In the first few moments of her three-day workshop, Supporting Reading Comprehension, Writing, and Study Skills at the Landmark College Institute, Linda Hecker prompted participants (I was one of five) to introduce ourselves and say why we came.

When it was my turn, I answered that I wanted to learn and develop more explicit teaching methods, to help not only my students with learning disabilities, but all students I work with. We were invited to tell the story of a student, and I talked about A., who, when I very clearly proposed to him an alternative structure for his paper, said to me: “I understand what you mean, but I don’t know how to do what you’re saying.” I’d like to know, I said to Linda and the group, how to teach better those students who don’t intuitively know all the little steps involved in tackling a big writing task. What’s involved, for example, in summarizing a passage or chapter? I know how to summarize — but do I know how to teach the same skill?

In the workshop, I did learn a strategy for teaching the summary, and picked up a few tools as well. Landmark emphasizes multimodal teaching, which engages a student aurally, visually, and kinesthetically in learning.  Even though their faculty have developed this kind of teaching to reach students with learning disabilities and AD/HD, this pedagogy is applicable to all learners.

Indeed, after three days at Landmark, I wanted to try out some of these exercises and tools not only on students, but on my own reading and writing practices. They’re more than effective — they seem motivating and, dare I say, fun.

What follows here is a select list of some of the ideas, remarks, readings, tools, and websites that seemed most immediately interesting to me. Certainly, there was more. It was a great experience, and, if you teach, I recommend that you go. Continue reading →