Gabriela was a quiet student in my fourth-grade class. She maintained top grades, completed all of her classwork well and scored very high on my initial reading assessment, indicating that she was a top reader in the class. However, on the surface, she appeared dour and unengaged. She never participated in class discussions and rarely raised her hand to answer questions.
My reading program consisted of assigning chapter books for the students to read in study groups. These groups were flexible, depending on the kids' interest in the books and their reading levels. When given the option, Gabriela would always choose the "hardest" of the books I offered.
After the students finished a novel, we would meet for a group conversation about it. I provided the students "discussion stems" or "sentence frames" to facilitate deeper-level comments, and I kept record of the types of comments made to help with grading. All of the kids in Gabriela's group were usually excited to discuss the book, contemplating a character's journey or the theme of the story—all except for Gabriela, who would sit completely silent.
By the end of the half hour, I would have recorded 15-20 comments from the other students in the group but zero from Gabriela. Even if I intentionally prompted her to speak, her comments were short, with little insight.
I began to question Gabriela's reading ability. Was she able to understand the books that she was reading? Were they too hard to her? Should I adjust the reading level down to allow her to talk more?
Then, after one group discussion, I had assigned a project for the students to create a fictional diary one of the characters would have kept during the events of the book. It was a creative way to have my students look at their story from a different point of view. After a week, I collected the diaries to grade.
Most of the kids did a fair job. Gabriela's diary, however, was stunning.
Her writing was complete and insightful. She ended up choosing a pet dog in the story, rather than a person, and pointing out nuances in the main character by showing how the character interacted with the dog. There were insights not shared by the group during our discussion, possibilities I hadn’t considered. I was floored.
The next day, I called Gabriela over to ask about her project. She first worried she had done something wrong. When I assured her that it was brilliant, she managed a weak smile. When I asked her why she wasn't sharing any of this in our group, she just shrugged her shoulders and returned to the book she was reading.
Gabriela taught me a powerful lesson. It was clear I had only valued one way to show reading understanding: through verbal discussion. Clearly, Gabriela wasn't comfortable with that format. Her discomfort may have been personal or as a result of her being the only Latina student in the group or even because the material I'd been selecting for reading wasn't culturally diverse. Whatever the reason, it was my responsibility to find other ways that Gabriela could shine and show her learning.
For our next novel, I chose to capitalize on her writing abilities. I gave her a journal to write down thoughts as she was reading. I told her that I still wanted her to come to our discussion but that my assessment would come primarily from her writing. She could also write during or after the group any additional thoughts she wanted to share. Gabriela shined in her writings, so much so that I referred her for gifted testing.
If you look at learning as a destination, before Gabriela, I believed there was only one route to that goal. If there was a roadblock, it was the student's fault. Gabriela taught me that there are many routes to the destination. It's my job as a teacher to uncover those paths and allow students to access them. The Gabrielas of the world deserve nothing less.
Hiller is a mentor to first- and second-year teachers in Oregon and a member of the Teaching Tolerance Advisory Board.
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