44
MARCH ‘10
Health & Fitness
PANORAMA MAGAZINE
How We Help to Create Dyslexia, ADHD, ADD, and Other Learning and Behavioral Problems (as in math) By Bob Washick, Ed.D. Learning Disabilities – 788-7649 At the American University, Washington, DC, I was trained and educated by Drs. Edith Grotberg, Paul Leedy, Nicholas Long and others. All specialists and known in their fields of learning disabilities, reading and behaviors. Part of the curriculum consisted of working in a Reading Clinic under the direction and supervision of Dr. Grotberg.. Students from surrounding schools were referred to the clinic because of academic problems. We were required to observe our students, test them, design a program from the test scores, provide and implement a program that would improve their strengths (just because you do good doesn’t mean you can’t do better) and weaknesses, and retest them to establish standardized proof the students did improve. In our final write up we would also include suggestions to the student, the parent and the school system they attended. In short, our goal was simple – the student(s) must improve. It didn’t take years to do this – this was a summer Reading Clinic, done in weeks. As I said, observing someone was required. Observing someone appears to be so simple, but it isn’t. It covers a great deal of information that allows the screener/tester with information that may not be on a test, but allows the screener to reason how, why and the way a student approaches a test, and the interim basis to complement, very, crucial to the development of a student. With that in mind, I worked as an educational consultant. Teachers in elementary grades who were going to refer a student for special education, had to see me first. After meeting the teacher and locating the student, I would make various trips to that classroom to observe the student. My job wasn’t to challenge the teacher, but to try and accommodate the teacher and the work being given and to see how the particular student and others were responding to the work. So, whenever I went into a classroom I tried to help the teacher out rather than standing out as a sore authoritative thumb. As I entered this particular classroom, the teacher was correcting math papers. The test consisted of double digit addition problems. For example, adding 81 plus 19; 27 plus 15, plus 32, etc. So, I sat
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down with her and told her to give me some papers and I would help her correct them. I went through a couple of sheets. I came across a sheet and it was apparent that the student had an answer for each and every problem, but all of the answers were wrong! My observation: Why would a student do all of the problems? In my opinion because he thought he was doing them correctly. And secondly, why were all of the answers Wrong! For example his answer to the first problem was 910, the second answer, 614. But, the answers were neat, no erasures – he was confident. So, I motioned to the student to come up (he was not one that was being referred to me) and said, It looks like you did a great job here, but show me how you got these answers. The boy proceeded – 8 plus 1 is 9, and 1 plus 9 is 10, so I got 910, for this problem and I added 2 plus 1 plus 3, and I got 6, and I added 7 plus 5 plus 2 and I got 14, so my answer is 614 for this problem. I then had new and different information. This was a test. Research shows that when you are under stress you might return to an earlier form of learning. What did this boy first learn. He learned to add single digit columns. And, that is exactly what he did here. He added the first column on the left side. And then he added the second column. But when you add two column addition you start from the Reverse side - the Right side, not the Left side. I knew the teacher had taught that when you add two columns you start from the Right side of the column and then go to the left side and/ or carry the number over to the left side. I asked him if he remembered that. Ohhhhh, yeh! OK, make those changes. This boy went from making a zero to getting a hundred. So, let’s rewrite the brain.
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