Focus Students:

1. ELL
1. Why select?
I selected this student because they represented an instructional
challenge due to their classification of being an overall early
intermediate student on their CELDT testing data. The student also
scored early intermediate on both their listening and speaking skills,
which were used heavily within this particular lesson. This particular
ELL student comes from an Asian background and therefore presents a
different challenge than the majority of the ELL students within the
classroom.
2. Linguistic Background
student has a strong support system at home, but the home support
system lacks the ability to support the student in English Language
Development. The student has been classified overall on her CELDT
testing data as an early intermediate level, with scoring early
intermediate in the areas of speaking and listening which were focused
on throughout the lesson that is being discussed.
3. Academic Language Abilities
The students academic language abilities in relation to the subject
matter of language and foundational skills requires the students to be
able to understand what the different terms mean such as segmenting
and blending. Students will be required to have an understanding of
the skills required to segment and blend such as having the knowledge
of the individual sounds and their corresponding letters. Students will
also need to have knowledge of syllables and vowels because the
lesson will be focusing on how to utilize long vowels when making
words.
4. Content Knowledge and Skills
The students content knowledge in relation to the subject matter of
language and foundational skill illustrates additional support due to the
students Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills, DIBELS. The
student scored at a strategic level, which is below grade level
benchmark standards for the third trimester. The student recognized
only 42 letters, as well as was only able to segment 49 words. Further
evidence from the nonsense words illustrated that the student was

only capable of recognizing 38 pieces and only 14 actually words

during the exam.
5. Physical, Social and Emotional Development
Physically the student is developing at a normal rate for her age. The
student is on the shorter side for her age and among the rest of her
classmates, but she is similar to the other students within the grade
level. The student is also physically capable of the fine and gross motor
skills required of her in kindergarten.
Socially the student is also performing at grade level when it comes to
her social development. The student is social when at school but does
lack the ability to consistently express her opinions and thoughts
correctly. The student struggles with her ability to express herself due
to her being an ELL student. She has a hard time trying to vocalize
things that she wants because of her lack of knowledge that she has
regarding the English language.
The students emotional development is average with the other
students. The student does have some days where they are slightly
more sensitive than usual, but this also I think is from her lack of
proficiency in the English language. The student does become upset
over things that are usually misinterpreted which correlates with the
students English language development. Overall the student is
developing appropriately for students of her same age and grade-level.
6. Cultural Background, family and home life.
The students cultural background is that of Pilipino the student comes
from a family that is well educated, but are also English language
learners themselves. The mother is a strong support system and is
very caring and supportive of the student, but she is an ELL herself so
it is often not the right kind of support that the student needs. The
student does a lot of the translating for mom because she is not always
able to understand so this might be an issue when it comes to
additional practice at home. This could also be an issue because of the
lack of knowledge that the family has that does not allow for correction
of words that are being pronounced incorrectly which might be difficult
when it the child does not know what is incorrect or not.
7. Special considerations, health issues.
The student does not have any health issues that affect her learning,
especially in the content area. The student does come from a family
that does tend to work long hours. The student participates in an after

school child-care program put on by the YMCA. This program provides

homework help as well as physical activities to keep the students out
of trouble and with a safe place to play and receive help with their
schoolwork. The program runs until 3 hours after school gets out, and
the student does spend a substantial amount of time there due to the
parents working long hours. This means that the student is not
spending a large amount of time at home, but is at school late, but is
receiving help from the peer tutors. The peer tutors are in charge of a
large group of students and this is where the student spends most of
their time, so the support she receives in the content area is not
individualized or the most effective either.
8. Students interests and aspirations
The student is interested in performing, and wishes to be an
entertainer when she is older. The student is very vocal and likes to
participate in activities at school. The student is vocal but is often not
clear in expressing her thoughts due to her status of being an ELL
student. Overall the student is outgoing and wishes to one day perform
for others, which is evident in her personality of being outgoing and
vocal.
9. Other information relevant to content area, attendance,
extracurricular activities
The student regularly attends school and has not missed a single day
this year. The student has also not been late this year, and is very
dedicated to her schoolwork. The student is also a participant in the
afterschool program offered by the YMCA in order to have a safe place
to do her homework as well as participate in after school games and
sports. The student receives additional homework assistance during
this program, which benefits her due to her parent support at home,
that might not be accurate.
Student 2:
1. Why select the student?
I selected this student as my student who presents a different
instructional challenge because the student has a 504 Action plan on
file with the school. The student is classified as having a Oppositional
Defiant Disorder, ODD as well as having Attention Deficit Hyperactivity
Disorder, ADHD.
2. How do they present a different instructional challenge?

