Jennie Sjursen 0:00
My child is just beginning to get the hang of reading, but their writing is horrendous. They just melt down anytime we ask them to write anything. Is this part of their dyslexia?
Jennie Sjursen 0:13
I'm Jenny Sjursen, ex special educator turned dyslexia interventionist. It wasn't so long ago that I too, was overwhelmed by balance literacy versus structured literacy, education speak, and everything in between. Fast forward after many, many hours of self driven education. And you'll see I've built a thriving dyslexia practice helping students from ages six to 18. My specialties, working with, quote unquote difficult almost always to the student, and breaking down the complexities of dyslexic to everyday language strategies and action steps.
Jennie Sjursen 0:54
Before we dive in, can you do me a huge favor? Would you mind sending this episode or just sharing my podcast with three of your friends, I've been working really hard to put out valuable content to support parents with dyslexic children. And I want to make sure it gets into the hands of the people that need it the most. So grab the link to this episode of podcast text at two three fans. Or you can just click the share button. Whatever works for you, but I would be forever grateful. Thank you.
Jennie Sjursen 1:23
At the beginning of June, I took one of the writing revolutions three day trainings. It's a training I've wanted to take for years but can never fit into my schedule. Finally, this June, I saw my chance. I want to share with you all some of my takeaways, and how their approach fits in with the instruction for dyslexics. So let's dive in. If you've been listening for a while now you know that all language B, oral reading or writing are intrinsically interwoven. You can't have one without the others. And a weakness in one will also show up as weaknesses in the other two.
Jennie Sjursen 2:04
Take this a step further. And you can see how dyslexia not only affects the ability to read, but also impacts writing skills. Dyslexics frequently have difficulty expressing their thoughts and ideas effectively on paper. And if you listen to our podcast on dysgraphia, Episode 19 dysgraphia, the Forgotten dis, you'll realize there are a lot of crossovers between dyslexia and dysgraphia. In that episode, we talked about sentence formation. dysgraphia a weakness not only in understanding sentence structure, syntax and basic grammar skills, but also a weakness and the ability to organize thoughts and get them down on paper.
Jennie Sjursen 2:48
As I said earlier, the exact same things that dyslexic struggles with when trying to write. But here's the thing. Gen Ed kids are struggling with this too. Why? Because no one teaches the teachers how to teach writing. These next few stats were provided to me during the training. The first one is from 2016 and is attributed to brindle Graham, Harrison Hiebert, quote, three out of 4/3 and fourth grade teachers reported that their college teacher preparation programs provided no or minimal instruction on how to teach writing. That's 75% of third and fourth grade teachers who don't feel prepared to teach writing. That's astounding.
Jennie Sjursen 3:36
Not far off. In 2009, Cahora Hakan and Graham found, quote, 71% of high school teachers surveyed indicated they received either no or minimal formal preparation to teach writing in their college teacher education program. I totally fall into either one of those categories. The majority of my teacher preparation focused on reading comprehension, not the foundations of reading or writing.
Jennie Sjursen 4:05
So how many of these teachers approach teaching writing in the classroom? You may have heard the saying, quote, good readers are good writers and good writers are good readers. And this is true. But you need to know the framework and rules for the both of those before that can happen. Just like teachers have whole language reading thought exposure to rich language and books will lead to strong readers. Many teachers thought if they expose their students to examples of strong and rich writing, their students will eventually become those strong, rich writers. It doesn't work that way.
Jennie Sjursen 4:40
And here come a few more stats. In 2011, the US Department of Education found quote, only 27% of students in grade eight through 12 are proficient in writing. Those students must have had the 25% of the teachers who felt prepared to teach writing. But here is where we see the long term effects. Access, poor writing instruction. And the 2019 AC T annual report, they found, quote 41% of students who took American College Testing AC T did not score well enough to meet the readiness benchmarks for a college level, English composition class.
Jennie Sjursen 5:20
I shared that stat with my sister, a former college history professor. She actually thought the stock was too low and that easily half if not more of her freshman students had no idea how to put a sentence together, let alone a paragraph. She told me she spent nearly as much time teaching her students how to write as she did teaching them history. And as an aside, her students don't know how lucky they were. Her undergraduate degree was in creative writing. My sister knows writing.
Jennie Sjursen 5:50
But it doesn't end there. In the 2021 how college contributes to workforce success, they stated, quote, employers find that less than half of college graduates are proficient writers. Wow. Wow, wow. Now, what would happen if we went all the way back to the beginning to the point where one of these employees started kindergarten, and we provided them with a structured, systematic and explicit writing instruction? See where I'm going here. It's the same exact approach that we use when teaching dyslexic storied, structured, systematic and explicit.
Jennie Sjursen 6:31
The writing revolution approach fits this to a tee and approach originally created by Judith Hochman. Now, before I go further, I need to point out that this approach is for expository writing, think academic essays, scientific reports, term papers, business reports, you get the idea. The writing revolution or T WR starts at the sentence level, basically, what is a sentence and then systematically adds new layers. It weaves in note taking along the way. And by the time you reach the five paragraph level, you have a repeatable, systematic approach and approach that several of Hoffman's former students have taken with them through college and beyond.
Jennie Sjursen 7:18
I originally bought the writing revolution book, which goes into detail on their approach and read through the sections on sentences. I focused on sentences as that's what my students need the most. And at the time, I considered notetaking to be further down the road. Plus I hate note taking, and was never formally taught how it was more of a madly writing half sentences down at a frantic speed when I had to do it. But I didn't pick up on all the nuances until it took the training. For instance, I didn't realize how the concept of note taking was woven in at the very beginning. Starting with finding keywords, those keywords eventually turned into a note taking system, which in turn supports the writing.
Jennie Sjursen 8:02
So now you know my students are definitely going to learn note taking along with sentence building. I also love their version of the graphic organizers. So many of my students hate graphic organizers. There's not enough space, there's no system to using them. And in general, they're almost as overwhelming as a blank piece of paper. A student familiar with a TW or graphic organizer can easily create their own on a blank piece of paper in any situation or setting that magic. The T WR system is very structured and explicit and systematic.
Jennie Sjursen 8:39
I've started weaving in elements with several of my students, and so far the majority have said, writing this way and going through the steps is so much easier. It gives them a way in to organize the information, their thoughts, and a starting point for writing. A couple of them I've outright said why didn't they teach me this in school.
Jennie Sjursen 9:02
To wrap up over the last few years reading has been pushed into the forefront. Awareness is heightened and small changes are beginning to be seen in school systems across the country. Writing is the last frontier. You cannot pull a thread and separate language into individual parts when teaching. They are all interwoven. And just like reading, writing needs to be taught using a structured explicit and systematic approach.
Jennie Sjursen 9:29
If you have any further questions about the role of writing instruction for Dyslexics, please feel free to sneak into my inbox. We'd also love your input. What would you like to hear from us in the future? Is there a topic we haven't covered yet? You really want to learn more about or do you have a pressing need and you're not really sure how to handle it or move forward? Send us a DM on Instagram or drop us an email at Jennie at literacy untangle. That's Jenny je n n i e at literacy untangled. We can't wait to hear from you. Until next time, bye bye.
Jennie Sjursen 10:04
I hope you enjoyed this episode of literacy untangled. If you love this episode as much as I did, head on over and rate and subscribe so you never miss an episode. If you want to continue the conversation or share your takeaways head on over to our Instagram at literacy untangled, and comment on your favorite part. I can't wait to hang out with you again soon. Bye
