EDA : European Dyslexia Association

"The European Dyslexia Association (Avrupa Disleksi Birliği) is a European non-governmental umbrella organisation for national and regional associations of people with dyslexia and other specific learning differences, children’s parents, professionals and scientists. It was founded and legally established under Belgium law in 1987 in Brussels as an international non-profit association by representatives of ten national dyslexia associations. It is the platform and the Voice of the people with dyslexia and so called ‘Specific Learning Difficulties’ in Europe.

The EDA currently has 23 regional and national Effective Members in 21 EU countries plus Switzerland and Norway and 11 Adherent member organisations; in all 34 member organisations in 24 European countries.

"EITHER the Austrian Dyslexia Research Center (Avusturya Disleksi Araştırma Merkezi), the Dyslexia Research Center AG (a swiss public limited company plc), the Erster Österreichischer Dachverband ( EÖDL - wrongly translated into Turkish : Avusturya Disleksi Birliği), Silverlife International NOR Ms. Ursula Günster Schöning are members of the European Dyslexia Association ( Avrupa Disleksi Birliği).

There are three Austrian Effective Members of the European Dyslexia Association:

Österreichischer Bundesverband Legasthenie (ÖBVL-Austrian Federal Dyslexia Association).

Steirischer Landesverband Legasthenie ( Styrian Dyslexia Association),

Initiative LEGA Vorarlberg ( Vorarlberg Dyslexia Association).

As a board member of the ÖBVL, I state that the ÖBVL has no contact to the associations and companies listed above."

Michael Kalmar ( President) : EDA

www.dyslexia.eu.com

Make Your Own Comics

In the long school holiday, as well as reading dyslexic children also need to practice their writing .Writing is usually the weakest skill of all in someone with dyslexia because it requires them to integrate many different skills – spelling, punctuation, handwriting, sequencing and organisation etc. Children with dyslexia usually hate to write, and it often takes significant encouragement to get them to write anything.!!As a result I am always on the look out for something which might motivate my child to want to write.

I recently found this great site called “Make beliefs comix” – where children can make on-line comics free.

You can create a comic strip fairly quickly.You can choose from a range of characters and their emotions, add thought or speech balloons and also add objects and prompts.It is very easy to use.

Comics are not saved on the site.As a result when your child finishes their story they need to print out or email their comic.

The site has some teacher ideas and also activities for families. For those struggling with writing ideas , the "Writer prompts" page is useful.

The comic strips can be written in different languages :English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, Italian, German and Latin.

Bill Zimmerman the designer of the site is a prize-winning newspaper editor and author of 18 books.

Google and the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) listed Make Beliefs Comix among "the world's most innovative web sites in fostering literacy and reading."

http://www.makebeliefscomix.com/

Basic Maths Skills

Especially during the long summer holiday it is vital that children with dyslexia / dyscalulia etc practice basic maths skills .

Learning maths is like building a wall with building bricks. If some of these bricks are left out of the wall or if bricks are not securely cemented in then the wall will eventually fall down.

A solid math foundation is vital for children to succeed. Students with weak basic math skills will find maths a struggle as they progress with school. As a result it is crucial for children with dyslexia and dyscalculia to practice and improve their basic skills in addition, subtraction, multiplication and division.

Here are some good online educational games your child can play.They are fun to play and your child will not feel like he is doing school work !! :

Arcademic Skill Builders

http://www.arcademicskillbuilders.com/


This is a website that features fun, arcade-type games to practice the four basic operations .Game titles include "Grand Prix Multiplication" and “Alien Addition”. Games can be played with one or more players at a time. There are also some literacy games available.

Crickweb site :

The Digit Workout :

This is a progressive range of mental maths activities in 6 levels, which can help to improve the recall of key number facts . Keep a record of your child’s scores and see if they can improve them.


http://www.crickweb.co.uk/assets/resources/flash.php?&file=digitmenu

World Cup Math from Mr Nussbaum

Your child must win the world cup by scoring as many goals as possible against world teams by answering math facts.

http://www.mrnussbaum.com/football/index.html

For other ideas of games see the great website set up by the Woodlands Junior School in the UK .


http://www.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/maths/

Practice basic maths using a pack of cards – Shuffle the cards then turn them face down.Get your child to turn over two cards and write those values down on a piece of paper. Afterwards your child chooses whether to use multiplication, division, addition, or subtraction to find an answer. In the end get them to write down the answer.

Tar Heel Reader

With the long summer school holiday upon us I am trying to get my son to improve his English.I recently came across a useful site that could be used for dyslexic children to do some online reading and writing.

The Tar Heel Reader site is a collection of free,easy-to-read, and accessible books on a wide range of topics. The books can be read online or downloaded. They are all speech enabled.

The books are intended for teenagers who are just learning to read ,however many are also suitable for younger children who are beginner or struggling readers and also for English language learners. The books have very simple wording so they are suitable for dyslexic children.Books are also available in a number of different languages such as Spanish and German, as well as English.

Some of the books may be inappropriate for your child so it is best to create your own favourites page of the books suitable for your child.To do this you need to be a registered user.

Besides reading a book, students also have the option of creating their own books. They can make their own books using pictures from the Flickr collection or using their own photos. To create a book you will need to register for free.

This site is a result of collaboration between the Centre for Literacy and Disability Studies and the Department of Computer Science at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

www.tarheelreader.org/

NB Tar Heel is a nickname for the state and people of North Carolina.

Get your child to make their own books and put them online as this may help to encourage your child to want to write more !!

Please see the article I wrote about talking / audio books for dyslexics.

