Anna Erikson

Final Assessment and Overview- Ralph

Description of Child

Ralph is a six- year old boy with many interests and hobbies. Ralph speaks Russian

and English. Ralph’s first language was Russian and Russian is the language that his family

speaks at home. His parents are both originally from Armenia and lived there

predominantly when it was part of the U.S.S.R. so Russian was the language that was

spoken. Ralph’s parents moved to the United States after they were married around 1997.

Ralph has grandparents that live in Moscow, who come to visit him in the U.S. for a few

moths a year and he has also gone to visit Moscow. At home Ralph’s family cooks many

traditional Russian and Armenian foods and Ralph helps out with the cooking. Ralph also

enjoys playing a Russian game called Lotto that is very similar to Bingo but played in

Russian. Rafael’s father Grant started teaching him to play chess when he was two and it is

still a game he really enjoys. Ralph’s mom Laney told us about how they continue Ralph’s

Russian learning at home through the use of a workbook. They also have a workbook to

work on his English because his family believes developing Ralph’s English is very

important.

Ralph has many interests. Ralph plays soccer and has practice on Tuesdays and has

tennis lessons on Saturday. Ralph also has a passionate curiosity about nature, bugs, and

lizards. Ralph loves going outside and exploring for different creatures, and is never afraid

of different bugs or lizards. He loves catching different bugs and studying them. Ralph is a

very curious child that has many different interests.

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Description of Assessment Tools

I used a variety of assessment tools to gather information on Ralph. The first

assessment tool I used was family interviews in the form of a home visit on September 17th,

October 21st, and November 4th. I went to Ralph’s home and talked with his family to gain

further information on Ralph. I also interviewed teachers that work with Ralph including

my mentor teacher and his English Language Development teacher. For the interview with

Ralph’s ESL teacher I asked her about Ralph’s English abilities, and Ralph as a student in

general. When I interviewed my placement teacher I asked her about different areas of

Ralph’s development, things that happened when I was not there and any other information

she could give me about Ralph. My mentor teacher shared her picture and video

documentation on Ralph with me as well. Interviews from other teachers and parents are

helpful assessment tools and can help give a different perspective on the student but for

reliability and validity it is important to remember that the information comes from another

person, and to look for similar patterns in my own observations. I also took a lot of

documentation and observation notes on Ralph, these notes include photos, videos, voice

recordings, and written notes. I looked at Ralph’s formal assessment that is done by my

mentor teacher every month including in July before school started in August, September,

and October. The assessment covers writing and identifying letters (upper and lowercase),

letter sounds, sounding out words, writing numbers 1-20, identifying numbers 1-20,

counting to 100, and identifying shapes. Finally the students are tested on their sight words

every week, and I have the data from Ralph’s sight word tests.

I also have data from reading comprehension assessments that I did with Ralph that

include two sequencing assessments one where I read the story the Gingerbread Man and

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he sequenced the story, and one where Ralph read the story There Was a Cold Lady Who

Swallowed Some Snow and then sequenced the story.

Also I have all of the data from the students data notebooks. Students sight word

assessments, formal assessments, are kept in their data notebooks and over fall break goals

for the students future learning were written by the students and the parents in their data

notebooks.

Also I did Math assessments with Ralph where I asked him to pick out 3D shapes in

the classroom and name what they were, and another assessment where he and a group of

students had to sort different sized and oriented 2D shapes into different piles by shape.

I also did a math assessment with Ralph called the Math problem solving interview

where I asked Ralph simple addition and subtraction word problems to see what strategies

he used to solve the problems.

Analysis of Child’s development & skills

Physical development

I have documented Ralph’s gross and fine motor skills in my observation notes. I

documented that Ralph can run a lap around the field without heavy breathing (9/2). I

documented Ralph playing red light green light (9/2) and being able to run, walk, and stop

abruptly. From my interview with Ralph’s mother on 9/17 I know that Ralph plays soccer,

tennis, and learned how to swim this summer. All of these activities require a large degree

of gross motor control. I have documented further growth in Ralph’s gross motor skills on

10/3 my mentor teacher showed me video that she had taken of Ralph from that day at

Chucky Cheese climbing up the equipment, going down the slide and, climbing through the

tunnels on his hands and knees. These actions require gross motor skills and coordination

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because you have to be aware of your body to move multiple muscles at a time to climb

through equipment and tunnels. Also on 11/18 I recorded in my observation notes Ralph

playing outside and I observed him climb up the slide which takes a large degree of strength

and gross motor control because you have to be able to use your arms and legs with enough

control to keep yourself from slipping back down the slide.

