1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:08,020 Hello and welcome to the What in the World is Dyscalculia podcast presented by Educalc 2 00:00:08,020 --> 00:00:09,020 Learning. 3 00:00:09,020 --> 00:00:16,880 I am your host, Dr. Honora Wall, and today I want to talk about one of my favorite success 4 00:00:16,880 --> 00:00:17,800 stories. 5 00:00:17,800 --> 00:00:23,280 They're not all success stories and there will be podcasts where I talk about times 6 00:00:23,280 --> 00:00:29,720 where interventions did not work for students and why I think that happened. 7 00:00:29,720 --> 00:00:34,320 Especially for me, I do have a lot more success stories than not. 8 00:00:34,320 --> 00:00:37,320 I recently got some information about one. 9 00:00:37,320 --> 00:00:43,040 I'm going to call this student Betty for the purposes of our podcast. 10 00:00:43,040 --> 00:00:45,800 Betty is dear to my heart. 11 00:00:45,800 --> 00:00:55,720 I first met Betty when she was leaving fifth grade and decided not to go back to a brick 12 00:00:55,720 --> 00:00:57,520 and mortar school. 13 00:00:57,520 --> 00:00:59,320 She was going to home school. 14 00:00:59,320 --> 00:01:09,920 She had a diagnosis of dyslexia and dyscalculia and she had had such a terrible time in elementary 15 00:01:09,920 --> 00:01:12,280 school. 16 00:01:12,280 --> 00:01:16,960 Working with tutors and teachers who were trying to help but who didn't understand her 17 00:01:16,960 --> 00:01:23,360 learning challenges and she just wasn't very successful. 18 00:01:23,360 --> 00:01:31,880 And she really internalized that which unfortunately is such a common story for people with dyscalculia 19 00:01:31,880 --> 00:01:34,800 and very heartbreaking for children. 20 00:01:34,800 --> 00:01:41,400 By the end of elementary school, this young girl had decided she could not do math in 21 00:01:41,400 --> 00:01:48,640 any way, shape, or form and never would be able to that she did not enjoy reading and 22 00:01:48,640 --> 00:01:58,080 that she felt so in her words dumb and I hate when students talk that way about themselves. 23 00:01:58,080 --> 00:02:02,600 It's heartbreaking but she felt so inadequate compared to her peers. 24 00:02:02,600 --> 00:02:06,240 She felt like everyone knew she wasn't good enough. 25 00:02:06,240 --> 00:02:12,680 She felt like the smarter kids were making fun of her and she knew she was behind and 26 00:02:12,680 --> 00:02:14,880 she was incredibly bright. 27 00:02:14,880 --> 00:02:23,080 Very sharp girl, very quick learner, an amazing musician, and a great artist. 28 00:02:23,080 --> 00:02:29,240 Just could not find success in a traditional classroom and had given up. 29 00:02:29,240 --> 00:02:36,080 Well luckily they found a wonderful reading tutor in South Florida who is a colleague 30 00:02:36,080 --> 00:02:41,560 and friend of mine and Betty was starting to have a lot of success with her reading 31 00:02:41,560 --> 00:02:44,160 progress. 32 00:02:44,160 --> 00:02:46,160 Not so much with the math. 33 00:02:46,160 --> 00:02:48,200 Her mom was pretty good at math. 34 00:02:48,200 --> 00:02:51,760 We didn't think that the learning disability was hereditary. 35 00:02:51,760 --> 00:02:53,840 Her dad was an engineer. 36 00:02:53,840 --> 00:03:00,640 There was a lot of pressure from the family not from her parents but what she internalized 37 00:03:00,640 --> 00:03:07,400 for herself because everyone else in the family seemed to get math so much easier and faster. 38 00:03:07,400 --> 00:03:14,720 Her older sister never had a problem succeeding in any traditional classroom and her younger 39 00:03:14,720 --> 00:03:19,640 brother seemed to be on the same track so it was really only Betty who was sticking out 40 00:03:19,640 --> 00:03:29,320 as this sore thumb who just could not succeed in school and could not understand math. 41 00:03:29,320 --> 00:03:38,120 So the reading tutor recommended me as a math tutor because of my specialization in dyscalculia. 42 00:03:38,120 --> 00:03:43,320 So I started working with Betty and she was very nervous. 