Julia is a shy student and, while the interview visibly made her anxious, she was a willing participant. You can tell she is passionate about her education. She comes off as eager to succeed and generally has a very good self-image and self-concept. That being said, her short stature and shy demeanor seems to make her easily unnoticeable and allows her to mold into the crowd. I am interested to see if this shyness is a norm or if she opens up when she feels more comfortable with the me and the interview process.
What I plan to learn by interviewing Julia is how to bolster reading comprehension for a student with a Reading Comprehension IEP. She is perfect interviewee because she has ambitions and is studious but has a learning disability that makes reading and doing projects harder. My plan is to interview her every Thursday. Next week, I am interviewing her favorite teacher and a teacher from her least favorite subject, Math. I am wanting to see the difference in her class performance and her interest in the course. I also want to see if her success in Spanish has to do more with her language comfort because it is her language of love.
Where I am conducting this interview is in alcove in the hallway right outside my CT’s classroom. It is a decent sized roundtable that the students like to hang out at in-between classes. I conducted the interview during the advising class period. The halls were empty but due to spirit week there were a few people rustling tissue paper which did distract us at times. It did not take longer than five minutes. The atmosphere is open and non-claustrophobic. The interview was conducted after a school assembly where they were giving out student of the month awards. This did not seem to affect her attention or my line of inquiry. At this point in time I did not know her IEP. Because of this, my questions did not directly address her IEP rather more of her background, interests, favorite course, least favorite courses, favorite subjects, her reading habits, and out of school activities.
My role in this situation is interviewer. In this situation I can tell that I have more of an authoritative role because her responses are short and only address the exact question with no added explanations. She is open but her shyness hints at a level of conservatism. This probably has more to do with the fact that she does not know me and I am asking her general but personal questions. I can tell she is anxious because she is subconsciously tapping her toes. I am trying to have a conversational tone in order to ease her anxiety. I think Julia sees me as an authoritative stranger. I think I need to change my tactic next time to make the power dynamic more equal and inviting. I think I will conduct the next interview in the library which will be away from distractions. The negative with this idea though is that she would be out of class longer, so the library may not work.
I think the setting may add to Julia’s anxiety because there are a lot of distractions in that hall way and it may affect her comprehension of questions I ask which may cause her more anxiety. Then there is also the worry about someone overhearing what she is saying which may also be the cause of her short responses. This could cause her to see my questions as more intrusive which may cause my presence to be authoritative and not casual.
I chose, Julia because she has a reading comprehension disability that gets in the way of her studious nature and classroom leadership. I teach a reading lab where we are going over reading comprehension strategies and it fit that I study someone who has a reading comprehension disability.
• 14, Freshman, Female. • Family: 3 sisters, 1 brother, => 3rd child => Mother and Father working => Mom: Nursing home, Father: Construction and A/C installation. • Lived in Thornton her whole life. York: since 4th grade. Clayton: K-3 => both in Mapleton School District. • Favorite Class: Spanish => easy because Native Speaker=> has fun in class=> Teacher is Ms. Silverman. • Favorite Teacher: Ms. Lewis => Science => Nice and she cares about students. • Least Favorite Class: Math => does not like it because it is what she is the least good at. • General Demeanor concerning school in A.M.: She wakes up in the morning and does not want to come to school. • Lives: She lives on High Street. • She claims that she does not use other things to help her in class. • Frustrations: She is frustrated about projects => mixes them up => forgets everything. • IEP: Did not seem to know about IEP (probably due to how I asked the question). • Reading: She does not have an issue reading => She can read well in Spanish => has a hard time with long words in English. She prefers to read in English. Her favorite book is The Lovely Bones. She says that the reason prefers reading in Spanish is because books in Spanish are harder to find and she generally does not find books interesting => she has a hard time sticking to books => only reads one page if she does not find the book interesting. • Her favorite subject is science because she likes the scientific part. • Goals: Wants to go to college to be an Immigration Lawyer => loves debate => wants to always be right => wants to standup for people without rights. • Extracurricular participation: Religious Dance => Catholic => a dance for faith in Mother Mary => other saints as well. => has done this over a year. => dances out in the community if have party for saint they dance for it => it is latin heritage dancing: Mexican style sandals, socks, shorts, bandana, sombrero, traditional blouse, and Benacho. => used to play sports but had to quit due to bad knees => soccer => played until half way through last season.
