Thursday, April 3, 2025

 Thursday, April 3, 2025

     I had an appointment with Shelly this morning.  I worked on my feelings about fifth grade ZN.  While the first two sessions with him went well, they are quickly getting worse. He’s decompensating. Today, he rocked as we worked.  For the last two sessions, he has endless problems with the phone. The sound goes off; the picture goes off. He says he does nothing. I can believe he feels that way. I can believe he doesn’t intend to do anything to the phone. The likely explanation is he touches the phone with his constant fidgeting. He is filled with distress and anxiety. He’s diagnosed a ADHD. But I think he's just jumping out of his skin with an anxiety disorder.  Hopefully, it’s nothing worse than that. Either way I have to deal with my own anxiety and my  own self-hatred. This is going to be a huge challenge. I’m going to need all the help I can get.

     My Bismarck palm dropped a frond yesterday. I went out almost immediately and sawed it in half. Today, I walked it down to Darby’s house, dragging the two halves a the block and a half.

   I dreaded working with the kids at Ulu Wini today. I wasn’t up for frustration. It wound up being wonderful.  I hadn’t worked with fourth-grade LK in a while. At the beginning of last year, I worked with him on reading comprehension. He saw improvement and that was it. I have no idea what his performance level is now. I didn’t know then either.

   At the beginning of this year, LK told me he needed help in math but no he didn’t want to work with me. I pushed him. His deep seat problem with math cleared up in two sessions. 

    He came to  me today, saying he needed help with math. It had something to do with fractions but he couldn’t explain to me what.  I had him write the problem as he remembered it.  He wrote a mixed fraction.  I figured out it had to do with converting improper fractions to mixed fractions. I illustrated the problem with diagrams and showed him how to solve the problem with the algorithm.  LK has a genuine ADD problem. The worst just plain ADD I’ve seen. All the others are anxiety disorders.

  Then, I worked with second-grade JM. She presented as cognitively impaired. Her word recognition skills were off the chart, but her comprehension was below grade level.  Her answers were hesitant and spoken with a questioning voice.  I saw the way she moved her hands when she picked something up and recognized the sign of raw intelligence. I told her I saw it. I pushed her to give her best answer without that questioning voice. The difference is incredible. 

   She does have a big problem. She lacks in basic background information.  The piece we read today was on a third -grade level about the Gold Rush.  It started with a statement the gold was discovered when builders found it accidentally.  When I asked her what were people interested in, the gold or the builders. She said the builders. When I asked her to explain why, she said the builders were building new apartments.  She lives in a world where new apartments are worth more than gold.  We have a housing shortage. I told her the answer should good thinking. It wasn’t the right answer, but it showed good use of her background knowledge and the text. 

   Next I had second grade NV. Who wanted to work on division. Huh? Division isn’t taught till the end of third or sometime in fourth grade. Before I went into the math, I asked her how her reading was doing. She gave me a big smile and said great. NV suffered from a big memory problem. She couldn’t remember any word other than the. I didn’t check,  I prefer to wait until the kids ask for help. I like to give them as much control as possible. 

   NV knew there was a connection between subtraction and division. I asked her to write a subtraction problem. She wrote 6-8=.  I told her she couldn’t do that. She argued. Yes, it’s 2.  I illustrated the problem and showed her it couldn’t be done. 

The rule of commutation applies to addition and multiplication but not to subtraction and division.  As for division, I showed her how to use repeated subtraction.  I’m not sure if I know how to use it correctly, but I made it work.

   AM is in first grade.  She is the most competent academically of those I’ve worked with.  I wrote a story with her last time. Today, I gave her three printed copies of it.  She read it to me, missing some words.  The greatest error was not remembering a word she had read in the previous line. I don’t think it ever occurred to her. 

  I hadn’t worked with fourth-grade AL since sometime last year. She said she was in a low reading group. When I had her read text, it quickly became clear she had problems decoding multi-syllable words. I taught her the procedure I use. It is a simple six-step procedure. 1) identify the vowel letters; 2) identify which of the vowel letters make vowel sounds; 3) identify the syllables; 4) decode each syllable one-at-a-time; 5) blend the syllables. Because of the relationship between English spelling and English phonemes, you more often than not wind up pronouncing an multi-syllable word with an unfamiliar pronunciation when decoding it. You have to use context to infer the real pronunciation.  If the word is not part of your listening or speaking vocabulary, good luck getting the right pronunciation.   I took AL through the steps with four or five words. She had it. She may need some review, but it won’t take more than once.

   Next, I worked with second grade PY. She had problems with knowing the difference between addition and subtraction. The problem was one of not paying attention to the operation sign.  I told her I would make and exercise for her.

   Last I had fifth-grade BT.  She was another one I hadn’t seen since last year.  She didn’t understand how to do addition with fractions. In fact, she didn’t understand the meaning of the denominator. I drew diagrams of 2/2. 3/3, etc.  She had to identify the denominator for each illustration. When it came to adding fraction, she wanted to add the denominators.  Once I got that straightened out, I showed her how to add fractions with unlike denominators. I could see the light go on in her eyes over and over. 

   As I drove home, the mountain was shrouded in vog. I couldn’t even see the ridge.  This is bad. Darby told me there had been  the biggest eruption in years. The fountain went  1,000 feet into the air. It’s great for the tourists. Where else can you see something like that and feel safe? Up to now, we could still see the mountain ridge but not the horizon over the ocean. Ah, what ocean?