43 00:03:43,320 --> 00:03:49,080 We did remote tutoring because I was not living in Florida at the time. 44 00:03:49,080 --> 00:03:54,800 And our first couple of sessions were getting to know each other, talking about her past 45 00:03:54,800 --> 00:04:04,200 experiences, finding out how she defined herself as a math student which was not a math student 46 00:04:04,200 --> 00:04:11,760 in her words and hearing from her mom about how the experience had gone for the family. 47 00:04:11,760 --> 00:04:17,960 The first couple of sessions mom sat in and this is very common in my experience because 48 00:04:17,960 --> 00:04:24,880 the students have had such a terrible time from teachers and from previous tutors who 49 00:04:24,880 --> 00:04:30,880 make them feel inadequate, who make them feel like they're failing and make them feel like 50 00:04:30,880 --> 00:04:32,600 there's something wrong with them. 51 00:04:32,600 --> 00:04:37,560 So they have a lot of anxiety when they first start working with me and a lot of fear of 52 00:04:37,560 --> 00:04:41,040 what the experience is going to be like. 53 00:04:41,040 --> 00:04:44,920 They think they're going to be asked a lot of questions they cannot answer. 54 00:04:44,920 --> 00:04:49,560 They think they're going to be quizzed on things they don't know and they fear they're 55 00:04:49,560 --> 00:04:56,720 going to let me down, let their parents down, waste everyone's time and money and they put 56 00:04:56,720 --> 00:05:01,960 so much pressure on themselves before we even sit down to say hello that the first thing 57 00:05:01,960 --> 00:05:07,880 I do is try to help everybody relax. 58 00:05:07,880 --> 00:05:10,720 We just take a moment to breathe. 59 00:05:10,720 --> 00:05:15,560 We just tell some stories about what math has been like before. 60 00:05:15,560 --> 00:05:22,520 I like to ask students questions about what went well, what didn't go well, let them talk 61 00:05:22,520 --> 00:05:23,680 out their experience. 62 00:05:23,680 --> 00:05:32,240 They have to get out those old emotions so that they are ready for some brand new emotions. 63 00:05:32,240 --> 00:05:37,960 They had tried working on different curriculums at home, going through different math books 64 00:05:37,960 --> 00:05:42,160 that have been recommended by people looking at different online programs. 65 00:05:42,160 --> 00:05:47,200 Betty hated working with online programs because there was no one she could ask a question 66 00:05:47,200 --> 00:05:54,800 to and she couldn't teach herself from the text partly because of the dyslexia and couldn't 67 00:05:54,800 --> 00:06:00,600 really get a handle on what they wanted her to do for the math because of the dyscalculia. 68 00:06:00,600 --> 00:06:02,800 Her mom had tried helping. 69 00:06:02,800 --> 00:06:07,760 There was a lot of fighting going on at home and arguing a lot of tears. 70 00:06:07,760 --> 00:06:13,000 That also is something I find common and heartbreaking. 71 00:06:13,000 --> 00:06:20,720 So the second thing I like to do with my students is talk about how the family is going to stop 72 00:06:20,720 --> 00:06:23,600 having these stressful times together. 73 00:06:23,600 --> 00:06:26,600 The family needs to have positive times together. 74 00:06:26,600 --> 00:06:32,840 Students and young children need to be enjoying the little bit of time they have before our 75 00:06:32,840 --> 00:06:36,160 kids grow up and go off to college and move away. 76 00:06:36,160 --> 00:06:38,440 It happens in the blink of an eye. 77 00:06:38,440 --> 00:06:43,880 As a parent myself, that time is sacred and precious in my opinion. 78 00:06:43,880 --> 00:06:47,640 You've got to protect it. 79 00:06:47,640 --> 00:06:54,960 So arguing over math homework is not how you want to spend your time as a family. 80 00:06:54,960 --> 00:06:57,920 So we stop that right away. 81 00:06:57,920 --> 00:07:02,920 After we've gotten through some of the old stories and we've decided we are not doing 82 00:07:02,920 --> 00:07:07,720 family homework anymore going forward, then we talk about some goals. 83 00:07:07,720 --> 00:07:13,760 I really like to talk with my students about what kind of goals they have for themselves. 84 00:07:13,760 --> 00:07:15,880 It puts them in a place of control. 85 00:07:15,880 --> 00:07:19,400 It lets them establish our path forward. 