Alida's Learning Nuggets: ALL PLD Dyslexia, ASD and Anxiety

Great PD! Diverse Learners
What I have taken from it:

Anger is another presentation of anxiety. Fight, flight, freeze

(Images borrowed from NZ Anxiety website)

How can we as teachers help?

Explicit coaching around emotions for kids that flare up out of nowhere. Talking through physical aggression. Listen to your body. How do you feel? How is your heart feeling? What do you feel like doing right now? What else could you do?

Prevention is better than reaction. Know your learners well enough to know how much they can cope with. If they can work for ten minutes, stop at 8 minutes.

Parents:

Parents of diverse students are often tired and overloaded as they have been dealing with their children for a long time. They don't need teachers telling them how bad their children are. Communication and building relationships with parents of diverse learners are extremely important. Showering them with love. Then they will feel supported - and will support us.

To get accelerations for diverse students, we need to use a holistic approach, not just learning. Include teaching about emotions, attitude, active participation, self-esteem, taking risks, self-managing.

Teacher agency is okay!! Recognizing, today is not the day to teach this specific activity that I planned. Press pause and revisit at another time. If that means they need time outside to play ball before they come back to learn, that is okay. Make the call.

Reporting for diverse learners – could include attitude, confidence etc. Not necessarily tests…

Learner Action Plan

Tap into their strengths; e.g. possibly let them take the lead in something. If they like science, use science to get them to do the writing.

In the classroom:

Set things up that is available for everybody, but have a rule that when Student Anxiety needs a quiet space, they might have to stand up and give him space. Talk to your class.

Explaining that we are all different, some like sport, others not, etc, etc.

Setting a culture of caring, acceptance, and understanding.

Diverse Students:

Dyslexia can learn to read, write and study efficiently when they use methods geared to their unique learning style.

ASD has lots of things going for them. Topic interests, exceptional memory for facts and figures, a high degree of accuracy, attention to detail, follow instructions and rules very accurately, creative arts

Honest, loyal, sense of humour, hobbies

Universal design for learning (UDL) a good approach for diverse learners.

Engagement, representation, action and expression.

Think of visually busy and quiet spaces.

Dyslexia – recognising letters on the keypad is a challenge. Might be better to write than type.

Myths: that they read backward or spelling being jumbled.

It’s about trouble remembering letters symbols for sounds and letter patterns in words.

Explicit phonics teaching makes it better.

They don’t have a lower level of intelligence.

Tips for dyslexia:

1. Specific and explicit phonics instruction

2. Build their vocab and comprehension through audiobooks

3. Front-loading before group learning- do not let a dyslexia student do Guided reading before they have listened to the MP3, read it with somebody beforehand or read the book before the time. It’s too hard. Don’t let them decode for the first time in a group and expect them to read. Too stressful.

4. Move from the known to unknown. Working from at to cat or like to bike etc

5. Avoid passive phrases and sarcasm or double meanings. They don’t understand.

6. Praise is very important. Praise them for asking questions.

7. Find ways to provide increased processing e.g. deliberately pausing after you ask a question

8. Check-in with students soon after they commence work to ensure they’ve got it right – if they haven’t, ensure you put them on the right track

TKI Online SoundSense a good phonics program.

If testing:

- Digital Clock

- Short breaks in the middle, tests in two parts

- Multisensory approaches work best

- Quick drawing to illustrate concepts

- Use pictures, diagrams and charts and use coloured highlighters for emphasis

- Use real objects as props

When anxiety is high, reduce the demands, when anxiety is low, increase the demands.

https://www.theottoolbox.com/ OT Website’

Sensory pathways see 3D stickers of a bridge can be good in a corridor to give anxious students a chance to move when anxiety is high.

Weatbags on their shoulders could ground them.

Do heavy work for diverse kids before expecting them to sit down and learn e.g. wheelbarrow - picking up leaves or digging in the garden, that cannot settle to sit down and learn.

Zones of regulations – see website Lea Khypers a strategy to identify emotions