On the Same Page

The University of Chicago Laboratory Schools

Communications from the Director

On the Same Page: Learning Differences—From Both Sides

October 1, 2005
David W. Magill, Director

Not many people know that I was drawn into education at the age of fifteen when I was hired as a junior counselor at a camp for physically handicapped children. That experience lasted for thirteen years and served as my summer employment while, during the school year, I taught special education in the city of Philadelphia. As a young administrator, I developed and supervised special education programs for children at both ends of the learning continuum.

Prior to coming to the Laboratory Schools, I served as the superintendent in a suburban school district known nationally for its programs serving children with special needs. I've seen the good and the bad of well-intentioned legislation, the cooperative and adversarial relationships between school personnel and parents, and how far our profession has come in understanding how the brain works and how far we have to go to improve differentiating instruction to meet the needs of most.

My intent in sharing some of this history is to expand your image of this guy who has the privilege of being part of a place that has one of the most academic and demanding pre-collegiate educations in America. I believe that we should welcome the learning differences in children and consider those differences as a challenge for appropriate teaching strategies. I also believe that delivering a rich and rigorous curriculum coupled with high expectations for learning is who we are and who we should continue to be.

For the first few months of this year, I will be inviting members of our faculty to share their thoughts about learning differences. I begin with remarks given to our entire faculty by Jennifer Gates, Lab's Learning Consultant at the Lower School. Jennifer came to us at the same time as she was completing her doctorate at the University of Chicago. She is among many at this place who have earned my deepest respect.

Faculty Address
August 27, 2005
Jennifer Gates, Ph.D.
Learning Consultant, Lower School

When asked to give this address, I thought briefly about talking about something other than learning differences—but ultimately I realized, problems with learning is what I know best—not only from an observer's perspective. People who know me well, are certainly aware that I have a real range of learning differences, weaknesses that are disabling and make some kinds of learning very challenging, and some strengths that are enabling.

The first indication that I remember, that something was wrong, was in first grade. We had reading bees. Each row of students was a team, and each student was presented with a word, on a flashcard, that they had to read, or sit down if they couldn't. The row with the most students standing at the end was the winner. I remember when I got the word W-A-S. I knew that word and answered, confidently, SAW. I was surprised when I was told to sit down.

What I remember most strongly about that experience was the sense of disbelief—I knew that word—how could I be wrong? This was the first time I learned that I couldn't trust myself; I couldn't be so sure of something that being right was guaranteed. I hear so many kids with learning problems say things like, "My brain plays tricks on me." I know what they mean.

This sense of my own unreliability compounded the second feeling I remember, which was humiliation—the laughter at my mistake, being the first on my row to have to sit down—I felt so stupid. The third feeling was relief; I didn't have to have another turn—at least not this time around. I wound up in the lowest reading group; it wasn't called the Buzzard group but it might as well have been.

Fourth grade also stands out; the good news was we had to memorize and recite poems each week—I was good at that. My mother, who was a high school English teacher and drama coach, coached me through weekly poems. The bad news was I got a U in math; subtraction—I just didn't get it. Out came the flash cards, and every night I did pluses and minuses and practiced borrowing with my father, who was an engineer and fortunately good in math.

Also in fourth grade, I discovered Nancy Drew. I wish I could remember how that happened because it was a real life-changing event. I do remember going to the library, where, on the bottom shelf, all the Nancy Drew books were lined up with green covers. I read them all, then moved on to Judy Bolton and the Dana Girls. Then the weekly trips to the public library where I went through all the fairy tale books—The Orange Book of Fairy Tales, The Purple Book of Fairy Tales. Fantasy and mystery made a reader of me. I still read mystery novels.

By high school I really loved English classes. My Mother read Shakespeare to me; she was a terrific Bottom and a fearsome Lady Macbeth. She also saw to it that I could diagram sentences—Latin helped with that. And I could still memorize. When in the doldrums sailing I can still mentally recite passages from the Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner.

