When Struggle Becomes a Strength: Dyslexia
Every child is unique, but when it comes to reading, all children have roughly the same brain.
When my parents pulled me out of my familiar school in favor of The Windward School, a school for students with dyslexia, in fourth grade, I was stunned. I remember feeling angry, and sad that I wouldn’t get to reconnect with friends after the summer break. However, like any resilient nine-year-old with no choice in the matter, I got on the bus. Little did I know that early intervention would forever change my life.
Once I was given the tools to unpack decoding (or word reading), how to write using a structured process, and most importantly, how to advocate for myself, the world changed. For a long while, I had a hard time understanding why I had not been taught this multisensory, direct, and explicit approach to reading, from the beginning. Emily Hanford’s reporting helped explain this. All brains are wired for spoken language, but not for reading. Reading is a code: sound to symbol. Words can be divided into syllable types. We divide and sound out those parts with practice until we are automatic. I have come to know that there are far too many children who have not been caught early enough in their reading struggle. According to the Nation’s Report Card, 37% of 4th graders are not proficient in reading. Too many children lack the resources and support to succeed, and most adults, educators, and professionals do not understand why students struggle to read and what to do about it.
When I asked my parents how they discovered my dyslexia, my Mom said that she never stopped asking questions about my learning profile.
In the spirit of asking questions, I sat down with Jamie Williamson, Head of the Windward School to discuss a variety of hot topics in the field of literacy.
Jamie Williamson, the Head of The Windward School, a K-9 independent school for children with language-based learning disabilities shares his thoughts about struggling readers, remediation of dyslexia, teacher training, early intervention, and more.
What does dyslexia look like?
I know that no two students are the same, but can you describe for my readers the profile of the students The Windward School serves?
We focus on language-based learning disabilities. We use that language intentionally. Some schools use the term language differences, but we want to make sure we use language to make kids feel empowered. They need to own their strengths and challenges to advocate for themselves. We serve kids with average to above-average intelligence, so their cognitive abilities are intact and sharp. Their reading, writing, and math should be average to above average, too, but they happen to be well below that range from a reading standpoint. They need help breaking the code, phonemic awareness, phonics instruction, vocabulary, comprehension, and writing skills.
Research to Practice
What distinguishes The Windward School?
I think many kids at many schools feel “done to” and at Windward we let kids feel “done with” – meaning you have a partner in the process. Teachers help guide you, but you are the one showing up and generating the success that you are feeling.
There are about 200 schools that are focused on learning disabilities and differences across the country. I believe that Windward is one of the top schools, if not the top school. We focus on bringing research to practice. There has been a great body of research that informs us about what should be happening in the classroom, and we leverage that knowledge base to inform the work that happens day-to-day. We spend about two years with our teachers, focusing on how to build a lesson and teaching what is a learning disability. How do you think about language structure and understanding executive function skills? When you have a learning disability on top of a reading disability, what does that look like for kids? We execute a well-thought-out program with fidelity and integrity. We are consistent about showing up and doing what we say we are going to do.
Definition of Dyslexia:
Infographic from International Dyslexia Association
“Dyslexia is a specific learning disability that is neurobiological in origin. It is characterized by difficulties with accurate and/or fluent word recognition and by poor spelling and decoding abilities. These difficulties typically result from a deficit in the phonological component of language that is often unexpected in relation to other cognitive abilities and the provision of effective classroom instruction. Secondary consequences may include problems in reading comprehension and reduced reading experience that can impede growth of vocabulary and background knowledge.”
Adopted by the International Dyslexia Association Board of Directors, Nov. 12, 2002. Many state education codes, including New Jersey, Ohio and Utah, have adopted this definition.
65% of the student population requires a structured literacy approach to reading. The remaining 35% may not require that approach but they benefit from it.
Nancy Young’s Ladder of Reading.
The Mindset of Effective Teachers
What kinds of teachers are successful at Windward?
“How can I reteach the part the student was missing so that when she leaves tomorrow, she will have this?”
Everyone is capable of learning and growing. That may seem like a simple thing but I would argue that it’s way deeper. I want our teachers to understand that a student has all the things to be successful, and I want to pull that out of the student.
Teaching kids who struggle with reading and writing is never easy. As a teacher, you have to look at what you did that day and figure out what that student was missing and then ask: “How can I reteach the part that the student was missing to make sure that when she leaves tomorrow, she will have this?” A lot of schools might say that the student didn’t do the work; I taught it and she didn’t get it, and so we are moving on. That is what separates a Winward teacher: that willingness to show up, think about what they did, see where the student is, and then adjust their process as a part of that.
