Students Who Learn Differently
In keeping with the spirit that learning-differently is nothing to be ashamed about, the author of this study and her daughter would like to share some of their experiences with you, in the hopes that others will take heart and persevere.
I attended graduate school in a Masters of English program. At the completion of the one and a half year program, successful candidates would be awarded a Master of Arts degree in English and permanent high school teaching certification. There were many graduate-level English courses in my curriculum, but there was only one education class that I recall. And that class, if memory serves me, consisted of little more than how to create a lesson plan.
Part of my program also consisted of teaching one semester as a full-time teacher. I was assigned to teach 7th and 8th grade English, 5 classes a day, from January to June, up to and including preparing the final exam and determining who would pass and who would fail. I had never even stood in front of a class for the purpose of giving a lesson before I started my teaching segment.
I successfully completed all my work for my Masters' Degree, except that I did not write my thesis. I had a committee set up and a topic and an outline approved. All I had to do was write one more paper. I had written many others previously. But every time I would try to enter the library to work on my paper, I became physically ill. There was no apparent physical reason for such a reaction.
So I left graduate school at the end of that summer, minus thesis and minus degree. And without too many regrets, because I realized that I had not been very happy when I was teaching. This was due in large part to the fact that my 7th and 8th graders were constantly finding spelling errors whenever I had to write on the board. I remember one child raising his hand to say, "Miss, you misspelled 'February,' again."
I had never heard of or been taught about dyslexia, and I had no idea why many of my students, none of whom were expected to go on to college, could spell and I could not. Or why so many of my students, who seemed very bright, were in the slow class.
I now think that a major reason that I was unable to write my thesis was because I was overwhelmed by the thought of having to look up all those words in the dictionary, again. For while I might not be able to spell a word correctly, I can usually tell when it is misspelled.
Freya's story is revealed in the following letter that I sent to her former school a year after that school dictated that she would have to repeat her Junior year of high school:
Dear Director and Faculty of Sint-Ludgardisschool,
First I would like you to know that I feel that Freya received a great deal of time and attention during her stay at your school and that most of the adults she came in contact with were persons sincerely committed to their professions.
However, I feel that a great deal more could have been done, and as I have learned more about students who learn differently and how to teach them, I would like to share some of my observations with you.
Because of Freya's problem with dyslexia, I frequently offered a book on this subject to many of her language teachers. The title of the book is, This Book Doesn't Make Sens Cens Sns Scens Sense (Living and Learning with Dyslexia), written by the then Educational Director of the British Dyslexia Association, Jean Augur. Unfortunately, I was not perceptive enough at the time to realize that, in addition to Freya's language teachers, I should have also offered the book to Freya's math teacher.
Freya decided to remove herself from your school when she learned that she would not be passed on to her Senior year, primarily because she could not bear the heartbreak of seeing her classmates graduate without her. Despite the fact that she was tutored privately every Monday for the whole summer, she was not able to pass your re-exam in math. This fact came as a tremendous shock to all of us, especially as her tutor, who himself is a teacher of higher mathematics, told us that she should be able to pass. Luckily we were given some professional advice that informed us that Pius X was the most user-friendly school in the Antwerp area for students who learn differently.
And indeed this has proven to be so. Once Freya's files from your guidance office arrived at Pius X, constructive action was immediately taken. Enclosed please find a copy of the assessment that was sent to all of her teachers this year, so that everyone was aware of the areas where Freya had difficulties. They were also given suggestions on how they might help right from the beginning of the school term.
At the new school, I remembered to offer the book to her math teacher, too. Because of this, for the first time a student at Pius X was allowed to take an additional mathematics exam orally because of dyslexia. As you will note from the math teacher's enclosed comments, Freya's work on her written final exam was "insufficient." In other words, she failed again, in spite of having repeated the year. However, she earned an "A" in her extra, oral exam. Surely these grades, if nothing else, should prove that dyslexics aren't failures, but rather students who need special consideration in order to be able to demonstrate what they do know.
I have heard some people argue that repeating a year or even two is not at all unusual in the Flemish school system, and that perhaps it is for the best - the child has a chance to mature. But I say that such mentality is misguided, and that an educational system that is set up to fail a large percentage of its students due to non-inclusive teaching methods is doing them and itself a great disservice. It is my understanding that studies have been done which indicate that making a student repeat a year is counterproductive to the learning process, and I heartily concur. What are you teaching, other than failure? How does Freya feel about this? "They have taken a year of my life."
Dyslexics, by definition, are of normal or above normal intelligence. But they learn differently than other students. Unfortunately, most of the current educational systems were created by persons who are not dyslexic and so the methods by which dyslexics are able to learn are not taught in most teacher training programs. And this I feel is a great waste. Most children want very much to succeed, to please their parents, their teachers and themselves. But when lessons are structured in such a manner as to make learning for the dyslexic extremely difficult, if not impossible, and if examinations are given in ways dyslexics cannot indicate just how much they really do know, unnecessary failures will continue to be the result, and more years will continue to be taken away from young lives.