In the classroom I have documented Ralph’s fine motor skills. Ralph writes using a

grasping grip (9/15). Ralph can also manipulate and grasp small objects, for example when

he plays chess (9/17). I observed Ralph play chess at my home visit with his family. I have

observed improvements in Ralph’s grip moving from a grasping grip to a tripod grip and

having more control over his writing (11/14), (11/22).

I think that Ralph has a lot of strengths in his gross motor ability he can run, swim,

climb and he participates in a variety of team sports. I think that areas of future growth for

Ralph would be to continue to work on his fine motor skills in the same ways that he does

now by working with small manipulatives like the toys he plays with at home or by

practicing his writing at school and at home.

Social & emotional development

Through my documentation notes and an interview with Ralph’s family I observed

that he has many friends and cooperates easily with others. On 9/12 I observed Ralph in

his English Language Development (ELD) class. I observed and documented Ralph

participating in reading buddies with another students. Ralph read a story and then allowed

the older student to have a turn reading a story. This example illustrates Ralph’s

cooperation. Also on multiple occasions (9/6, 9/16, 9/19) I observed Ralph working with

his group members at his table, and asking them questions, and helping them out as well. I

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have continued to observe Ralph’s ability to work in his group and be a helpful and

cooperative group member(10/14),(10/31), (11/18).

Ralph has shown a lot of evidence of self-control and a few instances where he is still

working on his self-control. By talking to Ralph and observing him on multiple days, he has

gotten many good student certificates and only a couple of frowns. Good student certificates

mean that the child had a great day at school. Ralph has about thirty great student

certificates and only 3 frowns. This shows a pattern in Ralph self control because he rarely

does not have self control except on a few occasions. For example Ralph got a frown on

9/17 for talking during his OMA class. On 9/19 when Ralph had OMA again he did not talk

unless asked. This is another example that shows his pattern of self-control.

When Ralph does receive a frown like on 9/17 he feels shame. when I visited his

house he told me that he felt very bad that he got a frown and he felt bad for talking. Every

other time I have observed Ralph get a frown he immediately gets upset and also gets

visibly upset when he gets picked up and tells his mom that he feels bad for whatever he did

to get the frown (9/12, 9/17). On days when I have not been in the classroom to observe

Ralph when he gets a frown my teacher told me that he has the same behavior and I

recorded that in my notes. For the second quarter of the school year Ralph has received no

frowns. I think that this shows even further improvement in his self control and also his

determination to not get any frowns.

I have also documented a few occasions where Ralph was slightly harder to

cooperate with because he has strong opinions and feelings (11/4), (12/2). On 11/4 a

student said to Ralph that he could not come to his birthday party so Ralph said, “You are

not my friend.” Ralph did not want to make up with the student even after the other student

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apologized, but then eventually he did make up with the other student. Ralph told me and I

documented in my notes that the other student hurt his feelings so he did not want to make

up with him right away. On 12/2 I documented in my documentation notes when Ralph and

Rain were building the robot Ralph had many ideas for what he thought the Robot should

be named and did not even consider Rain’s name suggestion for the Robot. Ralph just kept

coming up with names until Rain eventually agreed to one of the names that Ralph came up

with. This took a while because both students were determined to have the name they

wanted but Ralph just kept coming up with more and more names until one of the names he

wanted was picked.

I think that strengths for Ralph are Self- control and cooperation. Ralph has not

received any frowns for the second quarter and shown a lot of self- control. Also I think that

Ralph is very good at cooperating with his classmates on a daily basis. I think that Ralph

could continue to work on making sure when he is working in groups that everyone’s

opinion has a chance to be heard.

