All posts by Allison Hungerford

Data-Driven Instruction: Everyday Tips for Teachers

For Schools, Helpful Tips, Professional Development, , , , , ,

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At many schools, conversations about data-driven instruction are focused on formal progress monitoring tools and the school’s data wall. While assessments are necessary, there is also valuable data to be found in the classroom everyday. Through formative assessment, teachers are gathering data during lessons and activities, while learning is taking place. They can use the data to make instructional decisions in the moment—increasing or decreasing the level of difficulty, or zeroing in on a difficult concept.

 

Identify areas of weakness

For classrooms and intervention groups of all ages, be aware of what component of reading students are struggling with. Monitor phonological awareness, word attack, sight word recognition, contextual fluency, oral vocabulary, and comprehension.

 

Drill down on decoding

Note the following for your students who struggle to read fluently:

  • Response time for recognizing common words
  • Response time for sounding out new words
  • Consonant and vowel sounds that are challenging
  • Phonetic or orthographic spelling patterns
  • Complexity of syllables that are challenging
  • Ability to self-correct errors

Use the decoding data to determine reading levels and amount of work on individual tasks as the focus of your lessons. For example, if your students are slowly sounding sight words phonetically, adjust instruction away from phonological awareness toward activities that build sight word recognition and fluency.

 

Question comprehension

Most reading experts agree on one thing: in order to comprehend what they read, students must have strong decoding skills and adequate oral vocabulary. In other words, they must be able to accurately decode the words on the page and also know what those words mean. Unfortunately, many students who are able to decode well and understand words continue to demonstrate weak comprehension skills. Comprehension ability can be identified and addressed separately.

 

During contextual reading, or other tasks that require language comprehension, note the following:

  • Response time to comprehension questions
  • Accuracy of responses
  • Grasp of concrete vs. abstract content
  • Ability to use the context to identify new vocabulary
  • Ability to answer critical thinking questions (e.g. “What might happen next? Why do you think. . .?”)

It can be difficult to determine if students are truly comprehending. Try gauging understanding by asking how students imaged, or pictured, the story (or the lecture, or the directions, etc.). Ask questions that stimulate imagery—this will provide immediate feedback as to whether the students “got it” or not. For example, if students have a difficult time responding to “What do you picture for evaporation?” the teachers can adjust the lesson, in the moment, to help students develop an image.

 

Real-time RtI

Your classroom observations, along with assessment data, can inform next-step instruction decisions. Use the results from the skills assessed to choose an intervention that will address the cause of your students’ weaknesses. Lindamood-Bell’s research-validated programs address the imagery-language connection that is a silent partner to cognition and literacy.

 

As an educator, you can learn the steps of our programs to use in your classroom or small-group intervention. Consider attending one of our upcoming workshops, all available live online:

 

Help for Struggling Readers

Seeing Stars (SI)

Symbol Imagery for Phonological and Orthographic Processing in Reading and Spelling

Lindamood Phoneme Sequencing (LiPS)

Phonemic Awareness for Reading, Spelling, and Speech

 

Help for Poor Comprehension Skills

Visualizing and Verbalizing (VV)

Concept Imagery for Language Comprehension, Thinking, and Memory

Talkies

Foundational Development in Concept Imagery, Oral Language Comprehension, and Expression

 

 

 

Lindamood-Bell and EIS—Partnering for Student Success

Comprehension, Decoding, ELL, For Schools, Professional Development

Nestled against the El Merendon mountain range, Escuela Internacional Sampedrana (EIS) seeks to be the premier school in San Pedro Sula and La Lima, Honduras through the use of best teaching practices. With a student population ranging from 3-18 years old, the school’s stated mission is to prepare bilingual students with the academic/social/emotional skills and universal values to succeed in the universities of their choice and to contribute positively to society.

