Category Archives: Learning

(Re)Defining Dyslexia

Posted in Differentiated Learning, Learning, Metacognition, Spatial Ordering, Student Strengths, Student Weaknesses, Writing by

1310845577_cc84a596dfIn a recent New York Times op-ed, Defining My Dyslexia, physician and author Blake Charlton explores some of the emerging research and trends related to dyslexia while also sharing his own story about his struggles growing up a dyslexic. At the heart of his piece is the growing understanding that along with the challenges associated with dyslexia, are a collection of cognitive strengths that are too often under appreciated. He writes,

Last month, at the Emily Hall Tremaine Foundation Conference on Dyslexia and Talent, I watched several neurobiologists present evidence that the dyslexic brain, which processes information in a unique way, may impart particular strengths. Studies using cognitive testing and functional M.R.I.’s have demonstrated exceptional three-dimensional and spatial reasoning among dyslexic individuals, which may account for the many successful dyslexic engineers. Similar studies have shown increased creativity and big-picture thinking (or “gist-detection”) in dyslexics, which correlates with the surprising number of dyslexic entrepreneurs, novelists and filmmakers.

The conference’s organizers made a strong case that the successes of the attending dyslexic luminaries — who ranged from a Pulitzer-winning poet to a MacArthur grant-winning paleontologist to an entrepreneur who pays a dozen times my student loans in taxes every year — had been achieved “not despite, but because of dyslexia.”

It is a powerful message for everyone, especially students struggling to understand their dyslexia within the context of a world that sees their differences as deficits. He goes on to illuminate this point,

Today’s educational environment exacerbates dyslexic weaknesses. Schools misidentify poor spelling and slow reading as a lack of intelligence; typically diagnose the condition only after students have fallen behind; and too often fail to provide dyslexic students with the audio and video materials that would help them learn. Until these disadvantages are removed, “disability” most accurately describes what young dyslexics confront.

This heartbreaking reality further demonstrates what many of us already know: we must design educational spaces and experiences not to just accomodate, ahem, all kinds of minds but to intentionally leverage the mosaic of strengths that such diversity brings to the table. There’s a considerable difference between tolerating diversity and embracing it. Perhaps a good place to start is in how we define and diagnose such “disabilities” as dyslexia. To this point, Charlton concludes,

A more precise definition of dyslexia would clearly identify the disabilities that go along with it, while recognizing the associated abilities as well. If the dyslexic community could popularize such a definition, then newly diagnosed dyslexics would realize that they, like everyone else, will face their futures with a range of strengths and weaknesses.

We could not agree more.

Photo Credit: The Nikon Guru via Compfight cc

11 Characteristic of Meaningful Work (and Learning)

Posted in Classroom Culture, Differentiated Instruction, Differentiated Learning, Learning, Learning about Learning, School Culture, Strategies for teachers by

Meaning_People_700x300In a recent repost of Shawn Murphy’s “11 Characteristics of Meaningful Work,” the editors at QED’s blog noted that,

While this piece by Shawn Murphy is related to business practices and targeted to managers and business leaders, the parallels to education and student learning are striking. Teachers, curricula developers, and education leaders can find plenty herein to ponder, reflect on, and apply in practice.

We couldn’t agree more. Switch a few key words (for example: “work” to “learning experiences,” “employees” to students,” and  “the organization” to “school.”) and, voila!, some great advice for educators and education leaders.

Below are the 11 characteristics of meaningful work in title only. To read the explanations for each, you can visit Shawn’s original post here, or QED’s repost here. 

1. Basic needs are met

2. Strengths are leveraged

3. Pull personal satisfaction from work

4. Being in on things

5. Treated with respect by peers and managers

6. See how one’s work fits into the bigger picture

7. Personal sense of independence and interdependence

8. Employees believe they are valued by the organization, by management

9. Opportunities to know self

10. Promotion of other’s satisfaction

11. Recognized — give recognition for good work

Image: Shawn Murphy

Storytelling’s Impact on Empathy (and the Architecture of the Brain)

Posted in Brain Facts, Classroom Culture, Learning, Social Emotional Learning by

Screen Shot 2013-04-24 at 9.00.18 AMPaul Zak, who TED Talks describes as, “a pioneer in the field of neuroeconomics,” shares his thoughts and insights on the power of storytelling to affect change in the architecture of the brain in the below video — a collaboration between him, filmmaker Kirby Ferguson, and animator Henrique Barone for the Future of Storytelling conference.

He opens with a powerful story that will pull at your heart strings, and uses these emotions as a gateway to reveal the complex workings of the moral and ethical brain. He concludes from his research that stories, with the right narrative arc, have a powerful impact on the brain, and the actions and behaviors that follow.