Language development

Ralph speaks both English and Russian. His ELD teacher Ms. Cintron told me in an

interview that his English is very proficient and he is only in ELD to make sure that he is

able to pass the AZELA at the end of the year. Ms. Cintron said that she does think that Ralph

will easily pass, but she was unsure that he would pass without ELD at the beginning of the

year.

I have also documented in my notes that Ralph has moved beyond telegraphic

speech and into multiple word sentences. Ralph does make occasional grammar mistakes in

his speech that I have documented in my notes. For example on 9/12 Ralph asked me about

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an assignment and said, “Ms. Erikson, Did I make it bad?” In this circumstance bad was not

the right word to use, even though it is similar to wrong it does not mean the exact same

thing and is usually attributed to behaviors, not an answer on an assignment.

I have documented in my notes improvement in Ralph’s grammar although he still

occasionally makes mistakes as mentioned above on 9/12. On 12/2 I recorded him

correcting another student saying a word incorrectly. The student said, “I dounted 12 paint

bottles.” Ralph politely corrected the student and said, “It is counted not dounted.” While

pronunciation was not the error Ralph was making in his grammar being able to listen to

another student and correct him in a helpful way shows that Ralph has a certain

understanding of the English language and knew what the word was supposed to be by

listening to the student talk.

Ralph has a lot of language strengths including speaking two languages. I think that

Ralph just needs to continue working on his grammar as an area of improvement which I

think will come naturally as he continues practice his English.

Reading & language arts skills

Ralph has a lot of language arts skills. From my mentor teachers in class assessment I

know that Ralph can identify all of his upper and lower case letters (9/10). Ralph can also

write his capitol letters out A through Z without looking at the letters. Ralph knows all of his

letter sounds including the long and short vowel sounds. According to Ralph’s most recent

formal assessment on 10/31 he still identify all his upper and lower case letters, knows all

the letter sounds, and can write all of his capitol and lower case letters without looking at

anything. This shows Ralph’s ability to retain his knowledge. Ralph read 126 sight words

according to his sight word assessment done on (9/6). According to Ralph’s most recent

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sight word assessment on 11/18 Ralph read 220 sight words in three minutes and twelve

seconds. This shows Ralph’s growth because he initially passed 220 sight words on 10/21

and now he works each week on getting his time faster and faster and his fastest so far is

three minutes and twelve seconds. This shows a lot of growth from his sight word

knowledge in September. Also in an assessment on 8/29 where the students are given a

picture of the word and have to sound it out Ralph was able to spell words with phonemic

spell for example the word Book, Ralph B-u-c, while this is not correct it showed that he has

the ability to sound out words. On a more recent assessment of sounding out words when

given a picture Ralph was able to write Tree spelled correctly and also Leaf spelled Leef on

10/31. While Ralph confused the diagraph in leaf it shows an improvement from August

because he was able to recognize that there were to letters to represent the long E sound

unlike in August when he wrote book with a U and was only recognizing the consent vowel

consonant pattern he now is able to recognize vowel diagraphs.

Ralph can read simple books. On 9/12 Ralph read the book Bugs by Oscar Gake.

Ralph read the whole book by himself and I documented this in my notes. Ralph showed on

10/28 that he could sequence the story The Gingerbread Man using picture cards with

switching the place of two pictures but when questioned about the pictures he was able to

fix the order. Ralph mixed up two pictures because he misunderstood what the pictures

represented but did not misunderstand what happened in the story and after talking to the

teacher about the story he was able to correctly place the pictures. I documented this

assessment in my documentation notes and using photographs.

On October 7-11th over fall break the students data notebooks were sent home and

the family and students were asked to reflect on the information in the notebook. Ralph

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reflected on his progress by saying. “I will do my best. I will prectis sit words and numbers.

thank you Ms. Aho.” This shows Ralphs ability to write in complete sentences with

punctuation and to spell phonetically.

Two sequencing assessments were done with Ralph. A sequencing assessment of the

story the Gingerbread man the story was read to Ralph and he had to put it in order. I

recorded this assessment in my notes and with pictures. Initially Ralph mixed up two of the

pictures but when I asked him to explain his thinking it showed that he misinterpreted what

the pictures meant but did understand the sequence of the story. After explaining the

pictures to Ralph he was able to sequence the story correctly (10/29). On 11/6 I did a

second sequencing assessment with Raffael that I recorded with pictures and in my notes.

