Teaching Language Arts

By Linda Childress

Two years ago, I participated in a PPT Meeting to discuss a student who would be placed on my teaching team. We are a middle school, and our 7^th and 8^th grade is looped – meaning the students and a team of teachers stay together for two years. Along with my fellow team members, I listened as this student was described as a 12-year-old girl who was diagnosed with NLD, and had unique educational needs. I had never heard the term NLD before, and felt uncertain about my ability to support this student in a fully mainstreamed environment without special education support, especially for a two-year period. However, I soon learned that although I had not previously heard the term NLD, the learning differences of this particular student were by no means new, either to me or to my fellow teachers.

The NLD student profits from the best teaching practices, as do all emerging adolescents—with one difference:  Where other students merely benefit, these strategies are a necessity for the NLD student. The teaching methods described in this article, at best, make school a tolerable place for these students.

SMALL GROUP DISCUSSION

Most students, for instance, benefit from active engagement in small group discussion. Discourse with teachers and each other helps students to listen, explore, clarify, and even challenge each other’s thoughts and ideas. For the NLD student this is not just beneficial, but critical, because modeling appropriate teacher-facilitated small group discourse will help her to learn “how to do it.”  For the NLD student, teacher-directed groups, using open-ended questions that draw on her background, and her unique talents and interests are as essential to her growing up healthy as water is.

The NLD student needs to know that her environment is a safe and nurturing one before risking interaction. Knowing that their comments are being attentively listened to may not be a paramount concern for some emerging adolescents, but the NLD student likely interprets it as an indication of her worth as a communicator, and needs guidance and support along the way.

FRONTLOADING

In the NLD student’s personal and academic environments, they need to know the rules and expectations. If a teacher initiates a lesson by telling the students what they’ll be expected to learn that day, it provides focus – good for everyone, but absolutely necessary for the NLD student. Tell ‘em what you’re gonna tell ‘em … “When you leave today, I expect you to be able to identify an adjective and be able to use one to expand a sentence.” Everyone benefits - the NLD student, the “typical” student, and the teacher are all focused.

Students with NLD are contextual learners. “Frontloading” an assignment is critical for this student, because it allows them to see the lesson in as much context as possible. Frontloading begins by examining what the class already knows about the subject matter or theme that is being covered. A flip chart is helpful for jotting down “what we already know,” and works much better than a blackboard, not just for the NLD student, but for the entire class.

The next step in frontloading is expanding the student’s knowledge by providing related background information. Sometimes this includes vocabulary; other times it includes references to works of art. Always, it assures me that my NLD student is getting information that will help her make sense of the lesson.

Let us suppose, for instance, that I want to teach Longfellow’s Paul Revere’s Ride. Frontloading would surely include a determination of what the class already knows about the Patriot and Loyalist positions. Background-building might include a discussion of Patriot’s Day in Boston, a movie about the Battle of Lexington and Concord, a discussion about figurative language, and a look at a map of Boston to locate the Old North Church, the Charlestown Shore, and the Charles River. Is all this activity a lot of time spent to make a poem understandable?  Perhaps. But if these prereading activities increase my NLD student’s (and everyone else’s) comprehension of the text, it is most definitely time well spent.

Reading may actually be a bit tricky. Technically, she may read in the average to high average range, but it may not be that easy. This particular student read best when the print was larger, with plenty of “white space” between lines, and strong contrast between print color and page color. A few things that worked for this student were:

·        Rather than assign the paperback version of a book, get the hardcover version of the book out of the school library. You’ll generally find that the “white space,” print size, and contrast are better for this student than the paperback version.

·        If the child and the district are willing, order larger print books for the visually impaired.

·        If you’re assigning the reading in “chunks,” simply copy the assigned section on a photocopier and enlarge the size.

·        Don’t forget to consider books on tape from the association for the Reading For The Blind and Dyslexic.

And always give the student’s reading assignment a purpose. Read to page “x” to determine “x.”  You can actually do this for an entire book fairly simply.

Reading non-fiction material is likely to be a significant problem. The social studies text, for example, may present a more complex problem than what you may see in the reading of literary material. In this subject area, frontloading strategies are even more critical for this student before asking them to process information from a text book. Also consider some of the above suggestions, most notably text books on tape.

WRITING

Equally important for these students is knowing beforehand the criteria by which their work will be judged. I remember and rue those days when I assigned my students a topic to write about, and then spent countless hours red-penciling every error that I could find.

That would be unfair for all students, but devastating for an NLD student. Today, rubrics, checklists and models let this student know what it is that I want. Given clear, consistent standards, she knows what counts and can concentrate on it. She knows exactly what “writing well” means in my class. Since “my” writing standards are purposefully aligned with the state’s standards, it is not surprising that my NLD student was 1 of only 5 students  (of over 100 students) who scored a perfect 12 on the Connecticut State Mastery Test Writing Sample.

This student wants to please and wants to succeed. Responding to her work at the end, without the benefit of intervention, is callous at best. Both oral and written comments about her work will be heeded implicitly, but constructive one-to-one comments are probably the best way to provide  feedback. I would not, however, single her out to give this individualized feedback, because she does not like to feel different. You would probably want to give several students their feedback in this same manner. Collaborative “mini-conferences” as I circulate around the room provide an opportunity to suggest new ways to solve writing problems and assure my NLD student that it is normal and right to rework her drafts, even for gifted writers.

I write a model for every writing assignment that I give, and read it aloud to my students before they begin their writing. Do I mind if they borrow my words or ideas?  Absolutely not!  This particular NLD student’s ability to learn from writing “models” is truly extraordinary, so much so that she is the only student that I have ever taught who can model the “voice” of the reader. I was told that this student was an auditory learner, but I had no idea how critical the combination of an auditory message and written model were to her success.

These are some of the strategies that I found helpful in working with this exceptional NLD student. They were helpful, but not enough for her to function in a public environment that reflects all of the harsh realities of the 90s. She faces issues that I never had to face in my junior high school days, challenges that are compounded by her disability. And so, her parents have found an environment that provides her with the additional support and advocacy that her special needs demand.

I celebrate any decision that will help this student and her parents reach their shared vision for her adult life. But I miss her. And I look forward to her visits and watching her grow morally, physically, emotionally and socially, knowing that I played a part, albeit small, in that growth.

Today, I know the name for the disorder that affects so many of the youngsters that we have seen over the years. I just hope that somewhere along the way that I, or some other teachers, helped to make their life better for them. They have so much to share and teach us, if we just take the time to understand and listen. My own son, grown now into a young man that I respect and enjoy, surely had many NLD attributes that, thinking back, I either handled poorly or could not accept, but that is another story for another day.

Copyright:  Linda Childress

About the author - Linda Childress is a middle school language arts teacher in Connecticut. During her twenty-five year career, she has received numerous teaching awards.