students are encouraged to play in groups. A lot of students play pretend house in the class. All the students get together and decide what particular type of house they are playing. Then they disperse the roles that each person will have. At first I did not understand the importance but after watching I realized that a simple game of house does hold a lot of educational value. The students have to discuss what they want to play and agree on everything. This game works on communication tremendously. The students have to make believe and constantly communicate what they are doing. They are always when taking on the role expressing how they feel and are talking about the role they are playing and what is expected of them. It was amazing to see how a simple game of house that I thought was always something to just entertain students really does have a lot of educational value to it. The way I did this assessment was at first observed him in his reading group which consisted of five other students. I listened to him read out loud to see if he was able to read with ease out loud or got nervous reading out. I also observed him answering questions about the book. At first I wanted to see how in depth he would answer questions when he was in his group. I then asked him questions individually to see his thought process and how he would articulated and explain the different events of what happened in the story he read. After reading I observed

him with his whole class while they had free time. I wanted to see what type of student William was and how he interacted with his friends and what they talked about. These two different types of setting would allow me to see William in both types of setting so I could get a good idea of not only William and his oral abilities as a student in an academic setting but also William the five year old in his natural settings acting like a kid. When observing William I found that he was able to read the story with ease and clarity. When asking questions about retelling events in the story William is able to retell events with some prompting. His vocabulary for his age is impressive using words that you do not hear five year olds saying and using them in the correct context. Through the book William was able to predict what happens next and able to pick up on the plot, characters and predict what may happen in the book before he is done reading. This I thought was interesting how he was able to articulate all of this with no problem like he has been doing this for a while. The only thing that worries me about this is that while he was with the group of readers William seemed bored and would often not pay attention and instead crack jokes while the other students were struggling to read the story. When watching William interact with his peers during his free time I realized instantly that William like to take charge in every situation. They were pretending to play pirates and William decided he was going to assign everyone his roles. I could tell by just watching them that William was the most vocal child out of the bunch. The only thing that worries me with William is that he thinks that he is the one always in charge and does not understand how to articulate his feelings towards other students. When something happens he does not like he often feels overwhelmed and goes and sits in the corner to pout. When asking him why he walked away when he got mad instead of talking to his friends he explained that they do not understand

him and so he see try to explain how feels. Having this conversation with him brought me back to the reading groups. While William did know a lot from the story, when I asked him harder questions to challenge him he would either break down getting upset because he did not know the answer or tell me and the teacher it was not fair for us to ask him these questions when the other students did not have to answer them. Having observed both situations I found that William does like it when he is unsure of himself and the right answer. He also gets very frustrated when he wants to tell students something but does not know how to say it in a way they understand. After observing William and assessing him in various settings I have realized he is and exceptionally bright boy having said that I do not think he is being pushed very much academically. I would put him in a higher reading group and see how he does. William may be reluctant at first because of the harder material. He may step up to that level when he sees the other students are doing the same thing as him. Having doing this I think it will allow the teacher to see how much William truly knows and if with a little of guidance if he can change the way he acts when he encounters something that may seem to hard or him at first. The way William acts with other student by not being able to articulate how he feels in a way that other students understand. I would recommend that he works with a teacher they would first give him a hypothetical situation and would work with William on different things this child could say or how he could express their feelings. This would give William the chance to learn and understand how to act correctly in different situations he may encounter with his friends and when he does how he can express himself correctly instead of running away and getting frustrated. Overall William is very. Going into this assessment I did not think I would find the things I did. When talking to Mrs. Miller about my findings she was surprised I found what I found, but when explaining it completely agreed with what my founding were. It will be

interesting to see if and what Mrs. Miller will do with these finding and also how William will react.