86 00:07:19,400 --> 00:07:22,600 It lets me see what's important to them. 87 00:07:22,600 --> 00:07:28,520 And then we can also talk about math standards for the year if we're trying to stay on grade 88 00:07:28,520 --> 00:07:34,360 level, what kind of topics are most important for their age and grade if we're trying 89 00:07:34,360 --> 00:07:41,320 to build a stronger foundation, and what kind of methods and materials work best for the 90 00:07:41,320 --> 00:07:45,520 student and we can put together whatever we want. 91 00:07:45,520 --> 00:07:52,360 If you are tutoring people with dyscalculia of any age, I highly recommend you move away 92 00:07:52,360 --> 00:07:55,120 from the textbooks. 93 00:07:55,120 --> 00:07:57,280 People with dyscalculia have seen those for years. 94 00:07:57,280 --> 00:08:02,800 They look at them and they know this is a big red flag of failure. 95 00:08:02,800 --> 00:08:08,000 If you're tutoring, hopefully you know your topics well enough that you can look up your 96 00:08:08,000 --> 00:08:09,920 standards by state. 97 00:08:09,920 --> 00:08:14,760 You can look up what your local schools are doing by grade level and have an idea of what 98 00:08:14,760 --> 00:08:16,760 needs to be covered. 99 00:08:16,760 --> 00:08:20,080 Talk about those things without the textbook. 100 00:08:20,080 --> 00:08:23,600 Those different examples mix and match. 101 00:08:23,600 --> 00:08:25,100 Online materials. 102 00:08:25,100 --> 00:08:29,000 There are so many websites that have resources you can choose from. 103 00:08:29,000 --> 00:08:34,320 You can Google pretty much anything and find a worksheet. 104 00:08:34,320 --> 00:08:43,160 You can use the textbook to give you a starting place, but get out of those trigger areas 105 00:08:43,160 --> 00:08:45,000 as much as possible. 106 00:08:45,000 --> 00:08:50,400 Make some things up on your own and make some things up with the student while you're going 107 00:08:50,400 --> 00:08:52,800 through your lessons. 108 00:08:52,800 --> 00:08:55,760 You will get to the standards you need to reach. 109 00:08:55,760 --> 00:08:59,000 You will cover all the topics that you need to cover. 110 00:08:59,000 --> 00:09:06,880 You don't have to do it according to modules in an online program or chapters in a textbook, 111 00:09:06,880 --> 00:09:10,840 especially before you get into high school. 112 00:09:10,840 --> 00:09:16,360 Here in the U.S., once you get into high school, now we're really concerned about the transcript. 113 00:09:16,360 --> 00:09:22,320 We're really concerned with having accredited courses or we're concerned with establishing 114 00:09:22,320 --> 00:09:26,940 a homeschool program where you're keeping a portfolio of work signed off at the end 115 00:09:26,940 --> 00:09:29,200 of the year by a certified teacher. 116 00:09:29,200 --> 00:09:33,760 Then when you have your paperwork together for college applications. 117 00:09:33,760 --> 00:09:37,960 Before high school, that is not the important part. 118 00:09:37,960 --> 00:09:41,920 No college application wants to know what happened in sixth and seventh grade math. 119 00:09:41,920 --> 00:09:47,560 They just want to see through high school courses and through placement tests and standardized 120 00:09:47,560 --> 00:09:54,840 tests like ACT, SAT, PERT tests, whatever college placement test is required where you're 121 00:09:54,840 --> 00:09:56,200 looking at. 122 00:09:56,200 --> 00:10:00,440 Now we want to see that the foundational knowledge is there. 123 00:10:00,440 --> 00:10:06,400 When you're working with students in elementary and middle school, you really can pick. 124 00:10:06,400 --> 00:10:14,320 Use your tutoring materials or your course and class materials and progression based 125 00:10:14,320 --> 00:10:15,320 on student needs. 126 00:10:15,320 --> 00:10:24,280 You'll get a lot farther, a lot faster and everyone will be happier with the process. 127 00:10:24,280 --> 00:10:28,160 They're going to be happy with the results once the process makes sense. 128 00:10:28,160 --> 00:10:32,840 So the results are really going to take care of themselves if you've set up the process 129 00:10:32,840 --> 00:10:34,640 the right way. 130 00:10:34,640 --> 00:10:41,360 And for Betty, our way in came through art. 131 00:10:41,360 --> 00:10:47,120 It could have come through music because she's a very accomplished young musician. 