I can most easily think of a time when I learned something in my ZPD in the context of sports, and specifically thinking about Frisbee coaches I have had in the past. I can recall learning, for example, about different cut shapes (ways to get open) and when they are useful, which the coach instructed me on by explaining first what the cut is (relying on my ability to think abstractly about a situation where I would use the cut, and to envision what it would look like to make the cut in that situation) and then demonstrated to me what the cut itself would actually look like. Because I had all the necessary game knowledge to understand what kind of situation would call for the cut, learning about how to make the cut itself was something firmly in my ZPD. I was able to think about when I would use the cut, to learn from his demonstration and modeling, and physically able to mimic his actions from the demonstration.

This week in the classroom, I observed Mr. DuBe use a heuristic in conjunction with scaffolding to help the students in his 10th grade class write argumentative paragraphs. Mr. DuBe acts as the MKO for the students, going through example on the board of how students should cite quotations they use in their paragraphs, providing support and scaffolding for the students in the hopes that, through practicing citing quotations they use with the help of the example on the board, they will eventually be able to do so without Mr. DuBe’s help and without an example readily available. Mr. DuBe also provides the heuristic RACE, an acronym he uses to help students remember the four steps to constructing an effective paragraph. Mr. DuBe is able to help students as they write, offering suggestions for edits they can make to their paragraph before they turn it in at the end of class. By offering some basic examples and going through things on the board, Mr. DuBe acts as an MKO for the entire class and provides instruction and support as they try to complete tasks at a level of independence that in their ZPD.

As an MKO in the classroom, I have helped students by going through paragraphs with them slowly and asking them questions to help them think about what salient things they can extract from the short stories they are writing about. Mr. DuBe generally assigns me to work with a single student at once who is behind on work, and I spend time going over short stories with them to try and understand the basic concepts at play so we can write a paragraph about them. The students ask me questions and get much more personal attention from an MKO than they would get if I were not there, so I am able to provide much more support (scaffolding) than if they were in the 25 person class with only Mr. DuBe to instruct all of them. Both of the students I am working with have a very hard time arriving at basic understandings of the readings, so being able to support them as they try and understand the short stories seems to be immensely helpful for them.

This week in the classroom was simultaneously sobering and rewarding, as the students I was working with on Wednesday struggled through the work we were doing and seemed to get very little out of help that I attempted to offer them. We were working on writing a paragraph about a short story we had read (the class was supposed to have finished reading the story last week, and I helped the same students last week to read the story and annotate as they read), and the paragraph was supposed to be a basic, formulaic argumentative paragraph. The students I was working with had already started writing their paragraphs, but as I read what the students had already written, I realized there was lots of progress to be made and lots of different things I could help them with. Both paragraphs lacked clear topic sentences, didn’t really argue anything, and focused mainly on basic plot information that a capable reader could have gleaned from a quick read through of the story. That was part of what was disheartening; the students simply are not very capable readers, despite being in the 10th grade. They struggled to grasp anything beyond basic plot, much less to write something argumentative about it.

I worked with the students to try and understand what was going on in the short story on a level slightly deeper than basic plot, but we quickly got to a point where both students felt lost and told me something along the lines of “I’m not sure what I don’t get; I’m stuck.” We did make some progress, but it often felt that any progress we made was because I told them what to write or what it was they “should” be thinking about, which didn’t feel right. I was trying to provide support, scaffolding, and to help the students think for themselves, but I had to balance that with the fact that it seemed zero progress was made when I tried letting the students be more independent about their work. I may talk to Mr. DuBe about this balance this coming week, as I am worried that I at times put words in students mouths or things like that. I don’t know what to do when students simply have nothing to say to my guiding questions.

It seems to me that these issues of basic reading comprehension and beginning to understand the more complex aspects of reading have to do with a lack of early education and practice reading. I went to a PK-12 private school in DC, and I would say I received what I am now realizing was an absolutely phenomenal education. I fully understand that I’m bringing a great privilege to my understanding of reading and my educational experience, and as I try to think back to when I was learning to read, understand my reading, and write paragraphs, I cannot recall struggling with what it was we were reading at a given time, which I imagine serves as evidence that I was simply always at my requisite reading level. Mr. DuBe, and other teachers, refer to how students are at a lower grade reading level than whatever grade they are actually in; my question is how does this happen and how can it be prevented? Maybe in 7th grade, my students would do excellently in English class. So what leads to that falling through and then them struggling in the 10th grade because their ZPD is back in 7th grade? I don’t have any kind of an answer to this question, but I am very curious if anyone else has any thoughts.

• This topic was modified 4 years, 6 months ago by Chris O'Mara.