End of the Year

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Reading stories to the computer with Reading Assistant's voice recognition software.

No software at home like this? No problem! Get your kids reading to a mellow dog over the summer. If you don't have one, borrow one. They're the best listeners any kid could ask for, just don't forget the treats.

'Who's excited about finishing? Not me!

Ms Taylor's students reading a story from Reading Assistant to the rest of their class (heads just barely visible in front). Very impressive stuff.

So...

We’re entering into our last week of Fast ForWord on Monday June 6^th. It’s been a genuine pleasure to work at Gibsons Elementary again and even more of a pleasure to work with the kids in the program. All 36 of them!

Most of these 36 also had the extra added benefit of the Reading Assistant program. Some worked on this in conjunction with Fast ForWord. These kids put in a lot of hard work and dedication. I’d have to say virtually all of them worked towards bettering themselves daily and made sure of this by checking their results each day.

The overall results have been impressive, and with many of the kids we had both their teachers and parents notice a difference in their learning, often commenting on some aspect of their improvement. Sometimes the improvement has been difficult to measure, but it's been noticed in things like their attitude and effort. These are the things that I think really spark a difference in learning. And I’ve seen a lot of it here.

Thanks so much to everyone for making this happen at Gibsons Elementary.

Sincerely,

Frank Thorburn

*Individual reports on students’ progress will be included with year end report cards. If you have any concerns or comments about the program, please contact me at: fthorburn@sd46.bc.ca

Getting Fresh 'Air'

Life's Looking Up

Hello everybody,

All Fast ForWord students are showing some positive results for their hard work.

Those of you requesting results by email will begin receiving reports directly from Scientific Learning each Saturday, starting tomorrow. Check your Junk Mail box as the reports could be deflected there.

You won't be able to reply directly to scilearn.com but if you have any questions contact me at school or email: fthorburn@sd46.bc.ca *All students are registered under Kinnikinnick Elementary.

For those of you wondering more about why the different 'games' or exercises your child works on, focus so much on hearing differences in sound, watch the following slideshow from NorthWestern University. It demonstrates in 19 slides, how hearing differences in sound can help to improve language, reading and working memory skills. Especially interesting to me is the importance music plays in acquiring these skills.

*The graphs and some of the data may be difficult to follow, but the pictures and captions really tell the story.

http://www.soc.northwestern.edu/brainvolts/slideshows/sin/index.php

Have a good weekend.

Sharing Results

Sharing results with a student. Ongoing feedback is important to student success.