Visual thinkers
Monday, September 19, 2005 1:47 PM PDT
Vale School District laud's innovative program designed to tackle dyslexia
JESSICA KELLER - ARGUS OBSERVER
VALE - "Teaching to a different way of learning."
That's what Vale teacher Rhonda Erstrom said she does when working with students in the district challenged by the traditional learning process because of dyslexia.
Dyslexia is defined as "a specific learning disability that is neurological in origin," according to the International Dyslexia Association (IDA). Dyslexia is also characterized by "difficulties with accurate and/or fluent word recognition and poor spelling and decoding abilities" that may have secondary effects of reduced reading abilities and comprehension, according to the IDA.
Erstrom, whose 15-year-old son was diagnosed with dyslexia as a freshman at Vale High School last year, dislikes calling it a disability. Instead, she prefers to call it a "learning difference."
Her role in the Vale School District is working with students with difficulties learning through the traditional teaching style of "word thinkers." Instead, Erstrom utilizes techniques more easily picked up by the "visual thinkers" in her classes.
She said when her students read the word "tree" they just do not see the letters and know what that means, they see an actual tree itself in their mind.
"It's like they have this one little movie going in their head with all the senses," she said.
Both Erstrom and Vale Elementary School Principal Darlene McConnell, with the support of Vale School District Superintendent Matthew Hawley, said they are enthusiastic about the relatively new program the Vale School District has started to help dyslexic students and some with Attention Deficit Disorder.
"I am very excited about this program," McConnell said, adding as an educator, for years she has been frustrated because while there were students with dyslexia, no effective learning techniques or program was available to teachers.
"So we never knew what to do for them," she said.
All that changed last year, however, when Erstrom, McConnell and the school district learned about an education training program for people with dyslexia. After seeing her son make remarkable gains in his reading and learning skills through learning techniques taught at a specialized school in California, it was agreed upon by Erstrom, McConnell and the district, Erstrom should continue with the education training she began while her son was taking the classes, and become a resource to the school district.
While she has yet to finish her training at the Davis Dyslexic Institute, she is already bringing what she has learned so far into the classroom, with amazing results McConnell said.
"It's amazing to see the changes in some of these kids after so short a time," she said.
Still teaching second-grade in the mornings, Erstrom devotes the rest of her day to working with students at each grade level with letter and word recognition, reading and concept comprehension and some math skills.
In her classroom last week, Erstrom helped two elementary students work through "trigger" words. She said because people with dyslexia are visual thinkers and learners, they have trouble conceptualizing words they can't visualize, called trigger words. She said because her students can't visualize those words, 216 of them, such as "up," "down" and "nearly," they often register to students in their reading. Erstrom helped her two students recognize and understand the word "almost" Wednesday afternoon using one of the techniques she has learned in her training. Under her watchful eye, the two students found the word in dictionaries specifically geared toward dyslexic students, read the meaning out loud, spelled the word, spelled it backwards and used it in a sentence.
She then helped them conceptualize what "almost" - defined as "nearly, but not quite" - meant by having them build a model of their sentence. One boy's model showed him being "almost" finished with a car restoration project by standing over the hood of the car preparing to install the last engine component. Her other student "almost" got a cookie from a cookie jar before being stopped by building a model of him standing over a cookie jar as if he was going to reach in to grab a chocolate chip treat.
Once they completed their model and spelled the word "almost" out with clay, they repeated the earlier process, explained their model to Erstrom, then traced the word with their fingers, spelling it front and back, before doing the same successfully without looking. The lesson was complete. McConnell, however, attributes much of Erstrom's students' success to the positive changes in learning and attitudes she triggered. McConnell said it takes a special person like Erstrom, with a special gift of understanding and teaching bring about such amazing changes. Erstrom, however, said she feels just as strongly about the Vale School District and the administrators willingness to go beyond traditional teaching techniques to help struggling students.
"I feel so lucky to work in this school district that is just so willing to work with those different learning styles," she said. "As educators, how can we afford not to."
