Ben - TP #10

Jason and I just met at the library for our second tutoring session and it was a fantastic one! He hadn't brought back any of the books that we had checked out last time but I was ready for that so I brought along my awesomely handy Greek Mythology reading lesson. Right from the start Jason was extremely interested in the subject. I started out with a schema-building exercise where I asked Jason what he knew about Hercules and Greek Mythology in general. He had seen the Disney movie so he had some schema going in to the lesson. But the movie actually is quite selective in its understanding of the myth, therefore the lesson was a great learning experience for Jason. I gave him some background information about the Greek pantheon, about Zeus and the rest of the gods, and then we started to read the stories of Hercules' first four labors. I had Jason read each one aloud and after every paragraph I would stop him and ask him to give me general information and an overview about what the paragraph said and how it connected to the other paragraphs we already read. This was a great exercise for Jason to help him communicate the ideas and concepts within the reading. He was also quick to point out words that he did not know, and I was more than happy to explain definitions and provide context based on my own knowledge of Greek Mythology. Jason had a lot of questions about the text: how it related to the movie, what the meaning of the stories were, what specific creatures and characters in the stories were doing there. This was a challenging but rewarding lesson for both of us.
So we went through all four of the first labors and when we were done I asked Jason to tell me what he thinks the story of Hercules is about. He did a very good job of expressing the main idea behind each task, and he was able to recount the origin of the story and the cause behind the action. I really thought this was fantastic because it meant not only did Jason understand the words and their meaning, but it also meant that he could analyze plot devices and the function of the action. It showed a good understanding of the text, and it was nice to be able to lead him in the right direction and provide support if he ever got lost. By the end of it Jason was asking for the rest of the stories of the Labors. However, we ran out of time but I promised him I would bring them with me for next time. I also asked him to do a small homework assignment which was to identify any remaining vocabulary words he did not understand and I plan to go over them for our next session.