2. Interview Background
• Student was in reading intervention classes in elementary
and middle school.
• Student struggles with grade level reading, writing,
spelling, and speaking.
• Student is below mastery in English
• I know this student personally, through family and have a
detailed knowledge of his background information.
• Take the previous note into consideration as to the
student’s answers versus the truth
4. Question and Answer
• I presented the student with a paper that had thirteen
questions on it.
• The student had no time limit to fill out the answers. He
was told to answer questions in full sentences.
5. Question 1
• What type of reading strategies do you use to understand
complex information?
• Student’s exact answer:
read it 2 and if I can’t understand I read it 3 times.
• The student means that his reading strategies was to read
it multiple times to understand it.
6. What I learned
• Automatically I see the directions were not followed
correctly, where are the complete sentences?
• Students do not see close reading, context clues, and
annotating as reading strategies. They see reading as
reading strategies.
• Students must be immersed in the terminology. Students
must know what they are doing and what it is called.
7. Question 2
• What type of study strategies do you use?
• Student’s exact answer:
• study every 20 min ten wait 2 or 3 min
• The student means study in small segments.
8. What I learned
• Students do not have study strategies.
• Students study memorization for a test, not for learning,
understanding or comprehending.
9. Question 3
• How do you learn best?
• Student’s exact answer:
by doing it my self
• The student means that he is a hands on learner.
10. What I learned
• Most students place themselves in the hands on learning
category but in my experience they don’t all actually test
there.
• I try to, at the beginning of each year, test students for
their learning style and most usually initially think they
are hands-on when they are usually placed else where or
are border lined.
11. Question 4
• What do you like to read
• Student’s exact answer
• Drama and horror
• The student’s interest in free reading are drama and
horror, honestly I have never seen this student read a
book
12. What I learned
• When prompted, what do you like, they will come up
with an answer but in reality they don’t know what they
like to read, maybe their answer is what they like to
watch or what the genre of the last book they were forced
to read was.
• Students don’t actually always know what they like or
what their personal taste is.
13. Question 5
• Do you like reading?
• Student’s exact answer:
• kinda. When I do not have anything to do.
• This means no. There is always television to do or
something else “to-do”
14. What I learned
• Students sometimes are not wholly truthful when they
answer yes or no to “do you like to read.”
• The teacher knows the answer is no, but the student
doesn’t want to out right say they hate reading.
• The problem isn’t that they hate reading, the problem is
why and how can we fix that?
15. Question 6
• What motivates you to try in school?
• Student’s exact answer:
• Partys, learning, playing kemp
• This means that learning was thrown in there so the
student didn’t look so bad.
• So the student is motivated by partys (which he doesn’t
go to) and a silly card game…
16. What I learned
• This student, as with a lot of our struggling readers, is not
consciously motivated.
• He is actually motivated by the threat of punishment at
home if his grades fail or he is in trouble at school but
intrinsically this student is unmotivated to learn,
challenge himself, or push the limit.
17. Question 7
• What do you do when you fail?
• Student’s exact answer:
• retry
• The student means, try again.
18. What I learned
• Retry is not a bad plan but is definitely not a solid process
to ensure success and overcome failure.
• Students need strategies to overcome failing, which is a
natural part of life.
19. Question 8
• When did reading become hard?
• Student’s exact answer:
• all my life
• The student means he cannot remember a time that
reading came easy to him.
20. What I learned
• Too many students feel the way my interviewee felt. They
feel as if they have always struggled with reading and
writing and that they always will.
• Students need to know what success is and how to obtain
it and what skills they need for this journey.
21. Question 10
• What advice would you give me as a teacher to best help
students?
• Student’s exact answer:
• help them individually
22. Question 11
• What types of literacy activities do you participate in?
• Student’s exact answer:
• I participate in essays and other readings.
• What he means is, I do my work in English class.
23. Question 12
• What inspires you to pass a class
• Student’s exact answer:
• so I can work on passing the class
• That means the student is motivated to “pass”
24. Question 13
• What literacy challenges do you face? What strategies do
you use to help overcome these?
• Student’s exact answer:
• I can’t read well. Read slower pronounce words.
25. What I learned 10-13
• This student is struggling. He cannot read well and he
cannot spell well.
• He needs individual, or as close as possible to one on one,
instruction.
26. What can I do?
• What can I do to help this student and student’s like him
to succeed with literacy?
• He needs to now and understand the reading strategies
that teachers have taught him and are constantly
refreshing in his mind.
• He needs to be able to understand when he is confused
and what is confusing him.
27. Literacy skills he
possesses
• This student’s literacy skills do not go past basic reading
and writing.
• He needs guided instruction
• He can work independently if he knows exactly what is
expected.
28. Tell them what you teach
them
• Literacy skills that will be an essential part of this
adolescent’s ongoing development and identity formation.
• This student is constantly showing knowledge of close
reading, as that is required in my class.
• He is using context clues and other reading strategies.
• He is currently learning the names of these strategies,
which means he will know what he is doing
29. In conclusion
• Students in almost all of my classes are struggling with
reading. I can see them squirm as they look at the ants on
the page and try to decode them.
• Slowly, one word at a time, we are straitening them out
and figuring out what we need to do to be successful.
30. Reflection
• As I look at what I learned from this interview and from
this past week’s resources, I know that students need to
be motivated. Above all else, students need to know the
end goal and want it. If a student is not motivated, they do
not learn and they do not try. Students want to learn and
want to be considered intelligent but they also want to
conserve energy. If a student does not see the relevance of
this assignment then they will opt out every time. A
student who believes they are doing something that
matters and that it can be applied to real life will work
hard and do their best.