The implications for education in the design of learning environments and experiences cannot be understated. While we often put skills at the center of learning, what if we put people at the core — students’ well being and the stories that matter to them?

For more information about the collaborators of this video, check out:

  1. Paul Zak’s research.
  2. Filmmaker Kirby Ferguson’s “Everything is a Remix” website.
  3. Animator Henrique Barone’s website.
  4. The “Future of Storytelling” conference.
Image Source: ScreenShot from above video

Biodiversity and Neurodiversity

Posted in Learning by

poster01 biodiversityToday, April 22, is Earthday — a day to celebrate, appreciate, and advocate for our planet. This holiday seeks to build and sustain an international environmental awareness and ethos that reshapes how we conserve, preserve and manage the resources of our planet. Now celebrated or observed the world over, there is at least growing awareness about the challenges our planet faces at our hands.

Aside from climate change, which will affect everyone the globe over, there are scores of other environmental concerns. One is the rate of plant and animal extinction due to human related activities. Fragmentation, habitat destruction, and human intrusion continue to wreck havoc on both plant and animal communities. One of the key indicators of a healthy environment is the amount a biodiversity within that ecosystem. As a general rule of thumb, the greater the amount of diversity within plant and animal communities the more stable the ecosystem.

It is our belief that the same holds true for neurodiversity. We already know that no two brains are exactly alike (like fingerprints), and that the differences between brains is now understood to be variation, not deviation. Given this, we would do well to embrace and celebrate cognitive variety — seeking to ensure that each and every mind is at its full and unique potential. We would do well ensuring that each person feels that their contributions are valued.

Q.E.D. Foundation’s Theory of Change states,

IF we have cultures of transformational learning where we

  • create competency-based learning pathways and learning opportunities,
  • know each student’s strengths, challenges, interests, and abilities,
  • intetionally design for student agency, coaching and assessing habits of mind and being,
  • cultivate communities of collaboration and partnership both inside and outside of school, and
  • embed these practices in laboratories of democratic practice, 

THEN all students will flourish and achieve to high levels.

And, if we can achieve this, we can only imagine what might be in store for our planet — perhaps we will be one step closer to realizing and actualizing the dream of Earthday. For today, we will not only celebrate our planet, but also the great variety of minds that live on it.

Poster: Pedro Teixeira via DesignBoom (shortlisted in the iida awards 2010)

Transforming Batch and Queue

Posted in Classroom Culture, Learning, School Culture, Social Emotional Learning, Whole Child by

4782496500_273a4c7d29_bKim Carter, the Executive Director of our parent organization, Q.E.D. Foundation, was recently interviewed by the the good folks over at KQED’s Mindshift blog for a piece on competency-based learning.

As a leading expert in the field, she had a number of insights into both the benefits of competency-based learning and critiques of the traditional “batch and queue” model.  Among the many valuable ideas embedded in the the article, we found one of particular importance for working with a neuro-diverse student body. The author, Katrina Schwartz, writes,

If a student gets 50 percent in a class in a traditional school, she fails and has to repeat the course or grade level until she scores higher, even if the score means that she understood half the material. Forcing her to repeat everything is inefficient and puts the student at a disadvantage for the rest of her academic career. In competency-based classrooms, students relearn and demonstrate competencies in only the areas that challenge them before moving forward.

“‘Batch and queue’ is horribly inefficient and destroys kids’ concept of self,” Carter said. “It’s like manufacturing, where you put everything through the same system and compare it to standards at the end. If it doesn’t match, put it through again.”

How often do students experience failure not as a stepping stone toward success, but as a road block to progress? Far too often, in our opinion. Too many students find themselves branded and labeled by a system not designed for unique strengths, affinities, and, ultimately, individuals. This lack of personalization, by proxy, communicates to the students that they are of value when they fit into the system, and not necessarily when they do not.

A competency-based model ensures that students are recognized for their growth while encouraging their involvement, contributions, and unique insights. It gives students a platform for employing their strengths toward achieving their goals / the standards.

This sort of empowerment transcends the walls of the school building and prepares the students for achieving success in life beyond graduation.

Photo Credit: Yvonne Thompson via Compfight cc

Brief Review of L. Todd Rose’s “Square Peg”

Posted in Attention, Brain Facts, Learning, Learning about Learning, Learning Challenges, Social Emotional Learning, Student Strengths, Teachers, Whole Child by

“Behavior isn’t something someone ‘has.’ Rather, it emerges from the interaction of a person’s biology, past experiences, and immediate context.”