132 00:10:47,120 --> 00:10:48,120 But I'm not. 133 00:10:48,120 --> 00:10:50,520 I can't play a musical instrument to save my life. 134 00:10:50,520 --> 00:10:53,400 I can listen to music and appreciate it. 135 00:10:53,400 --> 00:10:58,360 But you certainly don't want me talking about music or playing an instrument. 136 00:10:58,360 --> 00:11:02,360 So that one would have worked for her, but not for me. 137 00:11:02,360 --> 00:11:08,880 We couldn't find access through math because I knew math and she did not when we first 138 00:11:08,880 --> 00:11:10,440 started working together. 139 00:11:10,440 --> 00:11:14,520 And she was very resistant for the reasons I've already said. 140 00:11:14,520 --> 00:11:18,600 So that would not have worked because it would have worked for me, not her. 141 00:11:18,600 --> 00:11:24,200 The place where we could both come together was in art. 142 00:11:24,200 --> 00:11:27,440 And Betty is much better of an artist than me. 143 00:11:27,440 --> 00:11:30,640 She's a phenomenal artist. 144 00:11:30,640 --> 00:11:38,800 She would make collages, she would do photography, she would freehand draw, and really made images 145 00:11:38,800 --> 00:11:40,600 come to life. 146 00:11:40,600 --> 00:11:42,640 So we would talk about art. 147 00:11:42,640 --> 00:11:44,440 We would talk about math and art. 148 00:11:44,440 --> 00:11:50,600 We talked a lot about different famous artists who used math in their work. 149 00:11:50,600 --> 00:11:54,080 I had her do some research projects based off of that. 150 00:11:54,080 --> 00:11:59,000 That led us into talking about math in nature. 151 00:11:59,000 --> 00:12:02,360 The math minded people who were listening. 152 00:12:02,360 --> 00:12:08,920 Of course we know all about cauliflower, the way the cactus grows, sunflower seeds, things 153 00:12:08,920 --> 00:12:12,800 of this nature that can be a really good access point. 154 00:12:12,800 --> 00:12:19,320 And then for Betty I would assign her homework based in photography where she had to take 155 00:12:19,320 --> 00:12:24,280 the things we had talked about and go around the house, around the neighborhood to her 156 00:12:24,280 --> 00:12:31,680 favorite local park, and find images that represented the math we had talked about. 157 00:12:31,680 --> 00:12:38,120 And then she had to bring back her photography and we could talk about it then and extend 158 00:12:38,120 --> 00:12:44,520 that into our next mathematical lesson. 159 00:12:44,520 --> 00:12:47,200 She right away took to this very well. 160 00:12:47,200 --> 00:12:49,320 She was excited to do this kind of homework. 161 00:12:49,320 --> 00:12:52,200 It did not feel like homework. 162 00:12:52,200 --> 00:12:54,920 It felt like something she was excited to go do. 163 00:12:54,920 --> 00:13:00,120 It was a nice thing for the family to do together and to talk about at the end of the day. 164 00:13:00,120 --> 00:13:05,960 She was able to talk about the math we had discussed and how it related to the images 165 00:13:05,960 --> 00:13:08,440 she chose to take pictures of. 166 00:13:08,440 --> 00:13:14,120 She also created a field journal for herself where she would sketch things and bring them 167 00:13:14,120 --> 00:13:17,000 to me and say, is this math? 168 00:13:17,000 --> 00:13:23,560 I would say absolutely and we would talk about how and why and pattern recognition and fractals 169 00:13:23,560 --> 00:13:29,160 and really higher end conversations about math concepts. 170 00:13:29,160 --> 00:13:33,240 Note that at this time we have not even started talking about numbers. 171 00:13:33,240 --> 00:13:38,120 We had not picked up a calculator and we had not looked at a worksheet since she was in 172 00:13:38,120 --> 00:13:40,320 a homeschool environment. 173 00:13:40,320 --> 00:13:45,480 And since her parents had exhausted every other pathway they were open to anything that 174 00:13:45,480 --> 00:13:48,920 would help their daughter feel more comfortable. 175 00:13:48,920 --> 00:13:55,520 That was very lucky for me and for Betty because it let us have the room to establish positive 176 00:13:55,520 --> 00:14:01,600 experience around math, which is something this poor child had not had in five years 177 00:14:01,600 --> 00:14:03,520 or more. 178 00:14:03,520 --> 00:14:08,800 So establishing that kind of positive experience was crucial. 