This question was received during the LD@school webinar, At the Heart of the Matter: Creating Classrooms and Schools that Support Well-being; click here to view the webinar recording. Answered by Dr. Sue Ball, Chief Psychologist, York Region District School Board Resiliency is a key skill for everyone, not just for students with learning disabilities (LDs). The ability [...]
These questions were received during the LD@school webinar, The SLP in the Math Class – Empowering Math Learners Through Collaboration between Educators and Speech Language Pathologists; click here to view the webinar recording. Answered by Sabrina O'Keefe, M.H.Sc., Speech Language Pathology How can Speech-Language Pathologists Support Students with Learning Disabilities to Acquire Math Literacy Skills? Regardless [...]
Answered by Nathalie Paquet-Bélanger Although some research (MacArthur, 2013) has shown that the use of text-to-speech technology improves the performance of students with reading difficulties, this method should not be the first one considered or may not be good for everyone. Here are a few ideas for strategies and tools that could be useful for readers [...]
Why have a classroom library? Research has shown that classroom libraries improve both the reading skills and motivation of students to read (Allington, 2012; National Council of Teachers of English, 2017; Neuman, 2016). Classroom libraries provide easy access to books and the classroom library may be the main source of reading materials for children from [...]
The decision tree below is a tool offering educators (grades 1 through 12) a roadmap to identifying issues and solutions when a student demonstrates difficulty learning. It is based on a series of five questions that educators can ask themselves in order to identify the difficulty observed in the student. Depending on the answer to [...]
For a student with a learning disability, the goal of an IEP is to maximize the student’s ability to access the curriculum. Now, what do we know about students with a learning disability? We know they are smart; that they have average to above average intellectual abilities. We also know they will have needs in their ability to learn and that these needs will require accommodations to facilitate success.
One of the challenges for educators in mathematics is to help students transfer their mathematical understanding from concrete to representational and then to abstract concepts. To support this process, three types of technological tools may prove effective.
Writing is one of the most complex tasks for all students, and particularly for students with LDs. In this section of the module, we will consider four stages of the writing process (planning, composing, revising, and sharing) and technological tools that prove effective at each stage. For each stage, educators may select different technological tools depending on the learning objectives targeted.
The act of reading draws on many different processes simultaneously. A reader must decode words, know what they mean, understand words when they are strung together in sentences, understand the use of pronouns, make connections between ideas using relationship markers, create mental pictures, make inferences, sum up information, and so forth. The right technological tools can make a significant difference to students who struggle with reading.
Having LDs may complicate the picture of anxiety, and may make it tricky for educators to recognize overlapping behaviors. For example, students who appear restless, distracted and who have difficulty concentrating may have a neurodevelopmental disorder, such as a learning disability or attention deficit hyperactive disorder (ADHD). But students may also be distracted by internal thoughts and worries, reflecting anxiety.
