"My name is Nathalene Vang and I am a 2020 graduate from Fresno State.
This spring marks my second year as a Literacy Mentor with Every Neighborhood Partnership. I joined ENP in the spring of 2019 while I was taking the course CFS 143S. It is a course that requires students to find a volunteer site while studying about children at risk. I chose ENP because I saw that it was a great way to learn more about children’s developmental years of learning. Little did I know that I would enjoy reading and playing games with students so much.
I choose to come back to ENP every semester because I saw that these small moments spent teaching children how to read, leaves a big impact on the student’s life.
A specific highlight with working with students online is being able to connect with the parents. Parents finally get to see what their child is working on and how literacy mentoring is conducted.
What I enjoy most is being able to teach students how to read using games and stories. My goal for this semester is to be able to write a little comic strip story with my student. My student loves to draw so making our own little comic strip will be a fun and engaging way to have him use as many words he knows.
My greatest experience as a literacy mentor is encouraging students to never give up by helping them find alternatives to reading words they do not know. Often times when children struggle to read a word, they stop and give up completely. I have learned to let the student know that there are ways in which they can read the word; such as, sounding out a word or reflecting back to a story. Surprisingly, something as simple as this really does help the student remember. This means every child can read. They just need someone to believe and guide them on their reading journey and that is what I love about being a literacy mentor. Being able to guide and teach students to read so they can look forward to knowing how to read independently for years to come."
Thank you Nathalene for sharing your story! We are thankful for you!