179 00:14:08,800 --> 00:14:14,760 Once we had done a few art related projects and once I had let Betty take the reins, make 180 00:14:14,760 --> 00:14:22,800 her own choices for what represented the information she learned from our conversations, then I 181 00:14:22,800 --> 00:14:30,160 could talk to her and tell her about how great she was as a mathematical thinker. 182 00:14:30,160 --> 00:14:35,480 This was a term no one had ever applied to her in her life and she certainly had not 183 00:14:35,480 --> 00:14:37,480 applied it to herself. 184 00:14:37,480 --> 00:14:39,800 And I was able to say, look at what you chose. 185 00:14:39,800 --> 00:14:41,520 Look at the patterns you picked out. 186 00:14:41,520 --> 00:14:47,080 Look at how you were able to use this image and describe to me the math behind it and 187 00:14:47,080 --> 00:14:49,280 retain what we talked about before. 188 00:14:49,280 --> 00:14:53,040 That is absolutely mathematical thinking. 189 00:14:53,040 --> 00:14:58,640 Well now she had a new name for herself and new feelings about math and now we could come 190 00:14:58,640 --> 00:15:07,320 back around to the numeracy, which is such a small slice of math. 191 00:15:07,320 --> 00:15:13,600 But it's the one that we obsess over, especially in elementary and the beginnings of middle 192 00:15:13,600 --> 00:15:15,040 school. 193 00:15:15,040 --> 00:15:17,720 So we got back around to numbers. 194 00:15:17,720 --> 00:15:20,280 We talked about them very gently. 195 00:15:20,280 --> 00:15:23,800 We talked about them on a grade level status. 196 00:15:23,800 --> 00:15:27,400 We did not go back to the beginning. 197 00:15:27,400 --> 00:15:33,120 It's very important that students with dyscalculia are doing grade level work and we use support 198 00:15:33,120 --> 00:15:41,240 tools to support them in any foundational weaknesses they have, but we give them grade level work. 199 00:15:41,240 --> 00:15:47,040 The main thing that stops students from being successful in elementary school when they have 200 00:15:47,040 --> 00:15:52,080 dyscalculia is that dyscalculia trifecta I've talked about before. 201 00:15:52,080 --> 00:15:54,200 Time, money, place, value. 202 00:15:54,200 --> 00:15:56,360 Well that goes away. 203 00:15:56,360 --> 00:16:01,120 We don't talk about those things after we get into middle school. 204 00:16:01,120 --> 00:16:04,760 And we certainly don't talk about them at all once we get into high school. 205 00:16:04,760 --> 00:16:12,080 So we let that go and we use support tools like time tables charts, time tables list, 206 00:16:12,080 --> 00:16:21,520 which personally I prefer over the chart for students with dyscalculia and using a calculator. 207 00:16:21,520 --> 00:16:29,400 Using a calculator will never just give students with dyscalculia the answer without them doing 208 00:16:29,400 --> 00:16:31,100 any work. 209 00:16:31,100 --> 00:16:35,160 Students with dyscalculia are desperate to understand what's going on. 210 00:16:35,160 --> 00:16:37,520 They want to know the right answer. 211 00:16:37,520 --> 00:16:43,520 They want to know the concepts and they want to know how to problem solve. 212 00:16:43,520 --> 00:16:51,440 So for them, using the calculator lets them confirm a right answer, get rid of an incorrect 213 00:16:51,440 --> 00:16:53,160 answer. 214 00:16:53,160 --> 00:16:58,200 That's a great podcast topic, how that works for the brain, that immediate confirmation. 215 00:16:58,200 --> 00:17:00,640 We'll definitely talk about that soon. 216 00:17:00,640 --> 00:17:06,200 And it lets them get the answer right, feel that sense of accomplishment while they're 217 00:17:06,200 --> 00:17:10,600 learning the different formulas and while they're learning the rules. 218 00:17:10,600 --> 00:17:15,880 There was a lot of work we had to do about turning improper fractions into mixed numbers 219 00:17:15,880 --> 00:17:16,880 and back again. 220 00:17:16,880 --> 00:17:21,400 What were the rules of working with fractions for adding and subtracting and multiplying 221 00:17:21,400 --> 00:17:25,120 and dividing and why are they different? 