Since 2010, Lindamood-Bell has been a proud partner in that mission. Early on, Lindamood-Bell staff members relocated to Honduras to deliver workshops and ongoing classroom coaching for Student Success Center teachers. These days, we would refer to the small groups as Tier 3 or Muli-tier System of Supports (MTSS) instruction, but back then, EIS just knew they needed literacy programs and mentoring to help their struggling learners close the gap with decoding and comprehension skills.

Fast forward to today and EIS is using Lindamood-Bell programs across its entire MTSS framework. All Early Childhood Center and Elementary teachers are trained, on both campuses, and whole classroom instruction in Talkies, Seeing Stars, and Visualizing & Verbalizing is decreasing the numbers of students referred for additional learning support. Plus, with virtual technology improvements and many EIS staff with nearly a decade of experience in these programs, the 2019-2020 school year workshops for new teachers and ongoing coaching are all being delivered online. We are proud to share 10 years of success with EIS, and the results of intensive instruction in Seeing Stars and/or Visualizing & Verbalizing speak for themselves—large standard score changes on all measures.

“I am excited to celebrate 10 years of partnership with Lindamood-Bell! There is no magic wand to fix a learning difficulty; nevertheless, I have witnessed how Lindamood-Bell programs have enlightened a clear pathway for creating magic and aiding struggling learners to reach academic goals. Consistency and intensity of intervention are the keys to success. In these 10 years, my school has served more than 400 Tier 2 and Tier 3 bilingual students into significant academic accomplishments in partnership with Lindamood-Bell.” – Laura Martinez, Special Educator, Student Success Center Lead for Elementary, EIS

Watch this video to learn more about Lindamood-Bell’s school partnership with EIS.

Download Decoding Results

Download Comprehension Results

Contact us

 

or call 800.233.1819 for more information.

 

 

 

Working with Your Child’s Teacher: Tips for a Great New School Year

Helpful Tips

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Between the stacks of sheets to sign and return and the back-to-school night presentations, all the new school year information can become overwhelming. But get beyond the dress codes, hot lunch orders, and school supply lists and you can find valuable information about how to forge a great working relationship with your child’s teacher—open lines of communication can have a positive impact on your child’s school year.  

Preferred Method of Communication

Communication between the teacher, student, and parent is essential for success. An important detail to know is how your child’s teacher prefers to communicate—email, phone, notes or text—or all of the above? Questions will invariably arise regarding an assignment or an issue in the classroom and it’s necessary to know how to reach the teacher and vice versa.

Classroom Volunteer Opportunities

Your child’s teacher most likely has several opportunities for parent volunteer hours. These may include helping with in-class assignments or special occasions. When during school hours helping is not possible, ask for tasks you can help with after hours, such as grading papers, ordering books, or helping set up the class website. If your schedule allows, take advantage of these opportunities—they give you a first-hand perspective of the the classroom beyond your child’s experience. Donating time to the classroom communicates to the teacher, and your child, how much you value their work.

Homework Expectations

Review the Back-to-School night paperwork for important information about the teacher’s plan for homework. Become familiar with the system for homework assignments. Know where homework assignments can be found and how often new assignments will be given. For example, some teachers send home a packet on Monday with a Friday deadline. Find out how much time the teacher expects your child to spend on homework each night. Preparing your family schedule for nightly or weekly assignments can make a big difference.

If it is not included in the information, find out what the teacher expects your role to be in homework. Are you expected to correct your child’s work? What about spelling? Would the teacher like feedback when an assignment took a lot of discussion to get going?

When you are on the same page as the teacher, you are better prepared to help your child with homework. And when you do help, try using language that encourages them to visualize. Starting with the assignment itself—ask them if they have a clear picture of what is due when. What does that look like? Do they have an image for what the task is? And when your child is reading about a new topic, ask questions that stimulate imagery like, “what does that word make you picture?”

The imagery-language connection is necessary for understanding and following directions, both key elements for success in the classroom.

