Focal Point: When students, especially high school students, are faced with a

problem/challenge, they tend to just give up when they hit a ”roadblock”. However,

motivation and guiding them through the thinking process drives them to continue

working on the challenge, and helps them even solve it in a way they wouldn’t

imagine solving it.

Observations:

Today at AVID was back to normal. The students were back to doing their

regular tutorials. With the first sophomore class, with only 2 tutors out of the

regular 6, it was very hard grading the tutorial request forms. But myself and my

partner Brian got it done. I was in charge of leading a geometry group consisting of 5

sophomores. Each of them had a specific question that had to be …show more content…
Even though sometimes they may not show it, they at least

know that someone is there for them to guide them along the way. In Danielle’s case,

by telling her she could do it, she is overthinking it, and also giving advice on what to

do when she feels like this, I at least got her to a point where she may feel confident

about her work, especially in mathematics. While working through the problem

alone with her, and seeing her make progress, remarks such as “good job”, “high

five”, “you got this”, may at first seem cliché, but I could see how good she was

feeling having understood the concept. According to the article “The Key To

Classroom Management”, Danielle definitely fit the category of a passive student

(one who is scared to fail , gives up easily, easily frustrated, etc) (Marzano, 2003).

But by asserting some positive self-talk, as well as words of encouragement, I was

able to provide an environment for her where she felt safe and comfortable to tackle

any obstacle put forward at her (Marzano, 2003).

Although I did see the same attitude with the senior class, there was a very

big difference. The seniors gave up not because they tried and failed, but