Angie Miner

School.  It runs from 8am to 1pm during the weekdays.  In between breaks children receive about 4 to 4½ hours of classes everyday, as long as there is not a holiday, teacher strike, or other meeting or event to cut the day short or cancel it altogether.  The high school graduation rate is low.  Students drop out all the time for reasons of work, economic hardships, or simply because they decide they do not like school and their parents don’t encourage them much to continue.  Toward the end of the year there usually forms a tutoring group of a couple of volunteers who want to help children who are struggling in school so they can pass the grade.  These volunteers generally are composed of a few older students and perhaps a concerned mother or two.  I decided to tag along to a couple of tutoring sessions to help out some of the kids. 

Within the schools memorization is the most common learning tool.  Students are asked to memorize facts and numbers so they can repeat them on the tests.  Ensuring the understanding of the reasoning behind the concepts is sometimes neglected.  At the tutoring session the children each had workbooks.  The object of the session was to help them each fill out their workbooks.  I watched the tutors for a little bit helping out the younger students.  For a question that asked a student to come up with sentences describing a passage they had read the tutor would say or write out the sentences on a separate sheet of paper and have the students copy it into their workbook. For a mathematics problem they would refer to the multiplication or addition charts and show the students how to look for the correct numbers on the chart to find the correct answer.

I was not particularly fond of these approaches and decided to move in and help a young child who seemed to be having difficulties.  I explained his first assignment.  He needed to copy a word that was written at the top of the page five times on the lines below.  He took his time and copied each of the letters down and did a good job.  Next I asked him to read the word he wrote.  He stared down at his hands and refused to speak.  Perhaps he was shy.  The next page was math- multiplication.  Not wanting to rely on the charts I attempted to encourage him to figure out the answer to a simple multiplication problem.  3×4= what? Say there are 4 people and each person has 3 apples.  How many apples are there in all?  Blank stare.  Let’s count.  The first person has 3 apples, so that’s 3.  The second person also has 3 apples.  What is 3+3?  He gives me an annoyed look.  Finger counting.  7? No, let’s try again.  I count with him.  6.  I guide him through every step of the problem.  The answer is 12.  Write the number 12 here.  Nothing.  Twelve, it’s a 1 and a 2 together.  Like this. 1…2….12.  Okay next one.  He is getting annoyed, I feel like he is not really ready for multiplication as he is still struggling with addition.  But we have to move on.  I decide to use the multiplication chart.  I do not like this method, but time is not our friend.  I show him how to match the numbers to the chart to find the one that is missing.  I must show him for every number. 

The next page is sentences.  He must come up with four sentences and write them down.  I ask him what he would like to write and he just looks at me expectantly.  I ask him what his favorite food is and he tells me it is fruit.  Write something about that.  What should I write?  He is frustrated that I don’t just tell him.  I give in for the first one, an example I tell myself.  How about “Fruit is my favorite food.”  He nods. 

Okay write that down on the first line.    He is frustrated and wants me to write it out so he can copy it.

You can do this, just start with the first word, write “Fruit”.

The pencil is poised, the stare is blank.

Do you know what letter ‘fruit’ starts with? It starts with the letter “F”.

Nothing.

Do you remember what the letter F looks like?  Like this.  I point to an F in a word on the page. 

He write the letter F.

Okay now the second letter is ‘r’. 

Nothing.

I then realize why he is so frustrated with me.  He doesn’t know the letters or numbers.  They are merely symbols on a page that he is asked to copy.  How can he be expected to write a sentence if he doesn’t know what the symbols mean on a page.  Just get him to fill out the workbook they tell me.  That’s all he needs to do.  Is that really so much to ask?