Instruction Goals

Learn the teacher’s instructional goals for your child’s class this year. If possible, find out the general content and skill expectations for reading, comprehension, writing, and math. For example, in math, find out if your child will be just learning the concept of multiplication or if they will be responsible for knowing math facts.

Knowing this information is helpful in order to gauge your child’s progress throughout the year. If she starts to struggle, you will know early enough to get in communication with the teacher and prevent her from falling behind.

Keep Asking Questions

Your good example of communicating clearly and often with your child’s teacher can rub off on your child, too. Successful students ask questions if they aren’t sure what they are supposed to do or what is expected of them. Remind your child that it is always okay to clarify directions or check for understanding with their teacher. It’s better to ask a question and fully understand than it is to guess and complete work incorrectly.

However, if you notice your child continues to struggle with understanding even after talking with his teacher, there could be a comprehension weakness interfering with his understanding.

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We hope these back-to-school tips help your child have a great year. However, if you notice your child struggling while working on homework or following assignment directions, contact your local learning center about how we can help.

Imagine Better School-Day Mornings: Tips for Back-to-School

Helpful Tips, Instruction, ,

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Perhaps your kids just spent the summer at camp. Or they spent long hours in the pool or at the beach. Maybe lazy days were spent reconnecting with friends and family. Regardless, the back-to-school transition may be a big change for your family. Why not take this opportunity to establish new habits that contribute to a successful year!

 

Below, explore ideas on how to make school-day mornings better. We’ve included tips for how you can encourage your child to make mental pictures during everyday tasks.  The imagery-language connection is key to good thinking and communication.

 

Imagine a better bedtime

If your kids are like most, they spent summer evenings watching television or movies, or playing video games, later than they should. The physical and mental challenges of school, paired with an earlier wake-up time, call for most kids needing an earlier bedtime during the year. Transitioning about a week before school starts can be helpful; and, depending on your goal bedtime, about 15 to 30 minutes earlier each night is an easy way to adjust.

 

Tip: When discussing any new healthy habit, try using language that helps create images. For example, instead of just, “It is important to go to bed,” add, “What does it look like when you are in class and you are very tired?”

 

Tip: Establish a simple bedtime routine that you discuss and visualize together. For example, instead of just, “Time to brush your teeth!” ask them to picture, “What do you see yourself doing after you get your pajamas on?”

 

Imagine getting organized the night before

Set aside time in the evening to get organized for the next day. Packing lunches the night before and having your kids organize their clothes in a tidy pile they can easily grab in the morning can be big time-savers. And working with them to get their backpacks organized—homework assignments in order, permission slips signed, and packing gear for extra curricular activities— can eliminate a lot of the “morning madness.”

 

Tip: Have your kids create a mental picture for the next day. Ask questions to stimulate imagery like, “Tomorrow is Tuesday. Where do you see yourself going after school? What do you see yourself wearing [at ballet, tennis, etc]? Let’s pack it!”

 

Imagine a morning schedule

It might seem like a child’s morning responsibilities are so simple, that they could not possibly require a schedule.  But if you find yourself repeating the same orders morning after morning, why not try something new and set an actual schedule. You can do a quick review of it the night before to ensure your kids understand what they need to do in the morning; and, have them imagine the order of their morning tasks.

 

Tip: Some kids will benefit from having the schedule written out and available, along with a clock. For example:

 

6:45 – Wake Up & Make Bed

7:00 – Eat Breakfast

7:15 – Get Dressed, Brush Hair & Brush Teeth

7:30 – Backpack Check & Out the Door

 

Rather than just reiterating the schedule (“Remember to check your backpack!”), use language that creates images: “What room do you see yourself going to after breakfast?” Connecting language and imagery is a great way to make sure your child understands what they have to do.

 

We hope these tips have you imagining better school-day mornings! If you notice your child is struggling to get organized or to remember their morning routine, it may be due to a weakness in concept imagery—the ability to create an imaged gestalt (whole) from language. The imagery-language connection is necessary for comprehension, following oral directions, and higher order thinking skills. To learn more about concept imagery, contact your local learning center: 800-300-1818.

