Dear Parents:
Calling All Neurons!

A few months ago, I had occasion to correspond and speak with Lisa Hanifan, who by her own admission, was an “angry teacher” and a mom who later “felt guilty as a parent.”  You see, Ms. Hanifan didn’t know what she didn’t know. My colleague, Lisa, has NOTHING to feel guilty about—neither as a teacher nor a parent.  I ‘met’ her after a totally on-line conversation as part of the Facebook Group Science of Reading. We later had a nice conversation by phone. Ms. Hanifan’s experience more than validates the notion that ‘change is possible and change is good’. …

Why Write a Thank You Note? A thank you note is simply an effective and simple way to show appreciation for the kindness of others in terms of generosity and support.. One can write a thank you note not only for gifts received (’tis the season), but also for any kind gesture including, but not limited to: a gift received–especially this time of year! a job interview a meal delivery to you when in need attendance at an event help provided to someone in need of assistance time spent professionally to help a client or patient a kind word…

Start Early!! Why wait? Start with oral language, encourage interest in letters, then speech to print (sound to symbol correspondences) to teach blending and segmenting! A few things crossed my desktop this week, but NOTHING compares to the birth of a new granddaughter, which also occurred this week!! That’s number 3 for me. Molly will be joining her older brother, Caleb (20 months), and her older sister, Jeri (almost 3 1/2). So ‘you-know-who’ got to babysit for a few days with Grandpa while the parents were otherwise occupied. We were glad to be called in to help. As I…

For some students, even able ones, reading is just “too much” work. A little parable is then offered in support of teaching literacy skills efficiently, effectively, and in accordance with what we now know about how the human brain learns to read–in other words–aligned to The Science of Reading. HERE IS THE STORY — EVERYONE LIKES A STORY, RIGHT? A couple of weeks ago, I had the pleasure of dining out with what most folks would consider a precocious 10 year old, currently a 5th grader in the northeast United States. We got to talking and inevitably, I asked…

Is it YOUR or YOUR CHILD’s Enemy too? I am downsizing, moving, and relocating to another state in just a couple of weeks. So you know the story. These are the file cabinets that were once filled with paper—stuff from my home, stuff from my job(s), stuff from my kids. I suspect NO ONE will be purchasing them. Paper remains the Enemy. Image by Lori Josephson I’ve had to go through every piece of paper, along with every item in our home accumulated over the past 23+ years. This is not some small task when one is an educator….

I love sharing stories. That’s why I received a gift of a ‘storyteller poster’ which hangs in my office. And that’s why I continued to receive gifts relating to storytelling over the years. Image by Lori Josephson I used to talk with my students, all of whom had dyslexia to greater or lesser extents, about how they felt concerning going back to school. I used to ask my own kids, none of whom had dyslexia, how they felt too. These were always my parting words: “There is only 1 time to make a first impression.” Lori Josephson And you,…