222 00:17:25,120 --> 00:17:32,720 And we were able to do that with accuracy by using the calculator and that really helped 223 00:17:32,720 --> 00:17:34,400 her progress. 224 00:17:34,400 --> 00:17:39,880 Well moving forward, I worked with Betty as a homeschool student for about two and a half 225 00:17:39,880 --> 00:17:50,480 years and this school year, beginning now in 2022, she felt ready to go back to a brick 226 00:17:50,480 --> 00:17:55,640 and mortar traditional school to begin her high school journey. 227 00:17:55,640 --> 00:18:00,400 We had a lot of talks about this situation at the end of the year. 228 00:18:00,400 --> 00:18:05,120 We talked about what she could do over the summer, which I asked her to please take a 229 00:18:05,120 --> 00:18:10,120 break and do something fun and have a great time and not worry about it because the first 230 00:18:10,120 --> 00:18:15,680 couple of weeks of school were going to be a review anyway and to give herself some breathing 231 00:18:15,680 --> 00:18:20,440 room to celebrate that she was even ready to take this step. 232 00:18:20,440 --> 00:18:26,080 We talked about how some topics were going to make sense and some were not and that's 233 00:18:26,080 --> 00:18:32,400 perfectly fine and absolutely normal for every student regardless of having dyscalculia or 234 00:18:32,400 --> 00:18:34,720 not having dyscalculia. 235 00:18:34,720 --> 00:18:39,720 We talked about how sometimes she would struggle and we talked about the resources she could 236 00:18:39,720 --> 00:18:42,600 use to work through those times, including me. 237 00:18:42,600 --> 00:18:47,800 If she ever wants to call and have a quick tutoring session or a few to get through a 238 00:18:47,800 --> 00:18:53,600 unit that would always be available to her and we talked about all the other resources 239 00:18:53,600 --> 00:19:00,160 at her disposal that she could use in addition to that. 240 00:19:00,160 --> 00:19:05,240 We talked about the self-advocacy piece, how she could explain her learning disability 241 00:19:05,240 --> 00:19:11,960 to her teacher, how she could explain the best ways for her to learn and remember and 242 00:19:11,960 --> 00:19:15,620 perform on a test to her teacher. 243 00:19:15,620 --> 00:19:20,320 We talked about how the teacher has final say in the classroom so some accommodations 244 00:19:20,320 --> 00:19:26,360 and interventions would be acceptable, some might not and what she could do in each of 245 00:19:26,360 --> 00:19:27,440 those cases. 246 00:19:27,440 --> 00:19:31,920 Well, we're about a month into the school year now. 247 00:19:31,920 --> 00:19:34,240 I have not heard from Betty. 248 00:19:34,240 --> 00:19:42,560 I did hear from her mom and her mom sent me a screenshot of the grade book from Betty's 249 00:19:42,560 --> 00:19:43,560 new school. 250 00:19:43,560 --> 00:19:50,240 Well, she's in ninth grade, Algebra I and she's doing grade level work and the grade 251 00:19:50,240 --> 00:19:58,000 book is full of 10 out of 10 for homework, 10 out of 10 for classwork, 10 out of 10 for 252 00:19:58,000 --> 00:20:06,880 the next homework, 23 out of 25 for a quiz, 10 out of 10 for her math notebook. 253 00:20:06,880 --> 00:20:07,880 It was great. 254 00:20:07,880 --> 00:20:12,360 It was such a wonderful thing to see and so of course I sent back some. 255 00:20:12,360 --> 00:20:17,880 Very excited congratulatory messages and told them to please keep me updated throughout 256 00:20:17,880 --> 00:20:24,800 the year but I'm just so pleased that she started off strong and she is thrilled and 257 00:20:24,800 --> 00:20:27,000 feels very accomplished. 258 00:20:27,000 --> 00:20:34,440 I'm sure that she will run into times where she struggles and she'll run into times where 259 00:20:34,440 --> 00:20:37,320 she doesn't do very well on the homework. 260 00:20:37,320 --> 00:20:43,040 I'm quite sure that at some point she'll probably fail a test because that's human. 261 00:20:43,040 --> 00:20:48,820 We all have periods of time like that and we all have topics that are harder than others. 