Ralph read There Was a Cold Lady Who Swallowed Some Snow Ralph was able to sequence

about half of the story but for the other half he used the book to sequence the rest of the

sequencing cards. This showed growth because Ralph had to read a harder story in the

second assessment and he also understood that he could look back at the story to sequence

the events that he was not sure about.

Ralph has many reading and language strengths. Ralph has grown from reading

simple books like Bugs to being able to read more complex books like There was A Cold

Lady who Swallowed Some Snow. Ralph has grown a lot in his reading abilities over the

year and I would recommend he continue to read more challenging books and explore the

meaning of books further to improve his comprehension abilities. Ralph’s writing is also an

area for future growth. While he has improved to writing full sentences an area for future

growth would be writing simple stories.

Math skills

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Ralph participates in the morning carpet time, which is very math oriented, and I

have documented Ralph’s active participation during carpet time on multiple occasions

(9/5, 9/10, 9/16). For Carpet time the students bring a white board, a white board marker,

and a cube they keep in their pencil box. The students set the cube on a table so that the

class President can start the morning meeting by putting the cubes together and counting

them, the whole class counts along with their hands, and I have documented Ralph counting

along. Then the students compare the amount of cubes, to a set of 26 stacked cubes in order

to see if any students are missing. During this time the students have tally marks for every

day of school and each day they add one more, they also have a number chart they add the

next number to, and they have a money representation for what day of school it was. For

example on the 35th day of school the money was a quarter and a dime, and the students

draw this on their white boards. Ralph participates in all of these math skills that take place

in the morning meeting and can do all of the activities without assistance.

From Ralph’s assessment done by my mentor teacher it revealed many of his math

skills (9/10). Ralph can write his numbers 1-20, when a teacher says them in random order

without looking at anything. When Ralph wrote the number 15 he reversed the 5. Ralph can

also identify numbers 1-20 in a random order except for the number 20. In Raphael’s initial

assessment he could count 1-100 (7/25). On Ralph’s second assessment he counted to 29

(9/10). Ralph can also identify the shapes of circle, triangle, and square.

Ralph has grown in his math skills from his formal assessment. In his most recent

assessment on 10/31 Ralph could write all of his numbers 1-20 correctly without any

reversals, Identify all of his numbers 1-20 correctly, and rote count to 100. On this

assessment Ralph was not tested on his ability to Identify shapes but I have documented

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improvements in Ralph’s shape identification through other assessments. On 11/18 Ralph

did a shape sort where he had to separate a circle, triangle, square, rectangle, rhombus, and

trapezoid, into their different shapes but the shapes were different sizes and orientations.

Ralph quickly sorted his pile of shapes and was able to identify all of the shapes he was

sorting as he did it. After Ralph finished I asked him to go find a 3D shape and he brought

back a glue stick and said it was a cylinder. Then Ralph also found a sphere, and cube in the

classroom. Ralph explained he knew the difference between 2D and 3D shapes because, “2D

shapes are flat and 3D shapes are not.” This shows a large improvement in Ralphs ability to

recognize shapes because in Ralphs assessments n 9/ 10 he did not recognize any 3D

shapes and now he could recognize them and find physical representations of 3D shapes in

the classroom.

Also through a problem solving interview that had word problems with addition and

subtraction Ralph showed his ability to solve addition and subtraction problems that used

numbers lower than 10 in his head, but did not use any other strategies.

Ralph has many basic math skill strengths of writing and identify numbers, rote

counting, and shape recognition. I think that an area of growth for Ralph could be to

continue to work on his addition and subtraction and to learn more strategies besides

mental math to help him solve problems like using mannipulaives, counting on, and more.