L. Todd Rose, from his book, Square Peg

6301560117_fa8f4c16b9_bFor students with learning differences schools can be (and often are) incredibly trying places. Imagine being a kid who wants to do well — motivated, eager to please, and enjoys interacting with other students — but struggles with attention and working memory. Rather than reep the joys of learning, the student finds herself labeled, removed from her classmates and made to do the things she struggles with for a significant portion of the day. Other subjects, like PE, Art, the Humanities, are sidelined, even though they may be areas of strength for her. Her resulting behavioral expression of the dissonance between her and her learning environment is seen as misbehavior and disciplinary actions follow.

At the end of a day, month, year, or decade, what has she concluded about her “smarts” or her potential as a student? More importantly, what is her assessment of her value as a human? What does she see when she looks at herself through the lens of a school experience that focused, almost solely, on her deficits?

w_2115_smallerL. Todd Rose, co-founder and president of Project Variability, offers a glimpse of a similar experience in his part-memoir part-neuro-education book, Square Peg. His story goes something like this:

  • Classic case of boy with ADHD
  • Struggles in school — discipline, academics, friends
  • Suspended, fails, becomes wholly disenfranchised
  • Drops out
  • Works minimum wage job to support wife and baby
  • Ends up on the faculty at Harvard (after a lot of hard work)

In the telling of this incredible journey, he shares insights from his experiences and from research into the needs, challenges, and value of the “Square Pegs” in our lives. The anecdotally academic weaving together of personal tales and studies from the field of neuro-education (he teaches Educational Neuroscience at Harvard Graduate School of Education) creates numerous access points for a compelling narrative arc as well as enlightening examples of applied theory. In short, it is a book that is hard to put down.

squarepeg-8-8-VER-8While he maintains a child’s sense of wonder and fascination about his own turnaround throughout the book, he also plays the role of scholar, unpacking the theories and ideas that became leverage points for capitalizing on his strengths and accommodating for his challenges. In the prologue he suggests the field of complex systems offers the best possible explanation for his story, and by proxy, the story of many others. He describes his application of complex systems as such:

To put it simply, the study of complex systems looks at how different parts of a system influence each other collectively to produce various outcomes. Nowadays, scientists have been holding up this lens to a range of traditional disciplines, from physics to biology–and, most recently, in centers like the one in which I work: Harvard’s Mind, Brain, and Education program–to the study of human learning. As this effort matures, it is offering a radically new and useful way for parents and teachers to understand the often bewildering behavior of children in their charge.

Throughout the book he uses complex systems and neuroscience to flesh out four ideas to help us be “much more understanding and effective parent(s) and teacher(s)” for the square pegs in our lives. But in reality, the ideas apply to myriad human systems. They are:

  1. Variability is the rule: As humans, our ways of perceiving the world and reacting to what we perceive are much more diverse and dynamic than we might ever have imagined.
  2. Emotions are serious stuff: Contrary to what we’ve long believed, modern neuroscience has shown that there is no such thing as purely rational thought or behavior. Parents and teachers need to learn to tune in to children’s emotional states to help them make the most of their education.
  3. Context is key: People often behave in dramatically different ways, depending on the circumstances. Among other things, this suggests that we unfairly prejudice children by labeling them with a disorder, when they’d be perfectly fine in a different environment.
  4. Feedback loops determine long-term success or failure: Remember those flapping butterfly wings, and keep in mind that small changes in your child’s life today can make an enormous difference tomorrow.

Taken together, these four ideas create a mosaic of factors playing into students’ lives, influencing and affecting their choices, decisions, and behavioral outcomes. They demonstrate that the only silver bullet is in not accepting there there is a silver bullet. No juggernaut exists for all people in all situations. Rather, we must be champions of the individual, unwavering advocates for the well being of each child, and Loraxes who speak for the square pegs.

We highly recommend this book to parents, educators, and clinicians working with square, triangular, and / or round pegs. Not only will you glimpse what the world may look like through their eyes, you will learn a bit about yourself, the science of learning, and, ultimately, the anecdotal and neurological value of caring.

Photo Credit: Mario Inoportuno via Compfight cc
Todd Rose portrait: HGSE
Square Peg Book Image: Hyperion

Dyslexia doesn’t define me

A short TEDxYouth talk by student, Piper Otterbein, about her journey from being labeled by dyslexia to creating and sustaining her passion. How can we better create environments where students like her don’t have to “graduate” from their areas of challenge in order to connect with their strengths? How can we help make sure learning is meaningful to all students no matter their learning profile? Or better yet, because of their learning profile.

