STUDENT B

Fall 2017
About Me

Name: Student B Ryan Fischer

Birthday: 6/11/13
Preschool Lab: Dan’s 4&5 Afternoon Lab
Teacher: Lexi Olinger
Family Life: lives with mother (Samantha Raymer) and
father (Ryan Fischer)
Interests: trucks, motorcycles, and building
The Purpose of Portfolios
“Portfolios are an authentic form of assessment,
primarily because portfolios provide actual artifacts
that children produce as they work, which can include
drawings, diagrams, photographs, and even
videotapes that when studied chronologically and in
all their qualitative detail, present a unique path of
progress for each child.”

Forman, G. and Fyfe, B. (1998). Negotiated learning through design, documentation, and
discourse. In The Hundred Languages of Children, C. Edwards, L. Gandini, and G. Forman
(Eds.).
Inquiry-Based Philosophy
• The Fishback Center for Early Childhood Education’s philosophy is
grounded in social constructivism and inquiry-based learning. Children are
capable, competent, and able to build their knowledge through exploration
and social interaction. Relationships with caring and responsive teachers
are not only children’s rights, but are crucial to their growth, learning and
development. These relationships help children to nurture, sustain, develop
questions, and hypothesize so that they may make meaning of their world.
• The Fishback Center for Early Childhood Education sees parents as the
children’s first teachers. Teachers and college students are seen as their
second teachers and the environment of learning as their third teacher.
Special consideration is given to the materials that are chosen for the
children’s opportunities for learning and how teachers construct the spaces
where children will play, learn and interact with their peers and adults in the
center.
Family Goals
• Social-Emotional Development:
• Social: Student B’s parents believe that he is very social and has the skills to make
friends. They have not listed any goals for Student B at this time.
• Emotional: Student B’s parents want him to work on his patience. They listed
that he shows agitation and resistance to being told “no”.
• Cognitive Development:
• Mathematics: Student B’s parents want to improve Student B’s counting skills.
He has basic counting skills but they want to build on that and improve the
existing skills.
• Communication and language: Student B’s parents said that he has a good
vocabulary, but want to improve the accuracy of that vocabulary.
• Reading and Literacy: Student B’s parents want to improve the accuracy of
Student B’s letter knowledge.
• Science and Inquiry: Student B’s parents want us to foster his curiosities about
how things work.
• Physical Development:
• Fine Motor: Student B’s parents want to improve his pencil grip.
• Gross Motor: Student B’s parents want to increase his coordination and balance.
Teacher Goals
• Social-Emotional Development:
• Social: Socially, I want Student B to improve his sharing skills. I believe that this
will also make it possible for him to start making friends as well.
• Emotional: I want Student B to use his own words to sort out arguments and
disagreements he may have with his classmates.
• Cognitive Development:
• Mathematics: I want Student B to increase his counting skills beyond the
number 10.
• Communication and language: I want Student B to work on his communication
skills with his friends. He does not have a hard time talking to adults, but tends
to struggle communicating with his peers.
• Reading and Literacy: I want Student B to recognize the letters in his name,
• Science and Inquiry: I want Student B to work on asking and understanding
why and how things work and happen.
• Physical Development:
• Fine Motor: I want to build a foundation and continue to work on Student B’s
grip. I also want Student B to start to chose a dominant hand.
• Gross Motor: I want Student B to improve on his balance and his coordination.
Social Emotional Development
Social emotional development refers to a child’s development in social
situations, interacting with peers and adults, group play and interacting
with the environment; and emotional development, understanding one’s
own emotions as well as the emotions of others.
Social Emotional Development
• Where was the child developmentally at the beginning of the
semester?
• Social Development: Student B always wants to engage in play with me.
He is very good at politely asking if I would like to come play with him.
Student B is less socially mature than his classmates. He has difficulties
inserting himself into play with classmates, and he does not call his peers
by their names and occasionally struggles with sharing. He shows interest
in playing with friends and is showing significant improvement in the first
few weeks.
• Emotional Development: Student B is developing properly from an
emotional standpoint. When he and a friend are fighting over a toy, he
can become angry, which is typical at this age. He frequently uses words
and tries to mediate the situation. If this does not work, he asks for a
teacher’s help.
• In what ways could teachers support development?
• Helping Student B join conversations, learn to share, and encourage him
to make friends would all help Student B’s social development in the
classroom.
Social Development
9/13/17
Student B and Noah were playing
with the toy barn and animals and
began to fight over who could shut
the doors to the barn. They started
to physically fight over the barn and
I intervened. We worked out an
agreement where Student B could
shut one door and Noah could shut
the other.
Social Development
10/10/17
On this day, Student B was very attached
to me. For the first 40 minutes of free play
he continually asked me “Teacher Lexi,
will you play with me?”
I asked him many times if he would like to
find a friend to play with and I gave him
choices of peers throughout the room to
play with. Each time he said no, and
asked me again to play with him. When I
told Student B that he should play in the
dramatic play area, he went but only with
the promise that I would follow him there
shortly. When I arrived in the dramatic
play area a few minutes later, I found
Student B engaged in play with two other
friends and I decided not to interrupt their
play.
 Social Development
10/11/17