Social studies skills

I have documented Ralph saying the pledge of allegiance on many occasions (9/5,

9/9, 9/12, 10/14, 10/31, 11/18/ 12/2). Ralph also participates in songs that the class

learns that are social studies related such as Yankee Doodle Dandy; You’re a Grand Old Flag,

and Fifty Nifty United States (9/5, 11/21). On 9/26 the student’s went to Cold Stone

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Creamery and one of the focuses of the field trip was the business aspect of Cold Stone and

the owner talked to the students about many things she has to do to keep her business

successful. I documented in my notes Ralph answering a question about how a business

needs customers to make money.

On 10/ 25 the Students went on a field trip to the bank and the bank gave us a tour,

showed us the new $100 bill, talked about saving money, and how even the students could

start their own checking account. They also talked about how people come to the bank

when they need money to buy a house or something big but then they have to pay the bank

back. I observed Ralph listen to the people talking at the bank and he made the connection

that while he does not save his money in a bank he saves it in a special drawer at home.

Also in the hallway there is a display of a map that says, “Where in the U.S is Bear?”

This map has been there since 9/16 because one of the students father is a semi truck

driver and takes the class bear in his semi truck with him and takes pictures of the bear in

different places around the US. Every time my teacher gets a new picture with bear she adds

the picture and a pushpin of where the picture is from to the map. Every couple of weeks

she goes over all of the places that bear has been with the students and it is always on

display in the hall (9/16, 10/18, 11/4). I have observed and documented Ralph participate

in all of these lessons and be able to point out different places in the United States.

Ralph has grown a lot in his social studies understanding from what I had

documented at the beginning of the year in his understanding of jobs in the community,

local businesses, and more. One area of social studies I did not have a lot of documentation

on for Ralph was world history and I think that is an area of future growth for him.

Science skills

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On 9/9 during the students unit on liquids, Ralph was called with half of the class to

get a mystery liquid, and they all had to sort themselves into categories. Ralph joined a

category of about four other students, and they categorized themselves by liquids that move

fast. The rest of the group that was not part of the liquids that move fast group was either in

a group by color, or by the fact that their liquids move slow. I documented that Ralph was

able to accomplish this task and get into a group without assistance. After the students were

done with the activity they were asked to share with a partner ways that they sorted the

liquids, and Ralph was able to list all of the different ways the liquids were sorted.

On 9/6 the student’s went to Cold Stone Creamery and continued to learn about how

matter can change state. The students observed how ice cream started as a liquid and got to

see it put in the ice cream maker and come out as a solid. I observe Ralph touched the bag of

ice cream mix and say it was a liquid and then say the ice cream was a solid when it came

out of the machine.

On 10/28 I observed Ralph participate in a whole class activity where my teacher

had the students make predictions about what would happen as she mixed certain

ingredients together. My teacher first mixed sugar and water and the students had to

predict what they thought would happen. Then my teacher mixed in lemon juice from fresh

lemons and the students had to predict again and finally she mixed in red food coloring and

the students had to predict what would happen. Finally the students got to taste the

creation but before they tasted it they had to predict what it would taste like. I observed

Ralph making prediction throughout the activity. Ralph predicted that all of the ingredients

would mix in together. He also said that he though that the mixture would taste sour before

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he drank it and was surprised when it tasted sweater than he thought. This activity reveled

Ralph’s ability to make scientific predictions.

Ralph has also shown growth in his scientific abilities by growing in his investigative

and prediction skills. I think that as Ralph continues to do more science activities he will get

more practice doing these things he will be able to build on the foundation of skills he has

already started to establish.

Presentation Reflection

Throughout the home visits Holly and I learned that Ralph was very interested in

building things especially with Leggos. On our last home (11/4) visit Ralph showed us two

transformers he had built out of leggos. Ralph’s mom also told us that robots and Leggos

were a strong interest of Ralph’s. Holly and I considered this interested when we were

deciding how to display our student’s work for their final presentation. Holly’s student Rain

said that he wanted to learn how to build a robot and when we talked to Ralph about how

he wanted his progress displayed and he said he would also like to build something. We

thought this was a great way to take both of the students interests and incorporate it into

how we displayed their work. On 12/2 Holly and I went to the school with paint and

cardboard and let the students design their own robot and paint it however they wanted.

We then cut out a slot for our computers to display our power points, but the students got

to create the robot that they wanted and their work was displayed form a robot rather than

just on a computer.