This student presents a different instructional challenge due to the fact

that they are classified as ODD as well as having ADHD. The student
requires accommodations in order to be successful due to the fact that
she has these disabilities.
3. Linguistic Background
The students linguistic background is designated as English only
speaking. The student is fluent in English and that is her only language
that she speaks.
4. Academic Language Abilities
The academic language abilities that the student has in relation to the
content area are that she is capable of segmenting and blending CVC
words. The student is able to complete those areas, but does not have
the knowledge to be successful when it comes to segmenting and
blending words of longer patterns, as well as CVCe words. In order to
blend and segment, the student would also be required to know the
sounds and the relation of the sound to the spelling of the alphabet in
order to decide which letter is making a specific sound.
5. Content Knowledge, and skills
The content knowledge that the student has in relation to the content
area is that she is capable of segmenting and blending CVC words. The
student is able to complete those areas, but does not have the
knowledge to be successful when it comes to segmenting and blending
words of longer patterns, as well as CVCe words. In order to blend and
segment, the student would also be required to know the sounds and
the relation of the sound to the spelling of the alphabet in order to
decide which letter is making a specific sound.
The skills that the student has is that she is capable of segmenting,
blending and matching the sounds to the different letters, but lacks full
comprehension in order to complete the process of matching the
sounds with the spellings.
6. Physical, Social and Emotional Development
The physical development of the student is on average with the rest of
the kindergarten class. She is taller for her age, but is within normal
ranges for her age. Overall the student is capable of the fine motor
skills that are required of her to hold a pencil as well as to properly
write. The student does lack gross motor skills, such as being clumsy

and careless at times, which causes her to also not pay attention in
class, which is why she struggles in this particular content area.
The social development of the student is that she is also on track with
fellow kindergarten students. She is very social when it comes to being
at school, she likes to share what is happening at home and with her
siblings, because she is so vocal she often lacks the ability to form
friendships because of her loudness and talkative nature.
The emotional development of the student is that she is just entering
the same emotional maturity of her classmates. She is just becoming
more mature, but often says silly things in order to get attention and
struggles when she is not allowed to do what she wants. The student is
often defiant in these situations, and will often disrupt the classroom
with outbursts illustrating her lack of emotional maturity compared to
her classmates.
7. Cultural Background, home life
The students cultural background is Caucasian. The student comes
from a stable home life where she lives with mother and father, as well
as her 2 siblings. The parents both speak English, with some college
education. The students home life is stable, although they are
currently moving in order to accommodate a new baby that is on the
way. This situation might account for the students frequent episodes
of defiance due to her being exhausted and not receiving the normal
attention at home.
8. Special considerations, health issues
Special considerations that the student has are that she is diagnosed
with having ADHD, as well as ODD. The student also is allergic to red
dyes, which causes her to having increased fixation on a particular
area or item once the dye has been consumed. This increases her
outbursts and causes her to being more emotional when she is upset.
The student has previously been medicated in order to control her
episodes but her reaction to the medication caused her to be in a haze
like state with little emotional response.
9. Students interests and aspirations
The students interests rely heavily in action figures. Although she does
enjoy girly items, she does take more of an interest in playing with toys
that are geared towards boys, but she is also very interested in playing
with more feminine toys as well. The student tends to be more
interested in those activities that are rough, especially at recess she is

often found to be playing tag with the boys or building blocks with
others. The student recently completed a writing activity that asked
what they wanted to be when they grew up, and this particular student
said that she wants to be a police officer, so that she can protect
people.
Step 3:
Adaptations for focus students:
1. what adaptations to the instructional plan for the student?
In order to meet the learning needs of the ELL student, I will provide
explicit direct instruction; this includes more individual attention when
teaching the lesson. The student will benefit from speaking slower in
order or them to comprehend more of the lesson. Furthermore allowing
for more wait time for the student to respond is another strategy that
was implemented into the lesson to help the student be successful,
along with additional wait time, peer-partner talk is also an adaptation
to the lesson that will help the student be successful. The student will
also benefit from having visuals when they are making words in order
to apply their knowledge of letters with the appropriate sound.
2. Why are these adaptations appropriate for the student?
These adaptations are appropriate for the ELL student because they
address the learning needs of the student. The adaptation of additional
wait time, as well as more peer-partner talk bridges the gap for the
student because of their lack of proficiency in the language. The
student also has a peer-partner of slightly higher ability in order to help
the student with expressing their thoughts. The adaptations were also
appropriate because the student does benefit from having visuals in
order to apply what they know, as well as to assist in their
understanding of the content area; the student might struggle with
remembering the names or spellings of a specific sound and can refer
to the card in order to help them remember.
3. For the areas not adapted, why are they ok?
For the rest of the lesson that did not include adaptations for the ELL
student, they were appropriate in the regards that the student already
knew how to blend and segment standard CVC words, but they still
struggle with knowing long and short vowels, this is where adaptations
needed to be made. The content area of blending and segmenting did
not need to include any adaptations because they student had the