262 00:20:48,820 --> 00:20:54,880 She will also have many more times where she's getting those 10s out of 10s where the topic 263 00:20:54,880 --> 00:20:59,880 does make sense where maybe she has to ask a few more questions but she can get it figured 264 00:20:59,880 --> 00:21:02,920 out. 265 00:21:02,920 --> 00:21:08,080 In most of her quizzes and tests she's going to do very well on and she's going to do just 266 00:21:08,080 --> 00:21:09,800 fine with this class. 267 00:21:09,800 --> 00:21:15,480 I'm so glad that we were able to take the time to step back for a year or two, change 268 00:21:15,480 --> 00:21:23,040 her experience with math, change her definition of self as a mathematical thinker, find the 269 00:21:23,040 --> 00:21:28,840 right support tools and now she's been able to transition back into the right place for 270 00:21:28,840 --> 00:21:35,360 her which is a brick and mortar school with her peers and I think she's going to do great. 271 00:21:35,360 --> 00:21:40,600 If you're listening and you have students with dyscalculia, children with dyscalculia 272 00:21:40,600 --> 00:21:47,160 or you yourself have dyscalculia, just know that if you're still struggling it's because 273 00:21:47,160 --> 00:21:49,240 you haven't figured out the right path yet. 274 00:21:49,240 --> 00:21:56,120 You don't have the right support tools in place yet but you absolutely can. 275 00:21:56,120 --> 00:22:01,600 Getting into your own as a mathematical thinker and performing math very well in a variety 276 00:22:01,600 --> 00:22:06,760 of circumstances is absolutely something you can attain. 277 00:22:06,760 --> 00:22:11,200 When we're working with students who have dyscalculia of any age or grade level we need 278 00:22:11,200 --> 00:22:16,600 to make sure first of all that we acknowledge where they've been and how they feel about 279 00:22:16,600 --> 00:22:19,320 math when they first meet us. 280 00:22:19,320 --> 00:22:25,640 We have to establish second of all what are some shared goals so we know what to work toward. 281 00:22:25,640 --> 00:22:32,800 We have to find any method we can to make a successful math experience and then we build 282 00:22:32,800 --> 00:22:34,600 off of that. 283 00:22:34,600 --> 00:22:39,240 We do grade level work using the right support tools and the right accommodations and you 284 00:22:39,240 --> 00:22:44,400 will be amazed at the amount of growth and how much it sticks. 285 00:22:44,400 --> 00:22:49,880 I'm excited to share more success stories like that in future podcasts but right now 286 00:22:49,880 --> 00:22:55,400 I'm going to go enjoy some of Betty's artwork that she has sent to me in the past and enjoy 287 00:22:55,400 --> 00:22:59,160 the great work she's doing today. 288 00:22:59,160 --> 00:23:03,480 If you'd like more information about anything I've said in today's podcast or the work I 289 00:23:03,480 --> 00:23:08,280 do with students please reach out to me. 290 00:23:08,280 --> 00:23:15,800 You can email me Honora at educalclearning.com that's H-O-N-O-R-A. 291 00:23:15,800 --> 00:23:21,220 Go to my website educalclearning.com and reach me through there. 292 00:23:21,220 --> 00:23:24,240 You can find me on LinkedIn. 293 00:23:24,240 --> 00:23:31,480 Educalc Learning has a Facebook page and you can also look up our courses. 294 00:23:31,480 --> 00:23:38,000 I should be launching the certificate program level one certification for teaching students 295 00:23:38,000 --> 00:23:42,080 with dyscalculia very soon. 296 00:23:42,080 --> 00:23:48,520 Right now I'm recording this at the beginning of September 2022 so that level one certification 297 00:23:48,520 --> 00:23:50,920 should be rolling out by the end of the month. 298 00:23:50,920 --> 00:23:55,560 If you'd like to get more information on the front end or put your name on a mailing 299 00:23:55,560 --> 00:24:00,600 list for interest reach out to me and check out the website because I put as much free 300 00:24:00,600 --> 00:24:04,480 information up there as I possibly can as well. 301 00:24:04,480 --> 00:24:07,880 Thank you for listening to What in the World is Dyscalculia. 302 00:24:07,880 --> 00:24:10,160 I hope you enjoyed the story of Betty. 303 00:24:10,160 --> 00:24:15,520 I certainly enjoy her story very much and I will talk with you soon. 304 00:24:15,520 --> 00:24:22,520 Thanks for listening.