Yes, There’s a Chest of Drawers in Your Brain!

Yes, There’s a Chest of Drawers in Your Brain! 

My last blog post entitled “Wait! I have a Chest of Drawers in My Head?” explained how I help lessen children’s frustration and fear when they feel as if they don’t have control over their own learning.  

I start by talking about our amazing brains and what they do for us every day. Together we explore our five senses as I guide them to the realization that their senses and their brain work together. 

At this point, I introduce my analogy of the “chest of drawers in their brain”. This analogy is fun and silly and activates all parts of their brain with the use of imagination, story and drawing. It gives them a “tangible, seeable” way to understand how their brain naturally works, and they begin to “see” how they actually have control of their learning. 

 I begin by asking my kiddos to imagine the memory part of their brain being divided into drawers much like the chest of drawers in their bedroom. I have them draw their chest of drawers and share what‘s inside each drawer.  

We then spend time imagining how each letter sound has its drawer in the chest of drawers in their brain. Each combination of letters making a special sound(s) has its drawer. Each word has its drawer. Each phonics rule has its drawer. We draw and label lots and lots of drawers!  

We image all the drawers our brains would have and laugh at our silly images and drawings.  

Suddenly the realization of the enormous task their brain is required to do, and does daily, in order for them to remember what they’re learning bursts into their consciousness. I begin to see fear creep into their eyes. 

This is when I assure each child that THEY are in control of ALL those drawers just like they’re in control of where they put their socks. I assure them that the drawers are not random and stacked in the crazy ways we’ve been drawing them.  

I remind them that it’s natural for their brain to find commonalities and patterns, to sequence, to draw conclusions, to analyze, to synthesize, and to evaluate and that their brain has been doing this since before they were born which means THEY have been organizing the “drawers” in their brain all along.  

I assure them that since they are an expert at finding commonalities and patterns, at drawing conclusions, at sequencing, at analyzing, at synthesizing, and at evaluating, they have been and will continue to choose the perfect “drawer” for everything every time. 

Further, since THEY are choosing the perfect “drawers”, it’s easy for them to remember whatever they want when they want it. I assure them they know where everything is. 

Together we imagine how their brain has organized their “chest of drawers” and has been putting all their learning in the perfect places (drawers). We draw this organized chest of drawers. 

This drawing helps me emphasize that since THEY alone have been using their five senses, collecting information and storing it, THEY ALONE are in control of their brain.  

We laugh and have fun imagining someone like their parents, teachers or friends trying to put things in their brain.  

To support their feelings of “ownership” of their learning, I share that they may get excited, nervous or worried and feel like they can’t remember an answer or concept, but the truth is always there – they always have been and still are in control of where they stored that answer or concept and they stored it in the perfect most logical place. 

To strengthen their understanding and feeling of control, we continue by talking about how they can have greater control over their five senses and how that would give them even greater control of their learning.   

We talk about how we wonderful humans have the control to truly focus on what we see, what we hear, what we smell, what we taste, what we touch!   

We explore that TRULY FOCUSING means putting their WHOLE attention to what they are learning or doing. We practice truly focusing so they begin to feel how, when they do truly focus, their mind slows down, they relax, they breathe comfortably and they really observe (hear, taste, smell, see, touch – think about) what they are focusing on.

 As they practice, they relax even further and begin to feel how natural it is for their senses and brain to work together. We talk about how when they truly focus their mind stays on subject and naturally begins to make connections. We practice noticing this.

I encourage them to practice TRULY FOCUSING at home and school and to share their successes when they are with me.  

They soon realize that when they truly focus, they remember what they are learning.  

As we continue working in Phonetic Reading with Silent Elephant “e”, I frequently stop in the middle of lessons to reinforce that they are truly focusing. I ask them what they’ve just learned and how it connects with what they’ve already learned. I ask them questions that help them realize that they are the learner and they are in control.

 Questions like, “Where did you put this new sound? Does it go beside the drawers with the consonants sounds or the sound a cow makes?” They laugh and explain, because they know.

 I’ve taught this lesson to children for years. It’s a fun, silly way that guides them to understand they are in control of their learning.

 I LOVE watching them relax as we play with the chest of drawer analogy. I notice the shift in how they hold their head, how they walk in the door. I smile as they approach a new concept with confidence, a feeling of control.

 My chest of drawer analogy has been very successful, but thanks to my dear friend Sayra, I have a new analogy that sets their imagination playing with a whole new image. My kids love it.  

You will, too!  I’ll share it in my next blog post.

If you are questioning whether someone in your life is dyslexic and you’re not sure what to do, feel free to contact us.

Linda Katherine Smith-Jones                            Nina Henson

WAIT! I HAVE A CHEST OF DRAWERS IN MY HEAD?