Mnemonic Lists

In a previous dyslexia blog article I talked about how mnemonics can help dyslexic pupils in their studies. A mnemonic device is a memory aide that helps you to remember sets of information more easily.

I recently found some websites which list ready-made mnemonics for a number of different topics:

Here are their addresses :

www.eudesign.com/mnems/_mnframe.htm

http://www.mnemonic-device.eu/mnemonics/

You could also search for specific topics in Google :

eg "science mnemonics " "maths mnemonics" etc...

Educational Games to Play Outdoors

Here in this dyslexia blog are some ideas about educational games to play outdoors in the summer :

Schools in Turkey will soon start the long 3 month summer holiday .In the summer kids will naturally spend more of their time outdoors playing. Dyslexic kids certainly benefit from a break from school; however in order not too forget skills learnt ;it is important that children undertake some learning activities on a regular basis.

One interesting approach, is to practice maths and literacy skills outside, through physical games . This approach encourages both sides of the brain to work, as the one side focuses on the physical movements and the other side has to come up with the answers. Also adding movement makes learning seem like more fun.

Running games
Carol Goodrow, who was trained as an Orton Gillingham Tutor, specializing in learning disabilities ,has an interesting site called Kids Running.com. It includes outlines of a number of different educational running games children can play such as :

Get even
Fractions
Sight word scramble
Run to Spell

Also she suggests cutting up maths worksheets and clipping them onto clipboards.Kids then run to the clipboard and do the problem after finally running back with their finished work to have it checked. You could test grammar,spellings etc using the same approach.

The games are designed for whole classes to do but you could adapt them .

http://www.kidsrunning.com/krschoolgames.html


Ball Games
You can shout out an adjective to your child while throwing a ball to them .Your child will then give the correct synonym or antonym and throw back the ball .
You could adapt this game to practice all sorts of grammar points eg different tenses, It could also be used to test maths skills eg multiplication , addition etc.The options are endless.

Pavement Chalk Maths
Get your child to solve problems on the pavement instead of on paper to make it more fun.

Maths hopscotch.
Put numbers into hopscotch squares. Call out a problem in addition, subtraction, multiplication, division etc and have your child hop to the two numbers in the problem and then the answer. ( NB :make sure numbers are accessible to each other).

Times Table Aerobics
Choose a times table you want to practice with your son or daughter .Decide with your child on some aerobics movements to do eg jogging on the spot , touching toes , twisting from side to side etc.
After your child can chant their tables while completing the aerobics moves.

Maths Twister
Adapt your twister game by putting numbers on your Twister board. After you can make up problems for your child to solve eg 5x 8, 5+ 8 etc
Make it harder or easier depending on the age or level of your child .

If you don’t have Twister you could make your own from 20 A4 pages joined together with the numbers 1-20 clearly written on them (place them in 4 rows of 5).The children are then told instructions such as " Put your left foot on the answer of 3 add 5" and so on Repeat until the child has 2 feet and hands on the numbers.

Flash card games -Make up two different sets of coloured flash cards to make a matching card game eg opposites, fractions and decimals etc etc.
Tie some string strategically around your garden. After use clothes pegs to attach the flash cards to the string. Have your child find the matching cards.

Make up a treasure hunt – write some problems on cards for your child to solve and also explain where the next clue can be find – If you child gets the right answers give a small reward or treat in the end.

On the Wirral Learning Grid there is a very useful booklet giving suggestions of maths games “Some Activities for the Kinaesthetic Learner in Primary Education”
It is geared for classroom use but some of the games could be adapted.

www.wirral-mbc.gov.uk/maths/index.asp

Here are some other sites which give practical ideas for teachers to integrate physical activity into lessons:

www.activeacademics.org

This site is from the North Carolina Physical Education Dept - It contains Primary and Middle School Energizers.

www.ncpe4me.com

For some Kinesthetic Language Learning ideas from
Susan Kramer : Learning Disabilities Site : Bella Online go to :

www.bellaonline.com/articles/art14894.asp

In Turkey lessons are generally conducted in a traditional manner.Children are required to sit still in their seats for long hours. It would be good however if teachers could in-corporate some physical activity into their lessons in order to re-vitalize students and aid learning. Many of the approaches good for kids with learning disabilities are also beneficial to ALL kids.... We drastically need a change in attitude towards learning in Turkish schools ............

Parents and teachers be creative and make up your own ideas !!

Sentence Expansion

Here in this dyslexia blog article are some tips on how to help your child improve their sentence writing.

Usually dyslexic children have problems with writing.They often find it hard and can’t write much.

Here is a way to help your child improve their sentence writing so that the sentences they write are more complexed and interesting.

First of all make up a number of simple or 'kernel' sentences which have a subject,verb and object

Eg The cat sat on the mat.

After, you can get your child to practise expanding these sentences systematically, by adding adjectives, adverbs, prepositional phrases and, clauses etc . ( not forgetting punctuation). Children in the end can build extremely long, yet well-formed sentences.

Kernel sentence:

The woman ran into the building.

Ask some prompt questions such as :

What kind of woman was she ?

What kind of building was it ?

How did she run into the building ?

Can you give some more information about the woman?

Why was she running into the building?

Expanded sentence:

The tall, well- dressed woman ran into the modern office building.

The tall, well-dressed woman ran hurriedly into the modern Office building.

The tall,well-dressed woman from the fourth floor,ran hurriedly into the modern office building.

The tall,well-dressed woman from the fourth floor,ran hurriedly into the modern office building, because she was late for a meeting.