How can we ensure our classrooms and learning communities reflect the best of our students, so when they look around they see their possibilities, not just their challenges?

Resources for Improving Your Long Term Memory

Posted in Learning, Learning about Learning, Memory by

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The following is a guest post by Dr. Craig Pohlman, Director of Mind Matters at Southeast Psych. You can view the original post here.

These days, it seems like there are no limits to what our genius gadgets (like computers, iPhones, tablets, calculators, etc.) can do.  So, is human memory even as important anymore?  The short answer to this is yes.

Even with all of the tools to which we have access, we still need our own memory for a variety of academic and other tasks.  Here’s a quick overview of the components of memory:

  • Short term memory holds a small amount of incoming information for a limited period.
  • Active working memory holds information in your mind while working with it at the same time, such as steps in a process.
  • Long term memory stores and retrieves information over a long period.

Both active working memory and long term memory are used extensively in academic activities, including reading decoding, reading comprehension, spelling, written expression, math operations, and math reasoning.  If you struggle with memory, there are plenty of strategies you can use to improve and to make these academic activities a little more manageable.

Last week, we presented tips for improving long term memory and before that, we listed ideas for boosting active working memory.  Here is a list of resources you can use to get more information about improving long term memory:

  1. Sum Dog – This website, www.sumdog.com, offers free games to make math fact practice fun.
  2. Quizlet – This website, www.quizlet.com, offers tools to help you study anything.  You can study words using flashcards, play games to learn and practice important course material, and test yourself to see if you are ready for success.
  3. “Thirty Days Has September: Cool Ways to Remember Stuff” – This book by Chris Stevens provides tips for memorizing across the curriculum.  Specifically, this book is helpful for younger students.
  4. “Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge: The Book of Mnemonic Devices” – This book by Rod L. Evans presents tips for memorizing across topics and is appropriate for all ages.
  5. Math Fact Grid – Web resources, such as www.mathisfun.com, offer free printable math fact grids (for addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division).  These can be used to practice and reference important math facts.

Exercising your memory (just like you would exercise your muscles) will help to make it stronger over time.  Visit www.sepmindmatters.com for more information.

Dr. Craig Pohlman is the Director of Mind Matters at Southeast Psych and the author of “How Can My Kid Succeed in School?”  Stay connected: Mind Matters Facebook | @MindMatters_SEP

Photo Credit: futhark via Compfight cc

Oh, The Places You’ll Find Yourself — Spatially Speaking

Posted in Brain Facts, Graphomotor Function, Learning, Spatial Ordering, Whole Child by

Below is a TED Talk by Neil Burgess, a neuroscientist at the University College in London, who researches, as described on the TED website, “how patterns of electrical activity in brain cells guide us through space.”

Supplemental to the grid cells Dr. Burgess discusses are additional neurological systems that give us a sense of our surroundings. Dan Peterson, who writes a fascinating blog (Sports are 80 Percent Mental) about the body-mind connection in sports, recently posted “Spatial Awareness on the Football Field” (where we found the above TED Talk — Thanks, Dan!) in which he writes,

Jeffrey Taube, a professor in the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences at Dartmouth, has been studying our sense of direction and location. “Knowing what direction you are facing, where you are, and how to navigate are really fundamental to your survival,” said Taube.

In his research, he has found there are head direction cells, located in the thalamus, that act as a compass needle tracking the direction our head is currently facing.  At the same time, in the hippocampus, place cells determine and track our location relative to landmarks in the environment, say the football field sideline or the end zone.  These two sets of cells communicate with each other to guide our movement.

“They put that information together to give you an overall sense of ‘here,’ location wise and direction wise,” Taube explained. “That is the first ingredient for being able to ask the question, ‘How am I going to get to point B if I am at point A?’ It is the starting point on the cognitive map.”

It reminds us once again that strengths and affinities can be left at the door of our schools and classrooms if we don’t incorporate movement, action, and an intentional use of our bodies in our lessons and activities. Research continues to indicate that taking advantage of the neurological links between spatial ordering, graphomotor functioning, attention, and memory can help nurture achievement among a broader diversity of learners than the traditional sit-n-git approach (which leaves too many students itching for something more engaging).

15 Things About the (Human) Brain

Posted in Brain Facts, Learning, Learning about Learning by

As we get excited for Brain Awareness Week next week, we thought it might be fun to take a quick look at our amazing brain.

Below is an info-graphic from onlineschools with 15 facts you may or may not have known. Number 9 is a great reminder for parents, educators, and health conscious people — we think what we eat.

our-brain-one-page-infographic-1