WAIT! I HAVE A CHEST OF DRAWERS IN MY HEAD? 

Children who are struggling with learning often believe they have no control over how or what they learn. 

They sometimes think, and feel, that learning happens to them by magic. 

They think they learn new things magically or magically don’t learn new things. 

They begin to feel frustrated when they realize that even though the magic doesn’t work for them all of the time, it seems to be working for their classmates all of the time.

Their feelings of frustration and disempowerment build as they realize their friends are reading so much more smoothly than they are reading. They often sit in class wondering how their classmates know words so quickly when they struggle with each word.  

Their answer is – “The magic just doesn’t work for me. I’ll have to deal with that.” 

When children come to me for tutoring, they’re struggling to learn to read, write and spell. Their confidence in themselves as a learner is at rock bottom! They are sure there is something wrong with their brain—they are stupid and dumb. (Their words, not mine.) They are certain they will never learn to read, write and spell like their peers.  

It’s painful to watch them approach my front door the first time they come for tutoring. Their heads are down. They shuffle their feet up the sidewalk while being prodded by their parents, “Hurry up!” They begrudgingly sit on a chair or on the loveseat in my office. They barely (if at all) make eye contact with me. 

Luckily I have a golden retriever named River. He is my service dog, so I begin our first tutoring session showing the children all of the tricks River can do and all of the tasks he does to help me. We talk about their pets, animals they know personally, and/or animals they wish they had for a pet. River breaks the ice for us. I can visually watch my kiddos beginning to relax. 

After meeting River and learning about his job, we share our favorites: favorite color, favorite healthy food, favorite snack, etc. When I broach the subject of their favorite subject in school, I watch nervousness and shyness creep back in.  

I return to subjects of ease as we continue by sharing our interests and hobbies: sports, music, art, animals, and outdoors. My kiddos begin to relax again. 

Then I ask, “Do you like to read? Do you like to spell words? Do you like to write?” 

Their nervousness immediately returns. They’re mostly quiet—not wanting to share their struggles. But a few have told me they like to write, and they love when someone reads to them. 

Within the first weeks of tutoring, I begin talking to my children about how they learn—how their brain works. I share that their brain began working while they were still inside of their mom. They could see, hear, smell, taste, and feel touch before they were even born! Once they were born, their learning continued as they gathered more and more information using their five senses. We talk about their senses and how wonderful they are.  

I share that our brain receives messages from our senses and interprets them by finding commonalities, patterns, drawing conclusions, sequencing, analyzing, synthesizing, and evaluating. I share that our brain just naturally finds connections. In other words, through our senses our brain is finding meaning in our world. Our brain then stores these meaningful messages in an organized manner in what we call our memory. 

At this point I begin to use an analogy to further teach them about their brain and how they learn. All struggling readers benefit from using stories and/or developing images in their mind that help them make connections and understand concepts.  

In the next blog post, I will share with you exactly what I mean when I say, “There’s a chest of drawers in your head!”

If you are questioning whether someone in your life is dyslexic and you’re not sure what to do, feel free to contact us.

Linda Katherine Smith-Jones                            Nina Henson

The Perks of Being A Silent Elephant “e” Tutor

The Perks of Being A Silent Elephant “e” Tutor 

As you know, Phonetic Reading with Silent Elephant “e” is the program that teaches learners the way they love to learn. It is systematic, language-based, multi-sensory, and FUN! It’s fun for learners and teachers! It engages the whole learner and accelerates ALL children’s learning, even if they are dyslexic or have any other learning difference. Learning to read, write and spell with Silent Elephant “e” is a given.

If you are considering purchasing Phonetic Reading with Silent Elephant “e”, now is the time.

When you have Silent Elephant “e”, you have all of your step-by-step, thoroughly researched lesson plans at your fingertips and with the online 9-hour workshop you can relax and know you will truly be ready to enjoy teaching with Silent Elephant “e” as right before your eyes you watch every child having fun rapidly and easily learning what just a short time ago, they struggled with.

Here’s another bonus!

When you purchase Phonetic Reading with Silent Elephant “e” and become a tutor, you will have our support as you set up your business and begin tutoring.

Further, I will share:

·       What I have learned about becoming and being a tutor

·       My tutoring agreement form letter that outlines my expectations for parents and for students and my goals for my students

·       My form letter that I give to parents at the end of a school year showing their child’s progress as demonstrated by their child’s recorded assessment results

·       The opportunity to be a member of a closed Facebook group to answer questions and learn from each other on a weekly basis.

·       What I have learned about the tax advantages of having a home-based tutoring business.