On this day, Student B was, again, very insistent on

playing with me. I had been with Student B at the
sensory table, and moved away from him to sit in the
block area with Wyatt. Student B noticed I was gone
and followed me to the block area. He asked if he could
play with me, and Wyatt answered, “You can play with
me, Student B.” Student B sat down and began to build
structures with Wyatt. As they played cooperatively, I
eased myself away from the environment and continued
to watch Student B and Wyatt play together for another
8 minutes.

SD Early Learning Guidelines

Goal SED-3: Children form relationships and interact positively with other
children in play and everyday tasks.
• Demonstrate social skills when interacting with other children (turntaking,
conflict-resolution, sharing).
Social Emotional Development
How have we seen growth and have the goals been
met?
• Social Development: Student B has expanded greatly in his social skills.
He has made friends and formed bonds through play with his classmates.
He uses their names and joins them in play or invites them to play with
him.

What are the possible next steps? Future goals?

• The next step for Student B will be continuing to learn the important
aspects of a good friend, and remembering that he must continue to be a
good friend.
Social Emotional Development
How have we seen growth and have the goals been
met?
• Emotional Development: Student B has improved on his emotional skills.
Throughout the semester, after being prompted by teachers, Student B
has used words to explain to his friends how he feels or to solve an
argument. If he and the friend cannot solve the problem themselves, he
will reach out to a teacher and explain the situation.

What are the possible next steps? Future goals?

• Giving Student B more words to explain his feelings and continuing to
encourage independence in sorting out disagreements with his friends
will help Student B to improve his emotional growth.
Cognitive Development
Cognitive development refers to a child’s development in processing
information. This includes communication, both oral and written, gaining
meaning from print, problem solving, decision-making and hypothesizing
as well as continuously learning about and investigating the many
environments a child encounters.
Cognitive Development
• Where was the child developmentally at the beginning of the
semester?
• Mathematics: Student B can count to 29, but then reverts back to 20. He does not yet
understand addition, but seems to understand one-to-one correspondence.
• Communication and language: Student B has an extensive vocabulary. Student B struggles
with the “th” diagraph and it comes out as an “f” sound. He also tends to yell, even when in
close proximity to others. He enjoys communicating and conversing with others.
• Reading and Literacy: Student B can say the alphabet correctly, but does not correctly
identify the letters when written. He names each letter “C” “S” or “X”. Student B doesn’t
recognize the letters in his name and when asked to spell it, he responds with “C”
• Science and Inquiry: Student B is usually drawn to the science table. He likes to experiment
and ask “why?” Then he usually takes the time to figure out why, if he is intrigued.

• In what ways could teachers support development?

• Student B is on good track with counting and mathematics. I feel that age will help with his
speech issues. I think it will be important as his teacher to remind him of his indoor voice as
well as helping him begin to identify the letters in his name. Doing individualized activities
as well as letting him learn naturally will help Student B in these areas.
Cognitive Development

How have we seen growth and have the goals been

met?
• Mathematics: Student B has increased his mathematical skills by building
a deeper understanding of the numbers he is counting. He has a
understands that as he counts objects, each one adds to the next to
represent the new number he is saying.

What are the possible next steps? Future goals?

• Continuing to build on Student B’s existing knowledge will prepare him to
begin simple addition problems.
Cognitive Development

How have we seen growth and have the goals been

met?
• Communication and language: Student B has grown in his
communication skills especially when talking to his peers. He is able to
initiate and engage in conversations with his friends, and uses their
names when speaking to them.

