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Showing posts from July, 2013

100 Powerful Learning Specialist and Educational Therapy Materials

This week I wanted to tell you about my online store, Good Sensory Learning. I’m Dr. Erica Warren, and I established this site so I could share all the materials that I have created over the last 20+ years as a learning specialist and educational therapist. When I first began my private practice, Learning to Learn, I had great difficulty finding fun and multisensory materials for my students that were effective and engaging. So back in 2005, I made it my mission to design and distribute high-end, remedial products as well as memorable, motivating lessons that bring delight to learning. If you would like to try a free sampling of my activities , CLICK HERE . How Are the Products Organized at Good Sensory Learning? You can download my Free Printable Catalog or you can browse the site using the grey “search all products” bar in the top right of any page with keywords such as dyslexia, working memory, and executive functioning. What’s more, drop down menus in the red banner allow you t...
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Teaching Metacognitive Skills: A Fun, Free Illustration and Download

Many students plod through schooling as passive learners and they rarely learn to take control of their own cognition. In contrast, others learn to be active participants in the learning process and develop metacognitive skills. Metacognition is the awareness of one’s own cognition or thought process and it involves higher order thinking that enables understanding, analysis and control. For many concrete learners, as well as those that struggle with attentional issues, this notion can be difficult to grasp. However, the process can be taught through visual aids, demonstrations, discussions, group work, and graphic organizers. In fact, the more multisensory the instruction, the greater the likelihood that all your students will master this skill.  The Process: After a lesson or reading, I like to summarize important details, main ideas, and then I make connections by sharing my own thought processes. I explain to the students that I will be thinking aloud so that they can ...
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Auditory Discrimination Deficits Can Result in Funny Misunderstandings

As a child, I was often teased by my silly misunderstandings of expressions, phrases, words and even lyrics to songs. Although my hearing was excellent, I struggled with auditory discrimination difficulties. As a result, I continually confused sounds that were similar and often misconstrued what people were telling me. For instance, after a year abroad with my family living in England, we returned to the United States and I entered the first grade. On the first day of school, when my teachers and peers detected my British inflections they asked me about it. To my dismay, my explanation resulted in laughter. When I got home I complained to my mother, with a big frown on my face, that the students and teachers had laughed at me. I just couldn’t understand why they chuckled when I told them I had an "English accident." One of my current students, Ben, and I are both members of what I like to call, “the dyslexia club.” For the two of us, the prima...
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The Different Types of Dyslexia: Targeting Intervention

Although reading disorders were recognized back in the late 1800s, the term dyslexia didn't become a recognized condition until the 1970s-1980s.  Since then, it has received an enormous amount of research and professional-based  attention.  However, many educators and clinicians are still mystified about how to best pinpoint the specific needs of each student with dyslexia.   The primary underlying cause of this confusion is the fact that there are many cognitive weaknesses or deficits that can trigger a diagnosis of dyslexia.  So much like a dartboard, if service providers continue to aim interventions at the wrong place, they may play a frustrating game and they will certainly never hit the bulls-eye.  As a result, professionals have begun to propose subtypes that categorize dyslexics based on common symptoms, so individuals with dyslexia can be understood and service providers can target the needed areas of attention.  What are the d...
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