DyslexiaCon 2023 Conference Highlights

Last week the International Dyslexia Association held their 74th Annual DyslexiaCon Conference in Columbus, Ohio. For me and members of the Branch Council, festivities began on Wednesday night with a special reception for the presidents and board members of the 44 branches of IDA.

Thursday morning I had the great honor of co-presenting a 2-hour session with Kelly Cartwright Ph.D. called Hercules Vs. Heracles, the Importance of Cognitive Flexibility. Kelly is not only brilliant, but she is also able to translate that brilliance into language and practical examples everyone can understand. To our surprise and delight, close to 500 people attended our session. Many of them stopped by my booth for Word Travel Press later that day to continue the conversation. Kelly and I are currently working on a study to determine the effects of cognitive flexibility games on decoding. To find out more, check out my website page on Cognitive Flexibility.  Kelly's publisher is offering a special discount on her book. Use code AF2E at Guilford Press.

Friday morning I started my day with a brainstorming session with the presidents of the Western Region branches (Austin, Dallas, Houston, Arizona, Utah, Rocky Moutain, and Southwest). I'm always inspired by this lively group. They shared ideas and inspirations. That night we all went to dinner at Buca Di Beppo. I have been serving as the IDA Advisor for the Western Region for over a year now, and it has been a pure delight getting to know these women who are changing laws and transforming lives.

After dinner, we attended a viewing of Harvey Hubbell's new movie, Hopeville, about a school called Hopeville that turned around student performance by implementing structured literacy. Afterward, Harvey (far left) led a discussion of the movie with leaders in the field of dyslexia.

I was so busy that I didn't get to attend many sessions, so I'm really looking forward to the conference recordings. I did take a spin around the exhibit hall and met up with my old friend Mary Jo O'Neill at the Brookes booth. She wrote a chapter for my book, Story Frames for Teaching Literacy about her work as a family advocate. She helps parents write a Family Story that they then use to help teachers and administrators better understand their students. 

I'm already getting ready for next year. The 75th Annual Conference on Reading, Literacy & Learning will be held in Dallas, Texas. I hope to see you there!

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Amy Miller and Superhero Stories

Earlier this month, Amy Miller interviewed me about my new book, Story Frames for Teaching Literacy. She is the director of the May Center for Learning and also the author of the chapter in my book entitled "Fostering a Growth Mindset: Strengths-Based Superhero Stories." She asked me several questions about Story Frames and at the end of our chat, I had the opportunity to ask her about her chapter. If you've already heard one of my previous talks about Story Frames and would like to skip ahead to the section where she discusses what got her interested in using superhero stories with diverse learners, it starts about 53 minutes into the video. You may access the video HERE. I have transcribed that section below:

Carolee: I recently did an interview with a very interesting author. Her name is Lyn Miller-Lachmann. She wrote a middle-grade novel entitled, Rogue. The main character has Asperger Syndrome and the author has Asperger's as well. That post appeared in April on my blog. Rogue is the X-Men character who can't be touched and can't touch other people. The main character of the story uses this superhero component to explain her experience with Asperger's, so it made me think about your chapter and how you use superhero stories with your students.

Amy: It was the kids who really initiated that because, as I say at the beginning of the chapter, I was not a big superhero fan when I was a kid. I really liked Spider-Man, but mostly I liked Spider-Man because of the visuals associated with him. I didn't really internalize the stories, which is so interesting because I internalized every other story. When we started the Dyslexia Justice League, which is an advocacy group for students with learning differences all across the state of New Mexico, the first thing we did was had a gathering and asked the kids to define the organization. They were the ones who came up with the name of the organization. They came up with the visuals and with the logo which was a superhero. They had heard the phrase that "Dyslexia is My Superpower," and they really loved that notion. So, they really brought the superheroes to the table, and then the more that I started thinking about and had the opportunity to talk to someone here who is a big fanatic who runs a comic shop here in Santa Fe, I recognized that superheroes face adversity and overcome that adversity. Often, that adversity is the source of their superpower. That just resonated so nicely to me and so deeply with my experience of working with kids with learning differences. When you work with kids who have learning differences there is a whole journey of acceptance that not just the child but the whole family goes through. It starts oftentimes with denial and the family not really wanting to know what's going on, thinking that maybe the child will grow out of it - all of those things that we go through as parents when we are concerned that something is going on with our kid. Then, of course, what we really come to learn, what I came to learn as an educator and as a mom of a dyslexic child myself was that the only way to persevere was to go through it and to embrace ultimately that this is who I am and that is not a bad thing. It is not something to be ashamed of. It's something that gives me strength and it is powerful. That was what really launched the whole experience for me was that idea that was so important for the students I work with particularly.