A Structured Literacy Approach to Reading Instruction
Structured Literacy instruction is the umbrella term coined by the International Dyslexia Association (IDA) in 2014 to unify and encompass the many evidence-based programs and approaches that are aligned with the Knowledge and Practice Standards.
A structured literacy approach requires teaching skills in a specific order based on moving from simple to more complex (and thus systematic). A well-defined scope and sequence enable the information to be presented in a way that indicates the relationship between the material taught and the past material taught. Direct and explicit instruction ensures that student approaches the learning experience by understanding what is to be learned, why it is to be learned, and how it is to be learned. Instruction is multisensory in that it uses all the learning pathways; seeing, hearing, feeling, and awareness of motion, brought together by the thinking brain. Decodable reading material provides repetition and reinforcement of the phonics principle studied, and skills are taught to mastery.
Showing Up
Do you have a "cannon moment" -- one moment that strikes you as extraordinary?
I did not like school as a kid. I never wanted a kid in a school setting to feel the way that I did. That was a big driver. Early on in my professional career, I realized how important it was for kids to have someone who believes in them on the other side of the table.
I was a caseworker for a social services agency in Cincinnati early in my career. I had one child in foster care who was a learning disabled high school freshman. He struggled with reading and was truant. He would show up in the morning at 8 o’clock and then leave school for the rest of the day. The school psychologist and principal were apathetic and seemed powerless. They blamed the kid who had been in nine foster care homes. Nobody paid attention to him. It turns out he loved his homeroom teacher. The rest of the day not so much, but this teacher cared about him. He showed up and had a little dose of that goodness and then was off on his way.
Adults make a difference — how we show up for kids is important.
Photo taken from The Windward School website
“We often wait until the student fails, or until we can’t deny it any longer. Early intervention has benefits for lessening the struggle and increasing the long-term outcome. ”
Catch Them Before They Fall
Can you speak on the importance of early intervention?
The research will tell you the earlier you get to identify the challenge, the quicker you get to remediation and intervention, and the better the outcome for several reasons. If you have spent your entire academic career struggling with reading and nobody has helped you or supported you, you start to think this is your fault. At that point, you have to do work not only on the academic side, but also on social emotional, and self-esteem repair.
Anybody with a reading disability can learn to read. Fluency may be a little slower than a typical peer but comprehension is what reading is all about, and the quicker you get to deeper comprehension and understanding - that’s when it gets fun.
I tend to come at early intervention from a public health at-risk perspective. If you have a family history of heart disease and markers on your labs that indicate you might be predisposed, your doctor does not wait until you have heart disease to do something about it. You focus on exercise, diet, and perhaps medication to help control cholesterol. You start treatment the moment you become at risk. Similarly, there is a lot that we can do for a child at risk for reading difficulties right away - to get him back into the classroom quickly.
The Science of Reading
The science of reading is a term used to describe converging evidence, from multiple fields of study over many decades that has established a scientific, evidence base for reading. This reading science explains how reading develops, and why some people struggle to learn how to read and write.
There is a big movement toward bringing the science of reading into classrooms across the country. What do you think needs to happen to make this shift successful?
For the science of reading to become well-developed in schools across America we need to train our teachers at the university level a little differently. We have talked about this but it has not happened. They need to have an understanding of what good research is, how to translate that into the classroom, and how to identify when students are struggling.
“We can’t blame teachers for not knowing something that they were not taught. ”
We need legislative policy work to help schools and universities with funding. We need to have a much stronger sense of what to do, and when. When we identify a student as a struggling reader, what do we do to make sure that the student gets the instruction he needs? We need good policies to hold districts accountable and be clear about how districts are selecting their programs. It is going to be a multi-pronged, complex approach that takes a partnership between state and local governments.
“That struggle can become a strength in the form of resilience. That is the gift right there that you helped to create, not that dyslexia gave you.”
Reframing the “Gift of Dyslexia”
What do you think people need to understand about students with dyslexia?
We get caught up in “gifts” and I struggle with framing “the gift of dyslexia” because it minimizes the struggle kids have in the process. When a student has dyslexia and a lot of resources and support, then they have a chance for this dyslexia to become a strength. That struggle can become a strength, and that strength is in the form of resilience. When you hit a wall in the classroom, you don’t give up. You say, “I have done hard stuff before. You bear down, use strategies, ask for help, and do what you need to do. That is the gift right there that you helped to create, not that dyslexia gave you.
My blog is titled: The Shoes We Wear in honor of people with differences and the folks who support them. What shoes are you wearing?
Dress loafers, but I have on some bright socks!
More resources and information about Dyslexia on the Inspiration page.