It doesn't replace early identification, remediation, and support, but reading at home supported the long term reading success of children with a positive family history of dyslexia. The study is interesting one because it followed children for 13 years! The youngest...
On Writing: A Guest Post
Recently, a bilingual teacher in my Dyslexia for Teachers class shared his experiences being a dyslexic writing in both English and Chinese. With his permission, I am sharing some of his reflections: "Under an educational system that attaches great importance to...
Where Classroom Reading Fluency Practice Can Go Wrong
Reading fluency is defined as an ability to read texts with accuracy, a good rate, and good expression (sometimes the latter two are referred to as automaticity and prosody). Strong reading fluency is a goal that all children should have on their path to becoming...
In Memoriam: Beryl Bennaceraf, Ultrasound Pioneer
"What helped me was realizing that there was silver living, that it wasn't all negative....in radiology... pictures just speak to me. I can look at a picture and I can see the pattern. I can see things that nobody else can see." — Beryl Bennaceraf, MD With great...
Daily Thinker Fundraiser for Dyslexic Advantage – Thanks Preston!
Recently, we were contacted by a member of this community, Preston Ausbrook, who told us that she has been making The Daily Thinker quote calendars for family and friends since 2018. She asked if she could now donate all profits to Dyslexic Advantage! We were very...
Nature Journaling with John Muir Laws
"I notice, I wonder, it reminds me of" are powerful prompts that lead you to observe more deeply, ask better questions, and make interesting connections." — John (Jack) Muir Laws This is a great time to get outdoors and draw. Even if you're a backyard nature...
Not Over Hurdles, But Around Them
If you have moderate to severe dyslexia, chances are that you've encountered many obstacles on path to higher education and career. The farther one gets in education, the more one can recognize that much of education deals with writing about things rather than doing...
Reading Beyond Level
Don't restrict students to decodable readers. It's a little like trying to feed an elephant one blade of grass at a time. Reading decodable books has an important place in structured literacy programs for dyslexic students, but recently some in the reading...
Co-founder Brett Kopf’s Journey to Success with Remind and Omella
"...Can I just start off by making a blanket statement that I think dyslexia can be such a gift?" — Brett Kopf Brett Kopf is co-founder of Remind and Omella, two companies that grew out of his interest in solving problems that mission-driven organizations and...
Julia’s Project : Boosting the Esteem of Elementary Kids with Dyslexia
As promised in the last newsletter, here's my interview with Julia de Montagnac of ColoringConfidence.com Julia shared her vivid memories of reading struggles in the 2nd and 3rd grades, and when the possibility of a service project came up, she wanted to interact with...
Language Teaching and Dyslexia: What About Exceptions to the Rules? [Premium]
The English language is especially difficult to learn if you are dyslexic – because about half of its words are not predictable by simple rules. So what to do? WORD FAMILIES Learning similar words in similar groups can be motivating for students because they learn many words at one time. Dyslexic students tend to be good at recognizing patterns, so approaches like these are well-suited toward dyslexic students. One site for word family lists can be found here. DON’T OVERSIMPLIFY THE RULES Problems usually arise when students are taught an oversimplified rule like “a silent e makes a vowel say its name”. The rule works for words like bake, bike, nose, and cute, but it doesn’t work for words like have or dance.
[…]Smooth Sailing into September
It's that time of year again when students have either started back or are beginning to start back to the school year and even old work routines. While some aspects of getting back to old routines are welcome, there are plenty of reasons why students, teachers, and...