Yeah, we got a snippy letter.

[conuly]

Which I expected, as noted.

And on the train we read the third chapter of Frog and Toad Are Friends ("This book is not on her reading level!"), which Evangeline has never read before: The Lost Button. She stopped a few times mid-story to guess what would happen next.

And I asked Eva after the fact what happened...

Me: So, Evangeline, what happened in this story?
Eva: He lost a button and -
Me: Wait, wait. What happened first?
Eva: They went for a walk, Frog and Toad, and he lost a button. And he-
Me: Who he?
Eva: Toad, Toad lost the button. And he and Frog went looking for it, but they couldn't find it. And they couldn't find it, and then when Toad went home he found it.
Me: Why did Frog look for the button too?
Eva: Because he and Toad are best friends.
Me: Okay. And then?
Eva: And then Toad took all the buttons they found that weren't his, and put them on his jacket and gave them to Frog.
Me: Why? (This isn't stated in the story.)
Eva: I think he just thought maybe Frog was upset at looking for the button, so he wanted to make him happy.

This is pretty close to the synopsis I would've given. This is, as near as I can tell, what Evangeline's teacher thinks she can't do. Are first grade teachers looking for something different?

Evangeline also, I will note, is very careful when reading dialog to try to read it with the appropriate emotion. She'll actually go and re-read something if she started out "sad" and thinks it should have been "happy", or if she was "shouting" and the text says the character "wailed". I don't think I'm just doting when I say that *I* think this puts her ahead of many young readers, and, for that matter, many not-so-young readers who ought to know better.

I mean, here's the thing. I am starting to think, as I've said, that Evangeline may not be reading as well as it seems, that she relies on guesswork more than she ought. However - is she also just working incredibly sub-optimally in class? Because I can't figure this out at all!

Her spelling test didn't come back yet either. I'm quite annoyed.

Comments

[brownkitty.livejournal.com]

Is she giving you what she thinks you want to hear, and unable to read her teacher that well? Or able to read her teacher that well, but her teacher thinks she's less able for some reason, so Eva's giving the teacher what Eva thinks the teacher's expectations are?

[conuly]

That's a good question that I have no idea how to answer.

[brownkitty.livejournal.com]

I imagine you'll get at least a partial answer from the classroom observation you'd mentioned.

[conuly]

God I'm hoping. And it's just going to be awkward now because of that darn reader response.

[elenbarathi.livejournal.com]

Aha, I think I see where the problem may be coming from. Just looking at the text of your dialog, not even seeing/hearing your non-verbal communication, it seems to me that you're doing quite a bit of cueing:

Me: So, Evangeline, what happened in this story?
Eva: He lost a button and -
Me: Wait, wait. What happened first?
Eva: They went for a walk, Frog and Toad, and he lost a button. And he-
Me: Who he?
Eva: Toad, Toad lost the button. And he and Frog went looking for it, but they couldn't find it. And they couldn't find it, and then when Toad went home he found it.
Me: Why did Frog look for the button too?
Eva: Because he and Toad are best friends.
Me: Okay. And then?
Eva: And then Toad took all the buttons they found that weren't his, and put them on his jacket and gave them to Frog.
Me: Why? (This isn't stated in the story.)
Eva: I think he just thought maybe Frog was upset at looking for the button, so he wanted to make him happy.

... what I'm wondering is how her narration would have come out if you hadn't given those cues. Her answers to the two 'Why?' questions you asked show that she did comprehend the story, but I get the impression that she's relying on you to a large extent for help in 'how to structure the narrative'.

I postulate that perhaps her reading is just fine, but she's having a little snag in her expressive language (https://gatornet.chapin.edu/~lrdept/expressive.htm), which could go right along with a glitch in auditory processing and/or executive functioning.

You could push to get her screened, but IMHO it's best to leave The System out of such matters and just address them at home on your own. What gets marketed as "therapy" for learning disabilities is really nothing more than finding strategies that work and practicing them till they're automatic.

I suggest you record Eva's chapter synopses - let her talk into the mike uninterrupted, with no hints about how to tell the tale, no questions till the end. You can listen to it together and talk about how to tell it better: start with what came first, use proper nouns, etc. Then she can have another go at recording it if she wants, and save the best of the two versions. A week or two of this may be all it takes to catch her up to where her teacher thinks she's suppposed to be.

*hugs* All you guys take care, 'kay?

[conuly]

That makes sense, although we have no way to record what she's saying other than writing it out. Would transcription work as well?

What gets marketed as "therapy" for learning disabilities is really nothing more than finding strategies that work and practicing them till they're automatic.

And yeah. I remember my speech therapy through the schools. One or two years of helpful work, carefully explaining where I was going wrong - and then that teacher left and it was the next several years of make-work.

[elenbarathi.livejournal.com]

Transcription would be better than nothing, but what you'd be working on would be her auditory processing, so no, it wouldn't work as well; she needs to hear herself.

Does your computer not have Sound Recorder? Go to Start, then All Programs, then Accessories; that's where it'll be if you have it.

If you don't have Sound Recorder, can you pick up a second-hand cassette recorder somehere? Lots of people have them sitting around unused because all their music's on CDs or MP3s; if you put out the word, someone may just give you one free.

If all else fails, the library may have recorders you can check out, or at least use there from time to time.

[conuly]

Jenn was going to reply and say thanks and "how insightful!" but she forgot her LJ password because, I don't know, because she forgot it.

[elenbarathi.livejournal.com]

*waves and smiles* Hi, Jenn, you're welcome; hope it helps!