(See our workshop page) 

I whole-heartedly love tutoring each and every one of my students with Phonetic Reading with Silent Elephant “e”! 😊

As the saying goes: “once a teacher, always a teacher” is true for me. I can’t think of anything more rewarding to do in my retirement years than tutoring my students! I love them all and am so proud of their progress! I would love it if you would read some of their parents’ testimonials on my website.

AND, MY FRIENDS, I HAVE TO END WITH THIS:

If YOU became a tutor, WE would be one step closer to fulfilling my dream to help ALL children become confident, successful readers, writers and spellers! This is a very exciting thought!

Get together a group of friends who are interested in becoming a Silent Elephant “e” tutor to share the $1000 cost of the 9-hour on-line personal training class. Have FUN learning together!

If you are questioning whether Silent Elephant “e” is the comprehensive reading, writing and spelling program you’d like to purchase, feel free to contact us.

Linda Katherine Smith-Jones                            Nina Henson

Not JUST a Picture Book - MY AWESOME GRANDMA

MY AWESOME GRANDMA

In my last blog post, I shared the educational reasons and “power” of my Silent Elephant “e” posters. 

I want to let you know that included with the purchase of Phonetic Reading with Silent Elephant “e”’s posters is My Awesome Grandma picture book. 

Just like my posters, My Awesome Grandma is not “just a pretty face”! I wrote it to engage children in a fun, educational, magical story promoting instant recall of the magic of consonant digraphs. 

I had an incredible time creating this story and collaborating with Brandin Hurley, the illustrator, determining exactly what the book should look like page by page.  

Just as I did with my Silent Elephant “e” posters, I wrote My Awesome Grandma to make the vague concept of consonant digraphs “tangible”. It can be confusing when 2 or 3 letters are combined and given a sound that is completely different from any of the individual letter sounds children learn in preschool and Kindergarten. Now, a child must disassociate their original learning of those letters’ individual sounds and give these new “sets” of letters their own unique sounds.  

As I began to ponder activities to help my students get a solid grasp of consonant digraphs, I kept falling back on my own love of the “magic” of these letters that could join together and produce totally different sounds. 

This made me smile. As I pondered further, the story of My Awesome Grandma emerged. 

Through this “magical” story and the activities I created to go with it, my students develop a firm knowledge that when you put two or three particular consonants together to form a consonant digraph, they magically make a new sound—their own unique sound.  Yes, consonant digraphs are MAGICAL!  

And so is Grandma! 

Brightly painted whimsical drawings of Grandma’s childhood accomplishments and her dream of becoming a dancer with the Rockettes draw children into this amusing story. 

Unfortunately, Grandma wasn’t tall enough to be a Rockette, and as this reality set in, she took it upon herself to do the only thing logical, to study magic with the hopes that one day she would be able to magically make herself taller. 

In the meantime, Grandma became a teacher and unexpectedly found her magic skills were especially useful in her classroom. (Wouldn’t they be!!) 

Then one fateful day, while performing magic during after school hours to prevent her students’ disappointment in the outcomes of some of their science experiments, her grandson, Andrew, unexpectedly discovers that Grandma can actually change one animal into another! 

At first Andrew is frightened, but soon his imagination goes wild as he “sees” ALL of the possibilities of Grandma’s magical skills! He makes a request of Grandma - to make him the tallest boy in the world, which has exciting and startling outcomes! 

As I mentioned in my post about my posters, My Awesome Grandma and the activities written for it activate all parts of the brain making it easier for children to develop automatic recall of all consonant digraphs. 

Children enthusiastically participate in the follow-up activities—animal mask making, play-acting using a magic hat, a magic wand, the animal masks and orange, alphabet letters that magically change their individual consonant sounds into consonant digraph sounds. The playfulness of these activities and the happiness experienced by children promote immediate recall and ensures long-term retention of the story and consonant digraphs. 

With the use of the story and activities around the story, children relax and enjoy the “magic” of something becoming something different. They let their imagination play and they let consonant digraphs “make sense” in the process.

For more information about My Awesome Grandma, feel free to contact us. You can purchase My Awesome Grandma separately. Click here for the store.

Linda Katherine Smith-Jones                            Nina Henson

Silent Elephant “e” Posters are Not JUST for Their Good Looks!

Silent Elephant “e” Posters are Not JUST for Their Good Looks!

I was recently asked, “Why should I buy Phonetic Reading with Silent Elephant “e”’s posters?” 

My Silent Elephant “e” posters may seem like an “after thought” to make Silent Elephant “e” “prettier”, and although they do make Silent Elephant “e” “prettier”, there are solid educational reasons and research behind each and every one of the 44 posters I created. 

One of the most powerful educational reasons is that ALL children, especially dyslexics, ELL/ESL or any student with a learning difference, need colorful, visual, kinesthetic, concrete methods using stories, plays, puppets, magic, games and tangible items such as food, clay, and personal drawings and personal writing in order to make concepts clearly conceptual and comprehensible. Further, concepts visually represented through drawings using bright, vibrant colors activate parts of the brain to develop automatic recall of the concepts represented. 

