Final Project w/ Sound

1. Tutoring a Special Little Girl Emily Scott Barneman escott6@knights.ucf.edu 4/19/2010 EEX 4070

2. Early Perceptions • My feelings going into this service project were very mixed. I was unsure of what the parents were expecting of me, and I have never tutored someone that I don’t know before. I was nervous to say the least. I just wanted to the best that I could, and I wanted the student and parents to be happy with how I tutor. • My worst fear was that I wouldn’t rise to the expectations that Morgan’s parents had for me, and that I would fail them in helping their daughter.

3. Introduction to the Setting • I spent the whole time working with the student at her house in Palm Bay. I did do some work on my own getting her lessons that I was teaching at my own home. • The students home was a great place to tutor for the most part. There were times when things would become distracting like her dog barking at someone walking on the street, so when her Dad would come home from work. Ultimately it wasn’t the best place to be tutoring because there were some distractions but it is hard to go anywhere and find no distractions.

4. Morgan’s House

5. Personal Demographics • For now I work at Meg O’ Malley’s part time while I am in school. I am also married, I was just married in September so a little less than a year. Besides school being married, and working consume my life. I go to Palm Bay Christian Church and am very involved there, as my husband is the worship leader. As for students with any sort of disabilities I have a very strong opinion because of my sister that has a severe learning disability.

6. Engagement Activities • For the most part the student and I focused on FCAT work. I downloaded last years FCAT work books and we worked our way through those books in math and reading, because those were her most troubled areas. • Not only did we work our way through those workbooks but I would also help her with any homework that she had that was confusing. • The students schedule was very hectic as well as mine was so it worked out nicely. The parents would call me at the beginning of the week on Sunday night and we would decide on a day of he week. It was always at the same time 3:30, but the date changed weekly because of the students schedule.

7. Participant Demographics • This student (Morgan) is twelve years old going on thirteen in September and is in sixth grade, which makes her an older sixth grader. The student was not held back, but her mother didn’t want to send her to school so soon because she had a previous child with the same birthday month and he went early and struggled. • The are originally from Lambertville, Michigan, and I am told by Mrs. Wallace that the schools here in Florida are much different than the schools here in Florida. • The student has a Romanian and Scottish background. She lives with her mom and her step dad who she calls her Dad, and from what I can tell Morgan does not have much contact with her father. • Morgan’s learning disability has to do with her eyes and how they function. It’s much like dyslexia, her eyes do not work together so they are both not reading the same sentences, which makes it very confusing for her much like dyslexia. She has gone through years of therapy for her disability and is actually doing much better her mother says. However because of the learning disability she is so behind in school and now that she can achieve what she needs to, it is hard for her to catch up.

8. Reflection of your Experience • This experience was a wonderful experience to really get my feet wet in tutoring and one on one with a student. I have never worked one on one with a student tutoring. I have worked one on one assessing but never to further their education per say. This experience really gave me the confidence to know that next year when I am interning that I do know good teaching strategies when it comes to any student, disabilities or not.

9. Conclusion I think that the last and the most important thing that I learned from this experience is that teaching a student with learning disabilities does take more work, there is no doubt in that. But I think so many times people think that its not worth the work because the student will never learn. Now me I knew this because of my amazing little sister, who can do anything even with her disability. However I think that many people think that because a person has a disability they can’t do what everyone else can, and that is so far from the truth. And my little sister and this little girl Morgan are proof of that.