The Dyslexia Justice League has inspired many struggling learners. Thank you to Amy Miller and the May Center for the important work you do.

Watch my interview with another Story Frames contributing author and parent advocate, Mary Jo O'Neill, as she talks about her chapter, "Advocating for Students: The Family Story."

Watch the author panel where three New Mexico children's authors and I discuss Tips for Getting the Most out of Summer Reading and download the free PDF.

THE FAMILY STORY - INTERVIEW WITH PARENT ADVOCATE MARY JO O'NEILL

Mary Jo O’Neill, M.Ed. Is a Special Education Advocate at Hickman & Lowder Company in Cleveland, Ohio. As an educational advocate, Mary Jo works with families of children with learning disabilities. Her background as a teacher and intervention specialist supports collaboration with teachers, administrators, and school systems to work together to create and implement the best systems and tools for successful learning. She is a contributing author for my new book on story structure, Story Frames for Teaching Literacy. She was generous enough to give a video interview to talk about how she helps families write their family stories. The video and transcript are below.

If the video does not display correctly, you may also find it on YouTube.

INTERVIEW WITH MARY JO O’NEILL, M.ED., PARENT ADVOCATE - VIDEO TRANSCRIPT

Carolee: Good morning, Mary Jo. Thank you so much for being here with me to talk about my book and thank you for being a contributor.

Mary Jo: Thank you for having me. It’s exciting for the families. It’s exciting for the educators.

Carolee: My book is Story Frames for Teaching Literacy: Enhancing Student Learning Through the Power of Storytelling and the chapter you’ve written is “Advocating for Students: The Family Story.” In just a minute, I’m going to ask you to talk about your role as an advocate, what that means, and who you advocate for, but before we do that, I have a little story to share about how we met. 

 Carolee: Here we are in Annapolis with either George Washington or Thomas Jefferson, I’m not sure who. We were in Annapolis in 2015, along with Paula Moraine, who is also a contributing author for my book. We were there for the Destiny Meeting of the International Dyslexia Association and we were working on strategic planning for the organization. At that time, I was the president of the Southwest Branch.

Mary Jo: And I was president of the Northern Ohio Branch.

Carolee: Your chapter is in a section of my book dedicated to “The Power of the Personal Narrative.” I’ve always been involved in stories. I’m an author of young adult novels, and as a speech-language pathologist working in the public schools for twenty years, I often used stories as a medium to work on expressive and receptive language, but I was surprised to find out that writing stories was a part of your job as a parent advocate. Tell us about that. That is fascinating to me.

Mary Jo: When a parent comes to us, there is a journey. The IEP (Individualized Educational Program) process, the special education process, are pieces to the puzzle. I need to listen to their story and find out where they are in that process. Are they at the planning meeting stage? Are they at the ETR (Evaluation Team Report) pieces? Are they receiving a 504 plan? I need to actively listen to where they are, if their needs are being met, and find out how they are feeling about the process. Then I take that information and we go back to the district, and we collaborate together to make sure that their child’s needs are being met.

Carolee: You have a whole process of writing a story with the family. That’s what you talk about in my book. How do you actually come up with the story that they write that they then share with the school?

Mary Jo: I call it a non-emotional timeline. It gives us the beginning, middle, and end of their story. When did they implement Orton-Gillingham instruction? When did they add occupational therapy? We bring that story to the school district and the district might have some “aha” moments. “Oh, I didn’t know you were doing speech-language therapy at home. I didn’t realize you were doing occupational therapy? It brings the story together.

Carolee: Does the school have their own story, their own perspective or version of events?

Mary Jo: Yes, they do have their own story, and their story matters. When that student is in speech-language therapy maybe twice a week at school, and then the child is getting speech twice a week at home, we may be wondering why he is so emotionally drained when he comes home, and it might be because he’s having speech four times a week. It may not have been necessary, or maybe it was, but either way, he is emotionally drained. Listening to everybody’s story helps us figure out what’s happening throughout his day - during the school day at home. 