My Learning problems had not gone away however, and I was reminded of this powerfully with Geometry--this time with an F. Again Dad hit the math book with me every night. I could memorize all the theorems and corollaries, but couldn't figure out what to do with them; it was seldom QED for me. Math has never gotten easier and I have few intuitions about how numbers work. Susan Olander teaches me lattice multiplication every year and I marvel at how it works, and how elegant it is, but I don't really get it.

Having my own learning problems and then teaching kids with learning problems, has taught me three lessons I'd like to share with you. The first, and most obvious, is that learning differences are not something that appear in school in order to frustrate kids and teachers alike. They are there all the time.

My particular learning weaknesses have to do with processing space and directionality. I still reverse b's and d's—usually when taking notes in a rush. I made a phone call just before I started working on this talk recently—the area code was 508. I dialed and got a recording telling me there was no such number. I had dialed 805. It is not insignificant that anxiety increases the odds of such mistakes. With consistency that is amazing (especially to my husband) I turn the wrong way when coming out of elevators, or offices, and I often say turn left, while pointing right.

The second lesson comes from my reading experiences and also from sailing. Learning for kids with learning problems often takes longer and requires more effort, more practice, and more review. The bottom line is one learns to read by reading a lot—not much fun when reading is an arduous, rough, mistake-ridden activity. Reading, math facts, handwriting need to be automatic, and one achieves automaticity by lots of practice.

The good news is that it can be worth it. I am a sailor. I say that with a great deal of pride. There is no pursuit that I can think of that involves more complex directional concepts. Port and starboard replaces left and right; on a starboard tack the sail is on the port side, the wind in coming from the starboard side. When learning to steer by compass, it took me a long time to figure out which way to turn the boat to change the course in a particular direction. North, South, East, West are more complex than left and right.

Then there is wind direction, and translating this little arrow at the top of the mast, which points to the direction the wind is coming from, into information that helps you head up or fall off, or trim or ease the sail. Steering or trimming sail requires integrating all these directional variables quickly. I would have to think it all through verbally;—"Let's see, fall off means to head away from the direction the wind is coming; the wind is coming over the left side, the port side, so that means turning away from that side or to the right or starboard," then stopping for a moment to remind myself which way is right. By the time I'd said all this to myself, and done it, it was time to change direction again. And it was so easy for so many of the people I sailed with. I was often frustrated and anxious and got it wrong more often than I got it right. Often near tears with frustration, I would wonder why I was subjecting myself to this stress.

The answer was always, I love sailing. I especially like big winds and waves and heeling over going fast, but I also love the quietness, the feeling of cooperating with nature, and the view of Chicago from the lake is incredible. I was really motivated to persevere. After 15 years of sailing, I feel fairly confident at the wheel now and don't need those complex narratives to know what to do. However, I still can't multi-task; I can't steer and talk at the same time. The real payoff is the satisfaction I feel. When I am standing behind the wheel and holding a course, I get such an adrenaline kick—such a sense of satisfaction. I feel triumphant. I can do this. I have talked to older kids with learning problems who can articulate this same payoff—they have learned to work hard, that perseverance leads to success, and that hard-won success is very sweet.

One of the greatest assets of a Lab school education is the ethos that learning is an adventure, intellectual curiosity is a virtue, and the pursuit of knowledge is rewarding. Here the payoff, for many kids with learning problems, can actually come in school. Why persevere, why work hard, why tough it out? The educational experience that Lab has to offer is a significant motivator. Learning is exciting, curiosity is rewarding, intellectual interests are valued, thinking differently, originally, is encouraged. Here at Lab, learning is the payoff. And having to work hard to get there can make it extra sweet. When I see students I have known get their diploma at graduation, I imagine they feel the kick of overcoming challenges and they experience a sense of triumph—"I did it"—that also prepares them for college and life in powerful ways.