Michigan Schools Using Lindamood-Bell Response to Intervention (RtI) Services Make Academic State Champs List

For Schools, Professional Development, Research, RTI

Background

Glenwood Elementary School (Kentwood Public Schools) in Grand Rapids, Michigan serves a large percentage of students who are at risk of reading failure. During the 2010-11 through 2012-13 school years, Glenwood implemented Lindamood-Bell instruction in Tier III. Students received Seeing Stars and Visualizing and Verbalizing instruction to develop symbol imagery and concept imagery for reading and comprehension. Instruction was delivered by Glenwood teachers who received Lindamood-Bell professional development. In an independent analysis conducted by Public Sector Consultants, student gains were measured with the state achievement test and the results were compared to gains made by students from all other elementary schools in the state of Michigan. After controlling for socioeconomic status, 1,210 elementary schools were ranked according to achievement exceeding expectations.

 

In addition to Glenwood Elementary School, four other Kentwood schools implementing Lindamood-Bell also made the Academic State Champs list. See chart below:

 

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Results

Five Kentwood elementary schools made the Academic State Champs list, with Glenwood ranking 3rd out of 1,210 schools. According to the article, “Five of the 10 Kentwood Public Schools’ elementaries are champs – the most of any district in the state – and the other five in the diverse, 8,800-student district are deemed exceeding expectations.”

 

The results of this study illustrate how Lindamood-Bell instruction in the Seeing Stars and Visualizing and Verbalizing programs can change a student’s ability to access curriculum. In Glenwood, developing the imagery-language connection for reading and comprehension made a difference for students in Tier III, as well as their entire school community.

 

Profile

School Years: 2010-11 through 2012-13
Number of Students: 1,210
Grade Level: Elementary
Lindamood-Bell Programs Implemented:
– Seeing Stars®
– Visualizing and Verbalizing®

 

Focus of Lindamood-Bell Services:
– Teacher Workshops
– Coaching via Telepresence Robot
– Instructional Leadership Support

 

Lindamood-Bell instruction can change learning for students, regardless of their previous struggle with language and literacy. Contact us to learn how your school can get started: 800-233-1819.

More Than Tutoring: Why Intensive Instruction Works

* News, Instruction, Learning Difficulties

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Those who are new to Lindamood-Bell instruction may be more familiar with traditional tutoring and programs which are generally conducted 1 to 3 hours a week over the course of months or years. Therefore, recommendations for intensive intervention—4 hours/day and 5 days a week—may be a new concept.

 

If your child is having difficulty with reading, spelling, reading comprehension, or math, they are most likely suffering from a language processing weakness. In order for an individual to become a global, independent reader and thinker, strength in these areas is absolutely mandatory. Your child’s sensory-cognitive functions must be intact, specifically their phoneme awareness—the ability to auditorily perceive sounds within words, symbol imagery—the ability to create mental imagery for sounds and letters within words, and concept imagery—the ability to create an imagined or imaged gestalt (whole) from language. If there is a breakdown within any of these areas, your child will struggle and experience frustration.

 

There is hope! These sensory-cognitive functions can be developed. In order for your child to strengthen his language-imagery connection, daily intensive instruction is necessary. Why daily intensive instruction? Nanci Bell provides reasoning for daily intensive instruction in the following excerpt from Visualizing and Verbalizing for Language Comprehension and Thinking:

 

“The rate of learning gain can be improved with intensive intervention. Students with severe weakness in concept imagery may be years behind in language comprehension. For example, Johnny, a student in the fifth grade with reading comprehension at the second-grade level, has a three-year gap between his grade level and his reading comprehension. Even with adequate oral vocabulary and decoding skills, Johnny didn’t gain a year in reading comprehension for each year in school…intervention has to decrease the learning gap by increasing the rate of learning. To increase the rate of learning, you need to provide the right diagnosis and the right instruction, in the right environment. The last is often intensive intervention, four hours a day, five days a week, which results in years of gain in weeks of instruction.”