Carolee: That perspective-taking is something that I have found is one of the most valuable aspects of getting kids to read a variety of stories from different people, different cultures, and different backgrounds. That ability to take other people’s perspectives, not only take the perspective but to honor that perspective. That is something that we need very much in our world right now. Perspective-taking through stories, writing your own story to share your perspective, reading other people’s stories to learn theirs, is invaluable. Tell us a little bit about that perspective-taking.

Mary Jo: Everyone has their version of the narrative. We need to respect the educator’s version and we also need to respect the parents’ version. By bringing those stories together we are able to understand the child’s learning patterns and we are able to put in place better instruction, which will only support the child.

Carolee: Mary Jo, thank you so much for sharing how you advocate for smilies through stories. This has been such an invaluable addition to my book and I hope that parents are inspired and empowered now to share their stories. Thank you so much. 

Mary Jo: Thank you for having me.

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STORY FRAMES COMING SOON

I am excited and delighted to share the cover for my new book, STORY FRAMES FOR TEACHING LITERACY coming out with Brookes Publishing in early April 2021. Many of you have participated in my workshops for Story Frames (formerly The Secret Language of Stories). I have presented these strategies at ASHA, ILA/IRA, and the Annual Reading, Literacy and Learning Conference put on each year by the International Dyslexia Association (IDA), as well as many smaller conferences and workshops. 

If you have used these resources with your students and would like to share your experiences, please contact me at carolee@wordtravelliteracy.com.

Story Frames combines the strategies that teachers and SLPs implement to teach story grammar with the techniques that professional authors use to plot their books. This unique combination helps students appreciate stories at a deeper level and gives them tools for creating their own narratives. 

Here are a few of the features of the book described by the publisher:

"This guidebook reveals how to unlock literacy and learning skills by captivating K–12 students with the power of stories: how they’re structured, how they reflect and change lives, and how students can create their own original narratives. Using dozens of diverse fiction and nonfiction books as vivid examples, you’ll discover how to teach 12 key story elements (Story Frames) in dynamic, fun, and highly visual ways, including Quick Draws, storyboards, and icons that make narrative structure easy to grasp. Then you’ll get in-depth guidance on how to use knowledge of story structure to build core literacy skills—from oral language to reading comprehension—and empower students to write their own personal stories in a variety of genres. The book includes more than 35 adaptable lesson plans and a complete package of online support materials including PowerPoints and other tools for online learning." 

ONLINE MATERIALS: Implement Story Frames effectively with a full package of downloadable materials, including sample storyboards and templates, 40+ handouts and worksheets, game cards, slide decks to use in instruction, 30+ sample story analyses of books for children and young adults, and brief literature guides for applying Story Frames to picture books and to chapter books and novels.

Several noteworthy authors have contributed chapters to Story Frames including:

Amy Miller, Director of the May Center for Learning in Santa Fe, NM shares how students transform personal experiences into superhero stories. She runs a project called the Dyslexia Justice League where she uses superheroes and the Hero's Journey to help students explore personal struggles and develop a growth mindset.

Paula Moraine, educator, consultant, and author of Helping Students Take Control of Everyday Executive Functions provides practical strategies for using narratives as a medium for improving executive function skills.

Mary Jo O'Neill, parent advocate, discusses how getting parents to write down their family stories provides a powerful tool for advocacy. Her chapter highlights a type of persuasive writing that has real-world implications for students receiving special education services. 

Lesley Roessing, university lecturer and author of Bridging the Gap: Reading Critically and Writing Meaningfully to Get to the Core shares insights for teaching memoir writing and explains how memoir can be a bridge to expository writing.

William Van Cleave, educational consultant and author of Writing Matters: Designing Sentence Skills in Students of All Ages, helps educators make sense out of grammar instruction by focusing on function rather than form.

Carol Westby, university lecturer, researcher, author, and leading authority on narrative development, discusses the importance of considering multicultural perspectives in the writing of personal stories and the ways storytelling varies across countries and cultures. Her chapter also discusses strategies for empowering English as a Second Language (ESL) students. She offers several online courses through PESI including Developing Social-Emotional Skills and Self Regulation in Students: Narrative Intervention for Long-Term Academic, Personal & Social Success. 

For a full list of the downloadable resources that accompany my book, find out more at Brookes Publishing.

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