The third lesson I have learned takes me to the other side of learning; teaching kids with learning problems is very challenging and often frustrating. One of the reasons that it is so hard is that, in reality, it is almost impossible to know what is going on in the brain or mind of another person, especially when what is going on is atypical. We all operate with an underlying assumption about human perceptions. That is, we all perceive more or less the same thing when we are looking at the same thing, or listening to the same thing. It is understandable to assume that when a whole classroom of children look at W-A-S, they are seeing WAS—because it is WAS. The difficulty with teaching kids with learning problems is that they don't always see as we see, hear as we hear or understand some concepts as we understand them.

I want to read to you a short passage from a book I am indebted to Kate Morrison and Dorothy Friedman for introducing to me. The book Reversals: A Personal Account of Victory over Dyslexia is by Eileen Simpson, who has dyslexia but, like me, was not diagnosed until adulthood. In it she describes her early experiences trying to learn to read. When I taught a course in The Exceptional Child to MAT students, this book was required reading. I think this passage is a powerful portrayal of the frustration felt by a teacher who doesn't understand why a child isn't learning. It also provides a window into the learner's frustration, and revisits the was-saw dilemma.

Eileen is recounting the efforts of her aunt and guardian, who was also a school principal, to teach her to read. Eileen is the narrator here.

With a feeling of impending doom I would begin. I might get halfway through the first sentence before Auntie would say in a dry controlled voice, "In the context, the word cannot possibly be 'saw' The man saw going home. Does that make sense to you? It must be 'was'."
I'd repeat, "The man was going home." In the next sentence, or the one after, meeting the word again I'd hesitate. Had I said 'was' before and had Auntie corrected to 'saw' or vice versa? My brain ached.
"Don't tell me you don't recognize that word. I just told it to you. You're not trying."
My teachers often accused me of not trying. They had no idea what an effort I was making. Was, saw, was, saw. How were they so sure which it was? Rattled by Auntie's foot tapping, I decided for 'saw'.
"No, no, NO! How can you be so stupid. The word is 'was' WASWASWAS. And for heaven's sake stop sniveling."
Every night these lessons continued. Auntie grimly determined, I increasingly despairing. She shouted, I cried, my sister hid. The night I read 'off' for 'of' for the third time, Auntie exploded. She flew out of the chair, grabbed the book from my hand, and hurled it at my head. When it hit me, we were both astonished and shaken.

My students inevitably railed against Auntie—how could she be so impatient, cruel, unsympathetic? Needless to say, I too felt great empathy for Eileen; but unlike most of my students, who were not yet teachers, I also felt empathy for Auntie. I have felt the knot of frustration and anxiety, and the feeling of helplessness—why can't I teach this child?—am I incompetent—that comes when teaching children whose learning patterns I don't understand.

That sense of helplessness sent me back to school with the naive assumption that I just needed to learn what was going on with kids who had trouble learning. I found that there were few answers; researchers were just beginning to figure out the best questions to ask. However, since 1976, when I went back, there has been a great deal of research into learning disorders and we are beginning to get some answers, and know what to do with them.

I'm sure my satisfaction in testing kids and trying to figure out what is going on with their learning is rooted in the terrible discomfort of not knowing. I strongly believe that knowing more about why a child has trouble learning—what his/her learning weaknesses are, can help a teacher understand the child's difficulties and then figure out ways to help that child.

This is the value, I think, in the Mel Levine "schema" enumerating neuro-cognitive functions and dysfunctions. It provides a dictionary or roadmap that teachers can use to help them figure out why a child is having difficulty and what that child's strengths are. This may be heresy but I think having a "list of accommodations" which Mel Levine also supplies, is less valuable, in the long run, than having the tools to help understand a student's learning experience—and over time, seeing that there are patterns of atypical learning that apply to more than one student. Having that, good teachers can often figure out effective accommodations.

Another thing that Mel Levine emphasizes, and that I have learned while at Lab, is how important a child's strengths are—partly because many children at Lab, with learning weaknesses that disable, also have prodigious learning strengths that enable. Using strengths as leverage—around difficulties—but also to insure successes—can make a huge difference in the child's educational experience.

