Giselle Corrales

EDEE 490&492

January 7, 2024

Student teacher: Giselle Corrales

Mentor teacher: Leila Talaro

Grade Level: Kindergarten

Number of students: 20

Part 1:

In education there are many factors that come into play when it comes to students and

how they receive their education. Some school and district factors include Socioeconomic

information as well as school performance data. Going a little more in depth with these two

factors, the socioeconomic information shows educators how the status within the society can

affect certain privileges and opportunities that students can have. With socioeconomic it shows

insight into students background and shows how some students might have different

opportunities and upbringings because of where they come from and that could then affect the

student and how they learn. As for school performance data this shows how well the school

performs. This data is gathered by reports from the schools test results, attendance, safety as

well as other factors.

With these factors in mind the performance in my mentor school at the kindergarten is

not reported but, looking at the other grade levels the english language arts percentage of

meeting standards range from 55%-83%. Same percentage goes for mathematics. In my own

classroom my teacher uses multiple assessments to test how well the students do in each

subject. I want to focus on one subject and one assessment used in my mentor classroom. An

assessment that is used currently in the classroom is called IReady. IReady is an online

program that helps show what a student needs as well as tracking and monitoring students
progress throughout the school year. The IReady diagnostic is taken 3 times a year. Pre, Mid,

and post which fall under the months of August, December, and May

There are two parts to IReady: the diagnostic and the personalized instruction. The

diagnostic is an adaptive assessment, the questions will adjust depending on student

responses. If the student consistently answers the questions correctly then the questions will get

harder, if the students consistently answer the questions wrong then the questions will get

slightly easier. Going more in depth to the diagnostic, there are different domains in each

subject that the diagnostic can show. Reading domains in IReady include: phonological

awareness, phonics, high-frequency words, vocabulary, and overall comprehension. The

personalized supports students learning by creating lessons that are specific to the students

needs and helps the student go at their own pace. The lessons are created from the students'

results after taking the diagnostic.

After discussing with my mentor teacher a learning challenge that we have noticed in the

classroom is reading comprehension. We will use IReady as a tool for the students to use to

help the student better with reading comprehension. The learning goal for our classroom is to

help build reading comprehension skills so that students understand the content they are

reading by using IReady. Like I mentioned previously IReady is personalized and will create

lessons depending on the results/report of the diagnostic.

In the classroom there will be some students who have unique learning challenges which

can happen given IReady is an assessment that is taken online through a program. For

students who have these unique learning challenges it might be hard to modify depending on

what the learning challenge is, if there will be a problem in which the student can not access or

is not able to physically use a computer or online browser to access the program then it cannot

be modified. Also given that the IReady lessons are personalized online, it would be hard to

modify the content since it is created by the program itself. What can be modified for this

assessment is how you take the results and find other ways that you can teach the skill to the
students. The learning goal is to build reading comprehension skills, if the results show the

students lack of comprehension you can try other ways to help build the skill of comprehension.

One way you can help build comprehension skills that is based on an online program is that you

can read aloud and follow up by asking questions that connect and refer back to the book.

Overall this assessment tool is useful as it can create personalized lessons and if online

learning is not ideal for certain students there are always in person ways to be able to use the

assessment to help build students comprehension skills.

Part 2:

For part 2 of this assignment the process that I used to identify the people on my list is

that I asked my mentor teacher for help and advice. I asked my teacher who are some important

people I should know in the school and what they do. She then proceeded to tell me the names

of each person and what they do. Knowing what I know now will help me with my students as I

would know more people to go to other than my own mentor teacher for help. Although these

people have importance in the school culture I feel that given the grade level that I am in which

is Kindergarten the most helpful from the list would be the student services coordinator Susan

Matsunaga as she can help me if there are concerns that I have with students academically or

behaviorally. If a student gets out of hand and it is completely out of my own control I feel like I

could go to Paula, I would probably ask for advice in case a problem like this may arise. One

last person I want to take note of is Mary Jane or MJ, she is the custodian. I know she will be

crucial also given the grade level that I am in. Kids this age might have accidents and having the

help of someone like MJ can help with the clean up as well as helping put less stress on the

situation of a clean up as well.

Name Title Role/Function Why is this person

crucial to school
culture

Mila Wu Curriculum The middle man Mila is important to

coordinator between admin and school culture as they
teachers in help communicate
what needs to get
information. Such as
done in the school
knowing information without the
that should be curriculum
communicated in coordinator it would
what needs to be be difficult to address
done or get done in the needs of what
the school students may or may
not need in terms of
their learning.

Paula Matsunaga (SSC) Student Who the teachers or Paula is important to

services coordinator parents go to when school culture as she
 there are concerns helps to address
for the child concerns of a
academically or student. The teacher
and the parent can
behaviorally.
go to her if they need
help, especially if the
teacher is not able to
address the concern
on their own.

Mary Jane Tapat Custodians They help take care Mary Jane or MJ is
of the classroom and important to school
help to keep it clean. culture as she helps
take care of the
environment that the
students are learning
in. If the classroom is
not clean, something
smells, or there is
trash around the
students' learning
environment it could
affect their learning
as it can be a
distraction to the
students. This can
then cause hindrance
to student learning.

Auli’i Solomon Grade level teacher They help you Auli’i is important to
in kindergarten coordinate plans and school culture as they
also who you talk are someone I or
teachers can rely on.
with, they are like
If there is trouble
your support. within the grade-level
you can always go to
another grade level
teacher to help you
out. I feel that this
helps to lessen the
stress that can be put
onto a teacher by
being able to have
someone to confide
and rely on.

Susan Yoshimura Office also known as The person who is in Susan is important to
the SASA charge of the school culture as she
finances like the does take care of the
money for the school. finances for school,
this includes having
to pay for school
activities and maybe
even grade-level
functions. If school
funds run low it can
be a problem as you
would like the funds
to go to important
things such as the
student' learning
materials. Susan is
important to the
teacher as well as
she is the person in
charge of the
paychecks, if the
teacher is not getting
paid properly then it
could affect the
teacher which can
then affect the
students and their
learning.
 What I learned from my students is the type of things that they like. My students survey

asks the students who they live with. This is important as I can see who I can contact if certain

family members might not be listed as an emergency contact. Something that I have seen in my

mentor teacher's classroom is that sometimes, siblings that are also in the same school play

vital roles in how the student can get information just in case they miss school. With this

information it will help me with how I can connect with my students and how I can take the

things that they like and apply it to some of their own work. Most of my students really enjoy

spending time with their families. This information shows me that I can plan events in which

families can join their child and activities can be planned. The students' favorite books, tv

shows, and games can help me with how I plan certain activities. If I want to gamify a lesson I

can use some of the students' favorite games as inspiration. If I want to include students'

favorite tv shows and its characters in stories or word problems I can do so since I know the

information. Also if I know the students favorite books I can see what new books I can add to my

class library as well as the kind of books that the students will be interested in when we do the

reading hw folders. When picking the books the students will choose I can pick books similar to

their favorite books or from the same author of their favorite book. Overall the all about me

survey helps me to better understand my students and the classroom environment.