If persons are not able to find success, achievement or fulfillment in one system, they will seek out other systems where they can succeed, or at least be made to feel good. After a while students get tired of hitting their heads against brick walls, and time, energy and talent will turn elsewhere, perhaps to illegal activities or substance abuse.
When I was a student and eventually a teacher in the United States, I was under the impression that when a student was failing, it could be as much a fault of the teacher as it was that of the student, given, of course, that the student was attempting to learn the material. It is this background, perhaps more than any other single aspect, that forces me to conclude that Freya's failure was your failure. And Freya's success could have been your success.
Thank you very much for your kind attention to this matter, and I hope that we will all be able to learn from Freya's achievement.
Sincerely yours,
Susan van Alsenoy
The Evaluation
Concerning Freya van Alsenoy (born 16/10/1979)
Advice to the school in regards to her dyslexia problem:
Freya was tested for dyslexia on 12/19/91 and 2/5/96.
Freya is a student with a high intelligence, with a striking difference of 22 points her between verbal and performance IQ. Freya was diagnosed as seriously dyslexic.
From a technical point of view, the difficulties are both with reading and spelling. Added to this, since the last school year, are difficulties with concentration for certain courses.
Reading
Reading speed = too low
Reading techniques = Freya's reading behavior shows too many substantial faults (omitting, adding or changing words) and time consuming faults (repeating and correcting). When Freya has the time to correct her work herself, it goes fairly well. In order to follow the regular speed in the classroom, Freya will sometimes "guess" while reading. It is not an imaginary danger that, because of this, Freya will store faulty information.Spelling: Faults concerning the basics:
- confusing short and long vowels
- diaeresis (accents on words that are a part of their spelling)
- diminutives
- past participles
- suffix "heid"
Confusing sentence construction
Insufficient automatizationThe consequences of the above for school work are, among others:
- guesses reading of tasks and tests in order to finish in the set time
- errors in taking notes
- errors while reading the course contents (both printed notes and books, as well as her own notations)
- errors when reformulating the course contents (tasks and tests)
These errors are not due to lack of knowledge or understanding! Oral tests are therefore more advisable for Freya rather than written ones.
Freya is a student that since the beginning of high school has done a lot of extra effort. We mention the following:
- school years 1991 through 1995: therapy sessions at "De Puzzel," center for children and adolescents with learning difficulties, for spelling Dutch and reading French
- study counseling at St. Lugardisschool
- study counseling this year at Pius X
- extra lessons in Dutch and math, during the 2nd and 3rd trimesters 1995-96, extra tutoring in mathematics during the summer vacation of 1996
Throughout the years, Freya has shown herself to be a hard-working student who will not avoid extra effort. She will find for herself a number of compensation mechanisms and succeeds to hold herself at the scholarly level. However, she is often very tense. Her efforts were not always rewarded with good results at school report time. Because of this, Freya has often been discouraged, but nonetheless, each time she has started again with a positive attitude.
Freya is now doing her 5th (Junior) year over. The good results on her Fall report card mean a good and well-deserved start for her. To a large degree these good results are due to the "repeating" of the things learned last year. Freya is a smart student. She will retain material that she has once understood. Without extra help from the school, certainly in the case of studying new material, she will not get the results that she should get according to her possibilities and effort. There is a danger for a negative fear of failing.
In order that her school results should reflect the right picture, the following dispensations are strongly suggested:
- Not to let language errors count for those courses or parts of courses where the language is not the essential part of the content.
- Allow extra time for exams and tests for all courses.
- It is important that Freya has the time to understand the questions asked as well as possible. She has been taught at Puzzel to work in a self-correcting manner, but for this she needs more time than other students. As a result of her reading disability, Freya does not have normal reading automatisation.
Compositions (e.g. for Dutch) and other such written works, where spelling and sentence construction is taken into account, should be made on a PC. Freya can bring a portable PC to school. She can then hand in the disc, and the teacher can then print it out. When the students have to work at home on a project, Freya can, of course, do the printout herself.
Antwerpen, 19 November 1996
This evaluation was signed by the Learning Resource Leader, the School Psychologist, and the School Doctor.
Freya's Suggestions:
Freya presented these suggestions to a group of Belgian High School Teachers in 2001:
- Get lecture notes from the teacher or have someone correct your notes; mistakes are often made when I take them myself, and then when I try to learn, I am learning mistakes.
- Try to get permission to use a computer when taking tests or exams because then it is much easier to correct your own mistakes because you can read the computer print much easier than your own handwriting and therefore spot errors more readily.
- Have extra time to take exams, but don't have unlimited time because that's too unstructured; maybe the regular time plus half that again would be good.
- Ask that spelling not be counted unless absolutely necessary.
- Reversals (of letters and numbers) are a very small, and sometimes not even, part of the problem.
- Teachers should try to remember that dyslexia is not just a problem for reading and writing but that it is also an organizational problem which often results in such things as work not being handed in on time and books and other equipment being forgotten.
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Students Who Learn Differently
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EvE. Last updated 30 August 2001 EvE
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