Although this is true of any concept being presented, it’s especially true of vague, abstract, intangible concepts such as phonics rules. Without personal interaction with phonics rules, learners find them difficult to comprehend and remember, and as new rules are always being introduced, the concepts they are trying unsuccessfully to understand begin to stack up. The learner will begin to feel like the process is hopeless.     

Children learning through Silent Elephant “e” draw upon their five senses and whole body to understand the relationship of a phonics rule to its application in reading words. 

In Silent Elephant “e” the phonics rules are represented visually on large posters using bright, lively color. To further activate the brain, each poster is presented with written stories, skits and whole body, multi-sensory activities that involve the learner even more deeply with the concept. The vagueness slips away, and the learner is developing something “tangible” to hold in his/her memory.  

With Silent Elephant “e” each phonics rule is introduced by a teacher led fun, exciting, multi-sensory, memorable learning experiences utilizing the posters.  

Following this whole-body experience, children draw their own poster pulling into play their kinesthetic muscle memory furthering their automatic recall of the information contained on the poster. At this point the phonic rule is tangible and they have muscle, visual and story memory to fall back on as they read. 

Continuing and reinforcing their clarity and understanding of the rule and how to utilize it in their reading, the children take their poster home to share with their parents as part of the home-school connection built into the Silent Elephant “e” program. They are always eager to share both their artwork and their knowledge.  

As they continue to move through Silent Elephant “e”, it appears that my students have memorized the posters and they have. However, it is much more than memorization. They have internalized the concepts; they’ve learned them. They now own the phonics rule.

From this point on whenever they approach an unknown word, they can “fall back” on their knowledge of the concept story, activities and their personal visualization of the poster giving them self-confidence to fluently decode the words. 

I watched Jamie demonstrate his knowledge of the hard and soft “c” and “g” phonics rule when decoding an unknown word. He paused a moment to draw in the air with his index finger the digital number 2 that he drew on his poster while visualizing where the vowels go on his imaginary 2. He then quickly and accurately decoded the word. 

Ten-year-old Alex took his knowledge into his classroom. He drew from memory the content of Silent Elephant “e” posters to share with classmates to help them understand a phonetic rule they were struggling to remember. 

I use these vibrant colored posters everyday while tutoring students from home. I have some posters displayed all of the time and pull out others when needed by an individual child to focus on his/her specific lesson. 

How you display them depends on your particular needs TO DIFFERENTIATE INSTRUCTION. You can:

·       Display all posters all of the time

·       Display particular posters for as long as your students need them

·       Display only the ones you are using for a particular lesson 

However you choose to display the posters, I guarantee your children will not only enjoy them, but will frequently gaze at them to solidify their phonetic concepts becoming a part of them. 

So, you see, my Silent Elephant “e” posters were not an “after thought” but instead are a vital part of my program that engages the whole learner to ensure success.   

To check out 5 examples of my Silent Elephant “e” posters, click here https://www.silentelephante.com/program/. 

For those of you curious about the content of each poster, I have included a detailed description below. The description shares the content of the posters and the part of Silent Elephant “e” they were created for.  

Posters 1 & 2: Visual representation of Silent Elephant “e”’s content guiding children and adults to form a broad understanding of the program’s topics and how each skill will relate and connect to another 

Posters 3-9: Use with Parts 3-14: Short vowels; Visual image of how the jaw moves when making the short vowel sounds; Illustrations of my spider plant story to use throughout the program for all suffix lessons 

Posters 10-11: Use with Parts 5-14: Consonant blends; Three sounds of the suffix -ed 

Posters 12-16: Use with Parts 6-14: Words ending with double consonants; ô sound; Long double “oo”; Short double “oo”  

Posters 17-24: Use with Parts 7-14: Silent Elephant “e” words 

Posters 25-28: Use with Parts 8-14: /oi/ sound; “C” and “G” Game boards 

Poster 29: Use with Parts 9-14: The “Band-Aid” Sound of /ou/  

Poster 30: Use with Parts 6-14: “y” at the end of words 

Posters 31-33: Use with Parts 11-14: R-controlled vowels 

Posters 34-37: Use with Parts 12-14: 6 Sounds of “ou”; “al” Words; 5 Ways to Make ô; 6 Sounds of “ie” and “ei”  

Posters 38-44: Use with Parts 13-14: Dividing words into syllables

As always, we are happy to answer your questions through emails or on the phone! We’re always eager to visit with you.

If you have further questions about Silent Elephant “e”’s posters, feel free to contact us.

Linda Katherine Smith-Jones                            Nina Henson