 

But will it work for MY child?

 

Parents often worry that their child will not be able to maintain focus for so many hours. Lindamood-Bell sessions are organized to involve a high level of interaction, movement, games, and motivational rewards.  Students work with a different tutor every hour to keep the levels of attention and intensity high and the sessions interesting.  Further, our students see the success quickly and realize they can learn given the right tools!

 

To hear a very powerful story from a family about their decision to do intensive instruction, view Why We Chose Intensive Intervention.

Helping Schools Close the Achievement Gap

* News, For Schools, Professional Development

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Lindamood-Bell’s® research-validated programs address the imagery-language connection that is a silent partner to cognition and literacy, and is often the missing piece in helping students close the achievement gap.

Our unique programs can help diverse groups of students learn to read, comprehend, and compute to their potential, including students with minor to severe learning challenges and English Language Learners.

We have created school implementation and professional development options designed to maximize student achievement, including Lindamood-Bell Learning Center on Campus (LCOC).

A Lindamood-Bell LCOC creates an instant literacy center, bringing the specialized environment and instruction of our Learning Centers to your school, and starts meeting your students’ needs on day one.

Check out examples of how schools are transforming the lives of their students with a Lindamood-Bell Learning Center on Campus:

Reading Gains for Targeted Students in a Large Urban District

An elementary school located in a large, urban district on the East Coast serves a large percentage of students who are at-risk of reading failure. During the 2012–13 school year, this school implemented Lindamood-Bell instruction to address the specific needs of this student population. Fourteen students received an average of 104 hours of Seeing Stars® instruction to develop symbol imagery for reading. Lindamood-Bell staff delivered instruction. Student gains were measured with a battery of reading assessments.

Results

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The students who received Seeing Stars instruction achieved significant improvements in reading. They made large standard score changes on all measures. Additionally, the 25-point percentile increase in phonemic awareness put these students well within the normal range (25th–75th percentile). Their pre- to posttest results were statistically significant on all measures.

Elementary School Provides Intervention to its Neediest Learners

A private elementary school located in the South implemented Lindamood-Bell instruction during the 2013-14 school year. Eighteen students received an average of 97 hours of primarily Seeing Stars instruction to develop symbol imagery for reading. Instruction was delivered by Lindamood-Bell staff. Student gains were measured with a battery of reading assessments.

 

Results

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On average, Seeing Stars students achieved significant improvements in reading. They made large standard score changes on all measures. Additionally, the 18-point percentile increase in comprehension put these students within the normal range (25th-75th percentile). Their pre- to posttest results were statistically significant on all measures.

Students At-Risk for Reading Failure Receive Help at School

An elementary school located in a large, urban district on the East Coast serves a large percentage of students who are at-risk of reading failure. During the 2013-14 school year, this school implemented Lindamood-Bell instruction to address the specific needs of this student population. Twelve students received an average of 197 hours of primarily Seeing Stars instruction to develop symbol imagery for reading. Instruction was delivered by Lindamood-Bell staff. Student gains were measured with two reading assessments.

Results

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On average, Seeing Stars students achieved significant improvements in reading. They made large standard score changes on both measures. Additionally, the 65-point percentile increase in word recognition put these students above the normal range (25th-75th percentile). Their pre- to posttest results were statistically significant on both measures.

 

The results for these students illustrate how Lindamood-Bell instruction in the Seeing Stars program can change learning, regardless of their previous struggle with language and literacy.

 

Learn more about these innovative partnerships, including how schools can bring genuine Lindamood-Bell Instruction to their campus here.

 

Click here to watch an inspirational video regarding the difference our LCOC is making in a large urban district.