content knowledge, but needed adaptations for those areas of higher

complexity.
Student 2:
1. What adaptations will you make for the student?
The adaptations that will be made for the student for this lesson will
include selective seating placement, this might be in the front of the
classroom nearest to the teacher or away from other students, the
student in addition to her seating placement will also be given a stress
ball that she can hold throughout the lesson in order to remain
focused. The student is also paired with a peer-partner that she gets
along with and a partner that is slightly higher achieving than her so
that they can help keep her focused when they are having
collaborative conversations.
2. Why are they appropriate??
These adaptations of selective seating as well as for the stress ball
assist with the students attention issues. By placing the student in the
front of the classroom the teacher is more closely able to watch the
student and keep her focused on the content area, she is also allowed
a stress ball so that she can exert some of her excess energy without
disrupting instruction. Due to the students ODD diagnosis the student
might be placed away from other students based on her behavior in
order to not distract other students from instruction. Lastly the student
has a special bond with several of the students which are placed near
her during instructional partner sharing so that she is able to
communicate her thoughts, these peers are of slightly higher
achievement levels and are slightly more emotional mature than the
student which helps to keep her engaged during peer sharing times.
3. Why no other adaptations?
There is no need to adapt the entire lesson for the student because she
does have an understanding of the content area, but does need
specific attention when it comes to the application of the lesson. The
student has a hard time staying on task, which requires the
adaptations discussed above, but she does not need additional
adaptations for the actual content area.
Step 5:
Student 1:

1. In what ways was your lesson effective, what might you do different
to improve?
The lesson was effective for the ELL student because they were able to
demonstrate mastery of the learning objective by being able to blend
words using long vowels. The student was also effective in meeting the
learning objective of segmenting words with long vowels. The lesson
was effective during the syllabication portion, where the student did try
to segment the words again, but upon further clarification of what was
expected of the student was able to break the words into the correct
amount of syllables. The lesson was also effective in the phoneme
substitution portion. The student did struggle also in this area, but
when more teacher modeling was done when I could see students
getting confused the student was able to understand and apply what
they knew about long vowels and apply that to the content area.
To improve the lesson, I might
2. How well did the lesson connect to the students background and
developmental information. Cite specific examples.
The lesson connected to the students background since I used the
information of their academic and content knowledge when planning
the lesson. For example, the content of the lesson built upon the
students academic readiness to begin using long vowels when making
words and dictation. At this time in the school year, the kindergarten
students are beginning to learn the VCe pattern when making words.
The students background information provided evidence that the
student was capable of blending and segmenting words using a CVC
pattern and that they were capable of successfully using a VCe pattern
when making words. Another example was that the student has been
introduced to digraphs, and the student was able to successfully blend
and segment with digraphs during the lesson. The developmental
readiness of the student was connected to the lesson and that was
illustrated because of the student being capable of forming words,
orally as well as processing information correctly due to the
developmental readiness of the student.
3. To what extent did the student make progress toward the academic
learning goals?
The extent that the student made progress toward the academic
learning goal was that the student achieved the academic learning
goal. The student was successful in achieving the learning goal during
the different aspects of the lesson. The student did achieve the
academic learning goal in all areas of the lesson and the content, even