Lab school by its nature, provides a range of learning experiences that enable teachers and children to find learning strengths. We also teach children to remind themselves of their strengths and accomplishments, and for many students this can greatly diminishes the devastating effect of "feeling stupid."

One lesson that I haven't been able to learn after being at lab for more than 20 years is how to predict which students, of those I test or have referred for testing, will be successful at lab in the long run, and which will not. The question is so often asked: "can this child make it?"—by teachers, by parents, by me. What I have learned again and again is that I don't know the answer. I remember the first high school graduation I went to, when kids I knew in my first years at Lab were graduating, seeing kids get their diplomas who I wouldn't have bet a quarter would be doing just that. I also remember with chagrin, in fact with great unease, some of the kids whom I was a part of counseling out; would they, too, have made it? At what age or grade can we be sure that a child won't make it?

I've had the experience, with more frequency that I would like, of talking with Susan Eisenberg about kids we were worried about in lower school, whom she has not even heard about in middle school. What happens? Do their learning problems disappear? Were we wrong in seeing learning problems in the first place? Did their learning strengths and/or more maturity help them compensate and succeed anyway? I don't think there are simple answers to these questions. And I don't think there is a sure way of predicting who will make it and who won't. Neither do I think that all children with learning problems can make it at Lab.

I have, however, come to see that there are factors that we can understand that increase the odds of success, and, whose absence, increases the odds of failure. I have arrived at my own list of factors, reflecting 20-plus years of experience and intuition, Reading the research about "success attributes" of children with learning disabilities has reinforced some of my list.

Marshall Reskind has spend 20 years in formal research into the factors that individuals with learning disabilities possessed who were successful in college, in their professions, and in life.

His list contains 6 attributes:

Self-awareness—knowing your own learning strengths and weaknesses and seeing the weaknesses as only part of who you are.
Proactivity—being involved and engaged; being an active participants in school, in learning; in there doing, rather than sidelined watching, ignoring, or avoiding.
Perseverance—going after what you want to learn, and what help you need.
Goal setting—having appropriate goals that can then provide a personal sense of accomplishment, and being able to change strategies or even goals when necessary.
Presence and use of effective support systems.
Emotional coping strategies—having ways of reducing the stress and frustration inevitable when learning is difficult.

My list, based on my Lab School experience, often echoes Reskind. I think the following are necessary for making it at Lab School:

Having identifiable strengths—having some sources of success.
Having resiliency—being able survive failures without a permanent sense of shame.
Developing, over time, a solid sense of self—which sometimes means a source of success outside of academics, in sports, in the arts, in social leadership roles. It also means comfort with a degree of success that is appropriate—not needing to compete with smartest in the class.
Being willing and able to work hard.
Having supportive parents—who are also working to accept and understand their child's learning problems, and are able to work with the school as part of a team.
Having appropriate intervention and support inside and outside of school.

The most interesting thing about these lists is that these are not just innate attributes. They can be acquired indirectly in the process of going to school, they can develop, when nurtured, with maturity, and they can be taught directly by the school and by parents. Hyde Park Day School has a curriculum for teaching children the concepts that Reskind has enumerated and helping them to develop these attributes. I think getting an education at Lab indirectly fosters many of these attributes.

I wish I had a formula—each success attribute gets so many points and there is a critical total that is needed for success in lab. Can extra points for an effective support system balance a point shortage in perseverance? I doubt that there is a formula, but I do think that looking at a student's success attributes and how they contribute to a student's experiences at Lab can help us think more carefully about which students should stay and which should not stay. I wonder if we couldn't figure out a way to think about the attributes a child with learning problems has, or needs, that can help her succeed, rather than thinking that the learning problems will cause her to fail.

But why should teachers add this extra burden to their already demanding jobs? I think the answer, again, lies in the payoff. These are the kids who make teaching challenging. But The Laboratory Schools are uniquely qualified to answer this challenge. Learning is alive here, and teachers are what breathe life into classrooms. When kids with learning problems graduate, we all share in the triumph. It is ultimately the teachers whose support, understanding, patience, and hard work have helped make that walk across the stage possible.