Self-selected Blog #1: A Success Story

Friday was the last day of summer school. I was very happy that things were kind of slowing down and that we'd be getting some kind of break soon. Over the course of summer school, I had only 2 students. The learning curve and learning differences between the two students was vast. There was particularly one student whose success I was concerned about. His name was Z. Z wasn't a bad student, he just did poorly on the majority of formally assessed assignments. In class, he would join the conversation, if you forced him. He would also answer questions. You may have to wait 2-3 mins after you asked the question, but if you forced him to do it, then he would. I knew he was struggling in all periods. Sometimes I felt bad about it, then other times, like when he didn't do his homework, I wouldn't stress about him. After Kate, my 2nd year, computed the averages before the final exam, I had a really bad feeling about Z. His average was on the line. Basically, if he passed the test, he would pass the class, but if he failed the test, then he failed the class. We reviewed heavily with each student. We really wanted to see both of our students excel in our class. On the day of the final exam, during the review, I felt a nervous about Z's performance again. He was answering review questions wrong and still didn't seem like he had retained any information at all. Once the test began I saw my other student on page 3, while Z was still on page 1. I couldn't take the pressure anymore, so I left. (Ok, not really, I left because we had to pick up the pizza for our party, but the pressure could still be felt.) When I returned, I saw that the test had been graded and Z had PASSED! I was so happy. He didn't just pass within one or two points, he had really passed with a 77 %. I was too ecstatic, because Z's test grades were usually on the lower end (50-70%), and his pretest was in the 30 percentile. End the end, Z passed the final and the class, AND the pizza was good!