Today I had the pleasure of observing Mia’s session with her Year 3 English and Maths student. During the English portion of the session, they were working on reading comprehension and how to understand a variety of texts and different keywords. In the maths section of the session they worked on questions to do with shopping, understanding how much change should be given back, therefore working on both the application of her addition and subtraction skills.
Mia started by providing a long fictional passage for her student to read out loud. When Mia noticed longer words that the student did not understand, she provided a definition and how to use that word in a sentence. For example, the word exaggerate, Mia talked about how that meant to describe something as being bigger/worse than it actually is. She then provided the sentence ‘he is exaggerating his movements so we can see him’. By doing this, she made sure her student could expand her vocabulary and fully understand the exert. After reading the passage, they answered a variety of questions. When her student was struggling to answer certain questions, Mia guided her to the section it was asking about and asked her to reread it. This way the student was able to answer the question by herself, enabling her to work on her ability to comprehend information from text.
I really liked how Mia had an extremely welcoming and fun nature with her student. This created a warm environment where the student knew she could ask Mia questions when she began struggling. I also took note of how interactive Mia was with her student. She consistently asked questions to make sure the student was understanding the questions given to her. This is a skill I will definitely use in future sessions.
Lily Powell
