Teacher! Teacher! Help Me!

Description of Learner:
Cam is a 53-year-old woman from Cambodia. She came to this country in 1975 at the age of 24. She completed fifth grade in her country, and upon entering the adult literacy program, she scored a 3.3 reading grade level on the TABE (Tests of Adult Basic Education: CTB/McGraw-Hill). After her husband died she realized she needed to go back to school and get a job. Until this point he had told her, "Your job is to take care of the kids. This is all you have to worry about."

Challenge faced:
Cam wants to learn the meaning of words as she reads. When reading alone or with others, she often stops and asks, "What does that mean?" This happens even when the paragraph is relatively short. At times I answer her question, and she immediately writes the definition in her own language near the word. As a result, she loses her place, has not comprehended the passage, fails to feel the flow of the writer's style, and frustrates herself and the class. Sometimes I ask her to wait and listen to the passage or sentence and see if she can understand the gist of what is being said. This strategy is ineffective for her because, she often says, "I don't understand" or "I don't get it" or giggles and says something that sounds silly to the group. These behaviors seem to reveal a high level of embarrassment and lack of confidence about her skills, yet she is determined to develop the desired skills and is willing to risk the group's disapproval to reach her goal.

What We Did:
Cam and the class participate in pre-reading activities that include: determining the meaning of the title, interpreting the illustrations and their captions, and relating information gained through these investigations to student histories to see what experiences might help prepare them for understanding the passage. Class members act as teachers, and through this process, Cam is often surprised that she knows more than she thought she knew. Next, we skim the passage for bold typed words, italics, or numbers to gain a sense of the key vocabulary terms and phrases and the organizational style the author uses. These steps take time, but they give the learner a plan to follow. Although Cam sits next to me and I encourage her to persevere, she tends to become impatient and forges ahead with her reading without attending to these preliminaries. Thus, she often misses interpretations made by the group during discussion. She then interrupts the group's reading process by asking the meanings of words the group already discussed. I feel unprofessional, but sometimes I get frustrated because she is interrupting again. If she had progressed with the group, she would have the answers to her questions.

Analysis:
Pre-reading and modeling are important strategies to use for skill development, and the process described above works well for preparing students to comprehend "News for You" articles. It is also effective with narrative text. Peer interaction is an added component designed to keep students like Cam on track while giving them practice with the process until it becomes automatic. However, Cam has yet to commit to this process. It can take time and moving at a pace to ensure understanding seems to frustrate her. Reinforcement (verbal and visual) tends to marginally increase her willingness to proceed with the group. My task is to continue identifying ways to keep her interest, focus, and enthusiasm high so she can make reasonable progress.

What I Learned:
The role of the learner is to develop the comprehension skills of main idea and to find the important details to support the main idea and to understand the words through context. This is an ongoing problem. Although I have seen some improvement I still feel frustrated.

Cam, Group Discussion:

Do you feel that translating words into her native language impedes Cam's ability to comprehend the passage in English?
Although Cam has been in this country for approximately 24 years, she continues to think in her native language, and I believe it interrupt her train of thought in English. As she is reading, she translates into a familiar language, processes the meaning and then translates back to English. If she were to develop a deeper understanding of vocabulary terms prior to reading, I think she could reduce and eventually eliminate the time needed for the translation process.

Is this dual translation process something you want to encourage?
No, not for her, but it may be necessary until she gains the English vocabulary used in the reading passages.

How do you handle the constant interruptions by this student?
It is a distraction for others and I feel frustrated at times, but I'm confident she is eager to learn and not intent on disrupting the group. I have taken her aside and suggested that when I use a certain hand signal, she should wait and talk with me later. She seems so intent on her own understanding that she fails to observe others' reactions to her interruptions.

How do you get the student to detach from individual words and focus more on the context?
I'm now asking her to make a list of the words she does not know as we preview a reading selection. By doing so, we can work on their meanings before the group works together. Also, I ask her to take three guesses as to what the word means, and she is gaining confidence, because she knows the meaning of more English words than she previously gave herself credit for knowing. Rereading then helps her cement the meaning into memory. Also, when I can, I tape record the passages for her to listen to while following along in the text before the group read. I ask her to stop the tape when she comes to a word she wants to learn and enter it on a list for her investigation prior to the group read. Later, after the group has read, she can listen again and read along with the tape.

How do other students react to her?
When she interrupts so frequently, some roll their eyes, make comments to themselves or sigh. Others try to be patient. These newly implemented tape recording strategies are helping her gain favor with the group. Also, I'm looking for a volunteer tutor to assist Cam with word study, rereading, and tape recording the passages. If another student agrees to make the tape recordings, it could help that student gain confidence while helping Cam. Further, I will begin to develop a library of recordings to use with other students.

Summary:

Director's Comments:

Your objective for Cam is for her to develop necessary comprehension skills to identify the main idea and find important details that support the main idea, but her goal is to develop a stronger vocabulary. This is a disconnect that must be analyzed and addressed. To reach your goal, Cam must grasp the meaning of individual words in context. The eventual goal is to know their meaning without context. It seems that you are emphasizing a higher level skill prior to Cam's readiness or personal need for that skill. Thus, your frustration continues as does hers.

The main lesson Cam may be teaching you is that you cannot impose a higher-level objective on someone who requires lower level skill development or on someone whose goals differ from your own. Your challenges are to develop additional ways to teach her vocabulary prior to reading, to teach her to visualize (make mental images) as she reads, and to teach her to paraphrase as she reads. I encourage you to view Cam as an individual learner with needs that differ from the group. This approach will allow her to prepare her for the group experiences more thoroughly and consequently she will find it unnecessary to interrupt the group to get her needs for vocabulary development met. Thus, your level of frustration is bound to reduce. You may wish to use individual flash cards with her new words on one side and the same word in her native language on the other. Having her draw a picture of the word's meaning on the back could be of value, as well.

Engaging her reflective learning system in ways that help her think about her behaviors within the group and how to read the nonverbal language of her classmates could go a long way in helping Cam develop necessary skills for the work place.