Julia is a shy student and, while the interview visibly made her anxious, she was a willing participant. You can tell she is passionate about her education. She comes off as eager to succeed and generally has a very good self-image and self-concept. That being said, her short stature and shy demeanor seems to make her easily unnoticeable and allows her to mold into the crowd. I am interested to see if this shyness is a norm or if she opens up when she feels more comfortable with the me and the interview process.
ReplyDeleteWhat I plan to learn by interviewing Julia is how to bolster reading comprehension for a student with a Reading Comprehension IEP. She is perfect interviewee because she has ambitions and is studious but has a learning disability that makes reading and doing projects harder. My plan is to interview her every Thursday. Next week, I am interviewing her favorite teacher and a teacher from her least favorite subject, Math. I am wanting to see the difference in her class performance and her interest in the course. I also want to see if her success in Spanish has to do more with her language comfort because it is her language of love.
Where I am conducting this interview is in alcove in the hallway right outside my CT’s classroom. It is a decent sized roundtable that the students like to hang out at in-between classes. I conducted the interview during the advising class period. The halls were empty but due to spirit week there were a few people rustling tissue paper which did distract us at times. It did not take longer than five minutes. The atmosphere is open and non-claustrophobic. The interview was conducted after a school assembly where they were giving out student of the month awards. This did not seem to affect her attention or my line of inquiry. At this point in time I did not know her IEP. Because of this, my questions did not directly address her IEP rather more of her background, interests, favorite course, least favorite courses, favorite subjects, her reading habits, and out of school activities.
My role in this situation is interviewer. In this situation I can tell that I have more of an authoritative role because her responses are short and only address the exact question with no added explanations. She is open but her shyness hints at a level of conservatism. This probably has more to do with the fact that she does not know me and I am asking her general but personal questions. I can tell she is anxious because she is subconsciously tapping her toes. I am trying to have a conversational tone in order to ease her anxiety. I think Julia sees me as an authoritative stranger. I think I need to change my tactic next time to make the power dynamic more equal and inviting. I think I will conduct the next interview in the library which will be away from distractions. The negative with this idea though is that she would be out of class longer, so the library may not work.
I think the setting may add to Julia’s anxiety because there are a lot of distractions in that hall way and it may affect her comprehension of questions I ask which may cause her more anxiety. Then there is also the worry about someone overhearing what she is saying which may also be the cause of her short responses. This could cause her to see my questions as more intrusive which may cause my presence to be authoritative and not casual.
I chose, Julia because she has a reading comprehension disability that gets in the way of her studious nature and classroom leadership. I teach a reading lab where we are going over reading comprehension strategies and it fit that I study someone who has a reading comprehension disability.
Field Notes:
ReplyDelete• 14, Freshman, Female.
• Family: 3 sisters, 1 brother, => 3rd child => Mother and Father working => Mom: Nursing home, Father: Construction and A/C installation.
• Lived in Thornton her whole life. York: since 4th grade. Clayton: K-3 => both in Mapleton School District.
• Favorite Class: Spanish => easy because Native Speaker=> has fun in class=> Teacher is Ms. Silverman.
• Favorite Teacher: Ms. Lewis => Science => Nice and she cares about students.
• Least Favorite Class: Math => does not like it because it is what she is the least good at.
• General Demeanor concerning school in A.M.: She wakes up in the morning and does not want to come to school.
• Lives: She lives on High Street.
• She claims that she does not use other things to help her in class.
• Frustrations: She is frustrated about projects => mixes them up => forgets everything.
• IEP: Did not seem to know about IEP (probably due to how I asked the question).
• Reading: She does not have an issue reading => She can read well in Spanish => has a hard time with long words in English. She prefers to read in English. Her favorite book is The Lovely Bones. She says that the reason prefers reading in Spanish is because books in Spanish are harder to find and she generally does not find books interesting => she has a hard time sticking to books => only reads one page if she does not find the book interesting.
• Her favorite subject is science because she likes the scientific part.
• Goals: Wants to go to college to be an Immigration Lawyer => loves debate => wants to always be right => wants to standup for people without rights.
• Extracurricular participation: Religious Dance => Catholic => a dance for faith in Mother Mary => other saints as well. => has done this over a year. => dances out in the community if have party for saint they dance for it => it is latin heritage dancing: Mexican style sandals, socks, shorts, bandana, sombrero, traditional blouse, and Benacho. => used to play sports but had to quit due to bad knees => soccer => played until half way through last season.