What are the possible next steps? Future goals?

• Encouraging Student B to resolve conflicts with his friends before telling a
teacher will help Student B’s communication skills and he progresses
through preschool.
Early Reading & Literacy
9-26-17
I displayed flashcards of the letters
of the alphabet (upper and lower
case) one at a time, and asked
Student B to identify them. He
named each of them “C”, “S”, or
“X”. I then used the cards to spell
out his name and told him what I
had done. I asked him to name the
letters in his name and he called
them all “C.”
An image of Student B building with bristle
blocks on the day this observation was
recorded.
Early Reading & Literacy

10-10-17
I put the letters of
Student B’s name on
cubes to help him begin
to recognize the letters.
Today I asked Student B
what letter his name
started with. Initially he
responded with the
sound “cuh” then he
paused, thought about
it, and yelled “B!” I
asked him to find the “B”
block and he pointed to
the correct block on the
second try.
 Early Reading & Literacy
10-23-17
Student B was tracing letters at the
writing table when Miss Cassie
asked him which was the first letter
in his name. He searched through
the pile of letters to find the B and
he held it up and shouted “B!” when
he found it.

10-24-17
The next day, Student B wanted to
find all the letters in his name and
with the help of Miss Lexi, he was
able to find them all and put them in
the order of his name.

SD Early Learning Guidelines

Goal CLL-8: Through their explorations, play, and social interactions children develop
knowledge of letters and the alphabetic
principle.
• Recognize and name some letters of the alphabet, especially those in their own
name
Cognitive Development
How have we seen growth and have the goals been
met?
• Reading and Literacy: Student B has mastered the letter “B!” He knows
that his name starts with a “B” and is making steady progress identifying
other letters in his name. He still is not consistent with “y” or “n,” but he
can almost always identify “r,” “a” and “e.”

What are the possible next steps? Future goals?

• Continued practice with the letters in his name will help Student B be able
to identify all of the letters in his name.
Cognitive Development

How have we seen growth and have the goals been

met?
• Science and Inquiry: Student B is still just as curious as the day he started
preschool. He always wants to know why and how! He continues to ask
why things happen and what causes them in our science experiments.

What are the possible next steps? Future goals?

• Having Student B start to make guesses that answer his questions and
then finding a way to test them will help Student B start to ask questions
and discover their answers for himself.
Physical Development
Physical development refers to both large and small motor development of
the child. Small motor development includes small movements of the
hands, fingers, wrists, feet, toes, lips and tongue. Large motor
development includes large muscle groups used in physical activity such as
walking, running, jumping and balancing.
Physical Development
• Where was the child developmentally at the beginning of the
semester?
• Fine Motor: Student B wants to write. He enjoys the activity. However, Student B
has not yet selected a dominant hand, and switches back and forth between the
left and right during activities. He is also switching between a modified tripod grip
and a tripod grasp which is developmentally appropriate.
• Gross Motor: Student B seems fairly coordinated and can run, jump, and ride the
strider bikes outside. His balance seems to be good as he can keep the strider bike
stable as he rides.

• What ways could teachers support development?

• Helping Student B chose a dominant hand will be important. Encouraging him to
use the hand that is comfortable and most effective for him will help his decision.
Giving him many opportunities to use fine motor skills will help him find the hand
he is most comfortable with as well as finding which hand is more effective.
Physical Development
How have we seen growth and have the goals been
met?
• Fine Motor: Student B has developed a stronger and more proper grip. He
is still occasionally moving back and forth between his right and left hand,
but he still has time to decide which hand he is most comfortable with.

What are the possible next steps? Future goals?

• Allowing Student B as many opportunities as possible to practice his fine
motor skills will help him.
Physical Development
How have we seen growth and have the goals been
met?
• Gross Motor: Student B continues to engage in high-energy play inside
and outside. Outside, he rides scooters, trikes, and strider bikes which
shows his balance and coordination.

What are the possible next steps? Future goals?

• Offering Student B more challenging tasks like walking a balance beam or
learning to do jumping jacks will increase his gross motor skills.
Goodbye

Dear Student B,

You have been such a fun addition

to our classroom. You are always happy
and excited to play! I love your
enthusiasm and readiness to learn. Keep
working hard in preschool!

Sincerely,
Teacher Lexi