 

Nanci Bell to present at University of Exeter Medical School, International Conference: The Eye’s Mind: Visual Imagination, Neuroscience and the Humanities

* News, Events, Research

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‘The Eye’s Mind’ is a study, based out of the University of Exeter, of the neural basis of visual imagination, and the individual differences in the ability to visualize.

 

A conference exploring the project’s findings will be held May 21-22, 2016. The Eye’s Mind: Visual Imagination, Neuroscience and the Humanities is an international conference at Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts, University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK.

 

Lindamood-Bell co-founder, and author of Visualizing and Verbalizing for Language Comprehension and Thinking, Nanci Bell, and Lindamood-Bell Research and Development Director, Paul Worthington, are honored to contribute to the conference dialogue on the role of imagery with the following presentation:

 

Visual Imagery: The Nonverbal Code for Language and Cognition

 

Imagery is the silent partner to language in human cognition. Behavioral neuroscience in America has validated the role of visual imagery in education as foundational to cognition, specifically for oral and written language comprehension. Recent neurological and behavioral research documents the role of visual imagery in remediating deficits in the area of visual imagination (such as aphantasia) as related to corresponding deficits in language comprehension. These studies are grounded in Dual Coding Theory (DCT) which posits that the dual coding of verbal and nonverbal information underlies human cognition. The application of DCT in a systematic instructional approach has successfully stimulated the nonverbal code of imagery for language in individuals of all ages.  Based on 30 years of instructional experience with 35,000 children in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia, five important aspects of the imagery-language connection have been revealed: 1) there are dramatic individual differences in the ability to generate visual imagery, 2) there is a significant correlation between visual imagination and language comprehension, 3) individuals can be taught to consciously generate visual images, resulting in significant gains in reading and language comprehension, 4) linking the sensory input of imagery to language results in significant neurological changes and reading improvements in children with dyslexia, and 5) stimulating the imagery-language connection in children with autism spectrum disorder improves language comprehension that is accompanied by fundamental changes in the connectivity of the brain regions involved in reading comprehension.

 

Learn more about The Eye’s Mind Study and Conference.

 

Tullahoma City Schools Team up With Lindamood-Bell’s Lucky the Robot

* News, For Schools, Professional Development

With the help of four robots named Lucky, instructors at Tennessee’s Tullahoma City Schools (TCS) and Lindamood-Bell Learning Processes have teamed up to provide an innovative way to educate students.

The goal of the partnership with TCS’s four elementary schools and Lindamood-Bell Learning Processes is to offer long-distance reading support using these instructional robots.

According to Kim Adkins, district assessment coordinator, “We and another district are the only two to try this program within the state of Tennessee. I talked to the principal at that school district in Anderson County and he went school-wide with the program. He said that of all the students they didn’t have one kid who did not show progress.”  

Access Full Article 

San Luis Valley Board of Cooperative Educational Services (BOCES) Partners with Lindamood-Bell

* News, For Schools, Professional Development

“The Colorado Department of Education provided the San Luis Valley BOCES an opportunity to improve literacy across our 14 member districts through an initiative called Increasing Achievement and Growth Grant: Literacy for All Students with Disabilities. We decided to create a partnership with Lindamood-Bell. This initiative has allowed us to provide personnel with professional development in research-validated programs. We have been able to provide mentoring, coaching, support for students and staff. We have been given a common goal and process for success.

The results from our first year implementation showed we increased proficiency rate for students with disabilities on state assessments in reading by 7.5% of the population. As an administrator, it was amazing to see the students grow and the teachers receive the professional development and coaching supports they need to be successful. Now that makes me feel like a good instructional leader. I am finally giving to staff and students the tools to grow.”

Nita McAuliffe is the  Executive Director of Exceptional Student Services for the San Luis Valley BOCES, which oversees special education services for their 14 member districts in the San Luis Valley in Colorado.  The BOCES is currently in its last year of a 4-year initiative to provide professional development for its faculty in delivering quality, intensive literacy intervention for their special education students and students at-risk of requiring special education services.