BASIC INSTINCT

Not a week goes by that I don’t get a call at work from a Mother with a hunch. The conversation begins with a simple request about services I provide as a Learning Coach. Then I probe a little as to specific areas of her concern and then the floodgates open. I get a litany of symptoms and observable characteristics about a son or daughter having trouble in school. Her child might not have a formal diagnosis but as a Mother she is able to articulate what her child experiences, describe the extra help her child has been given and tell me what is not working.

Who is this child? This child is healthy and one of average to above average intelligence. This child has no unusual socio-cultural factors or unusual socioeconomic hardships to deal with. This child attends an above average school given appropriate and adequate instruction by a teacher with a Master’s Degree. The curriculum is taught comprehensively, systematically and explicitly.

This child has gone to preschool or daycare providing a language rich environment, promoting literacy with the fundamental building blocks of reading, writing, math and science. This child has attended a Kindergarten where lessons were presented to enhance phonemic awareness and children get phonics instruction so that they integrate the concept that letters and letter groups represent the sounds in spoken language. From 1st to 3rd grade this child is immersed in decoding strategies, spelling lessons, vocabulary acquisition, sight word attack as well as attention to skill development in reading comprehension and fluency.

As this Mother tells me more about her child’s situation she says that despite having the best of circumstances AND EXTRA HELP AT SCHOOL her child is struggling. He is beginning to doubt his own abilities and has started to use the “S” word. Yes, he is beginning to refer to himself as “stupid.” In her gut this Mother knows that there is a way to reach her child but it is not by giving him more of the same approach. She wants to know if I can reach him via his strengths, using her child’s gifts and talents as a doorway into his style of learning.

This Mother with a hunch, this Mother who trusts her gut and is willing to think creatively and out of the box, sometimes seeks the road less traveled. This Mother is the hero of her child because she took the first step to setting his feet on his path to success. http://www.opendoorlearningcenter.com

Blog Tights

I was shopping in TJ Maxx the other day and came upon a display of socks and tights. I noticed a pair of very stylish patterned tights labeled as “one size fits all.” I almost laughed out loud. How ridiculous! The word “all” means “the whole of; everyone of.” In an instant I thought of four friends of mine each having a different body type, height and weight. In no way would this one pair of tights fit comfortably on each of them. Ah ha, that marketing/advertising ploy would not get the best of me. So, despite the fact that the tights were pretty cool looking and were highly discounted, I pushed my cart along until I could find something more customized to fit my needs.

It got me thinking that we are faced with that same marketing/advertising tactic of “one size fits all” in our education system. It is common knowledge that not all students think alike. The term “Learning Style” was coined to describe the different ways which an individual optimally takes in, processes, stores, retrieves and presents information. Yet, when we look at the bulk of the teaching being given in the classroom, it favors one learning style more than all of the rest.

What happens when your child doesn’t learn in the “one size fits all” fashion? What happens when your child misses key concepts and ideas because the lesson plan doesn’t fit with his learning style? Well, what happens is …confusion followed by a lag in performance. If you wait long enough, what comes next is frustration, tears, anger, self-doubt and loss of self-esteem.

The whole concept of Differentiated Instruction was put forth to educators to acknowledge that lesson plans should be designed to help students learn concepts and idea in a format which best fits his/her learning style. This means that educators, intervention specialists and parents need to not only recognize the learning style of the struggling child, but become flexible and adapt the instructional approach accordingly. The method should be modified to the student rather than the student having to modify himself for the curriculum sake.

While all children are responsible for the same educational information in the end, some might need customized instructional approaches to best meet the needs of their learning styles at the start. If your child is a visual, spatial or kinesthetic learner, an auditory approach is not the best fit. An auditory approach might be the standard in your child’s classroom, more comfortable for the teacher, easier to administrate but not what is best for your child.

You might not know your child’s learning style and your journey might begin at this point by researching the topic and doing your best to identify it. See Gifted Development and Appendix C has characteristics and comparisons of the auditory-sequential learner and the visual-spatial learner. If your child has visual-spatial learning style characteristics, your answer is The Davis Method. Changing the approach to how your child learns will make all of the difference. What have you got to lose by visiting Open Door Learning Center to see if this kind of intervention is right for you or your child?