though they struggled with some content areas. The student was
successful when they were practicing the blending portion. The student
made progress in the segmenting portion of the lesson, and did
achieve the learning goal of the segmenting portion even though it was
more difficult for the student. The student also achieved the learning
goals in both syllabication and phoneme substitution. The student also
illustrated mastery of the learning goal during the dictation portion of
the lesson as well as during one-to-one teacher observations.
4. What will you do for the student who did not achieve the academic
learning goals?
For student 1, as well as my other English Language Learners that did
not achieve the academic learning goals I would utilize small group
instruction. The small group instruction would be used for these
students to help review concepts and skills. By grouping these
students, it will allow me to focus on providing more one-on-one
attention to these individual students. I will also be sure to call on
these students more frequently during instruction so that I can ensure
they are meeting the academic learning goals. I will also consider the
proximity of where these students sit and whom they are partnered
with during the lesson in order to help keep these students engaged
during the lesson as well as to ensure they comprehend the content
that is being taught.
5. What are the next steps with this focus student?
The next steps with this focus student would be to review the area that
the student struggled in, which was the segmenting portion of the
lesson, as well as the dictation portion. The student was able to meet
the academic learning goal of those particular areas of instruction but
the student struggled with the concept. My focus would be to reinforce
their knowledge of the sound/letter relationship to increase their
automaticity of the letter sounds so that when the student is asked to
segment they are more confident in that content area. This will also
help the student in other areas of language development and become
a more successful student.
6. What would your next steps in planning to facilitate this students
English Language Development?
The next steps in order to help facilitate the English Language
Development of this student would be to focus on the students
understanding of letter/sound relationships. By building upon this area,
the student will have a deeper understanding of the sounds and their
spellings and be able to make more words. In order to help the area of

letter/sound relationships, sound games would help to practice those

specific areas and increase the knowledge of the students sounds. The
student will also benefit from using word family chart so that the
student can practice the word using a different onset for the rime.
Continuous reading and rereading of stories and commenting on
language and encouraging students to predict words based on what
they already know. These steps will help to facilitate the English
Language Development of the student.
Student 2:
1. in what ways was your lesson effective and what might you do
differently?
The lesson was effective for this particular student because it gave the
student an opportunity to master the skills of phonemic awareness,
while focusing on the newly learned consonant digraphs as well as the
long vowel patterns. This student was successful within the lesson
because the student was able to build upon their current knowledge of
VCV patterns and utilize more complex patterns and utilizing digraphs
in order to build words as well. In order to improve the lesson, I would
make sure to focus on the spelling patterns of the long vowels during
the making words portion so that the students would understand more
quickly. Students were also confused when given the option between a
c/k I would be sure to discuss this particular area when making words
and remind them of the sound that the letters ce make when placed
together.
2. How well did the lesson connect with the student background and
developmental information, cite examples?
The lesson connected with the student background and developmental
information, since I used this information of their academic and content
knowledge when planning the lesson. This students background
information provided knowledge about the students content
knowledge as well as information about the type of support system at
home that would support classroom learning. For example, the lesson
built on the students academic readiness to begin using long vowels
when making words and dictation. The student is diagnosed with ODD
and ADHD, which causes lack of concentration during instruction. The
background knowledge supplied information in which to utilize when
planning instruction, such as providing adaptations for the student in
order to help facilitate learning of the academic learning goals. The
students developmental information provided information regarding
the student being emotionally less mature than her classmates, which
might account for her lack of focus within some areas.

3. To what extent did the student make progress toward the academic
learning goals?
The student made progress towards the academic learning goal by
successfully being able to achieve the learning goal. The student was
successful in the blending area of instruction. The student was also
able to achieve the academic learning goal in the area of segmenting
and phoneme substitution. The student did struggle with the dictation
area of the lesson but was successful at reaching mastery of the
academic learning goal. The student was also successful in the
syllabication portion, but lacked some focus and needed to be
redirected.
4. What will you do for the student who did not achieve the academic
learning goal?
For focus student 2, as well as other students who present an
instructional challenge I would utilize small group instruction to review
concepts and skills taught within the lesson. The small group
instruction would provide limited distractions for those students as well
as be able to differentiate the instruction so that the amount of
information given to those students would be smaller and more
manageable for those students to remain engaged within the lesson.
These students will also benefit from additional one-to-one instruction
that could help with their focus within the lesson. I will also be sure to
provide seating that will help eliminate distractions from the students
so that they are able to remain engaged throughout the lesson.
5. What are the next steps with this focus student?
The next steps with this focus student would be to increase her skills
within the lesson. This would include providing her with more
opportunities to share her responses, which will help keep her engaged
within the lesson. The student will also need to work on her spelling,
since that was an area of weakness during dictation so the student
would benefit with small group instruction using sound spelling cards
and Elkonian Boxes to help the student put the appropriate amount of
sounds per the words she is making, as well as to visually see the
relationship between sounds and the letters.