American Dyslexia Association

Tag: practice

  • Working Memory, the Predictor of Learning

    by  | Dec 12, 2020

    Working Memory, the Predictor of Learning

    Working Memory Improves IQ and Attentiveness

    Most children are not getting the right kind of memory practice.  Long term memory is improved by tests – rote memorization, but it’s working memory that impacts IQ and learning capability, making it far more important

    Working memory is defined by the NIH as the retention of a small amount of information in a readily accessible form. It facilitates planning, comprehension, reasoning, and problem-solving.

    If you can hold, interpret and compare more information in your mind at one time, it makes sense that you will be able to think more deeply, leading to thinking associated with a higher IQ.

    Furthermore, if you are able to hold more information in your mind, you can follow lectures more easily, understand the plots and flow of books more comfortably – make them more engaging and interesting, and therefore easier to pay attention.

    Einstein’s Brain – Is a Good Long Term Memory Harmful?

    Einstein is known to have a notoriously poor long term memory, which scientists wonder helped him.  Part of his brilliance was that his mind was not cluttered with rote learned information he didn’t need.

    However, a bigger factor in the Einstein story is his working memory. He is thought to have been able to come up all the moving parts in his Theory of Relativity by holding and manipulating them at the same time in his working memory.

    Working Memory Practice?

    You’d think that given the potency of improvements in working memory to improve attentiveness and IQ that it would be consciously developed at school.

    You’d be wrong in that assumption.

    Even though working memory is a foundation for learning, if your child does not develop it normally – through listening and reading – it will not develop. And so, it’s not surprising to know that one in 10 students have a low working memory, a gap that will not close without intervention.

    Because working memory is foundational skill, it is often diagnosed along with auditory processing disorder, dyslexia, dyspraxia, and ADHD.

    This is not a surprise.  If a child has auditory processing delays, working memory development will be hampered through lack of practice – if the language being heard is muddy, it cannot be held in working memory.  Since dyslexia, ADHD-PI and many other learning issues have their source in processing delays, the presence of working memory in their diagnoses is to be expected.

    Short Term Memory vs. Working Memory

    Working memory used to be called short-term memory, and you even see it used as a synonym. However, there’s a lot more to working memory than just the short-term memory component. They’re all part of executive functioning skills.

    Here’s a good definition with handy quantifications, thanks to The Human Memory website. We’ll start with ‘short-term memory’ to associate the topic with that common layperson term:

    “Short-term memory acts as a kind of ‘scratch-pad’ for temporary recall of the information which is being processed at any point in time, and has been referred to as ‘the brain’s Post-it note’. It is static –  a way to hold and recall small amount of information (typically around 7 items or even less) in mind in an active, readily-available state for a short period of time (typically from 10 to 15 seconds, or sometimes up to a minute).”

    (By the way, children tend to hold less than seven items – more like a couple – particularly if they have learning or processing difficulties.)

    Active not Static

    Meanwhile, working memory is active – information is held and manipulated. It spans auditory memory and visual-spatial memory, which understood.org explains this way. They’re like skills you’d use to make a video: “Auditory memory records what you’re hearing while visual-spatial memory captures what you’re seeing.”

    But, wait there’s more. To ‘see’ the film again, you’ll need to play it back immediately to access it even while you’re trying to incorporate new information. It can get tricky if you can’t replay that video in your mind (thinking of it as a piece of information nested in your brain) while you’re being bombarded with other information you’re trying to connect to it. If you’re confused by how much information I tried to shove into that sentence, you’ll get a sense of what poor working memory skills are like!

    In short, working memory is about recalling and processing relevant information. When you recall information, you’re remembering it in a specific sequence. As for processing, this centres on controlled attention – a cognitive function – that’s linked to processing emotions.

    Continue reading:

    https://www.gemmlearning.com/blog/learning_science/working-memory-learning-predictor/

  • 13 Simple Ways to Practice Addition and Subtraction

    In my day, we just memorized math. I don’t know that I ever really truly understood much of what math was nor was I able to compute higher-level skills until I started teaching math and learned how to be flexible with numbers. Flexibility with numbers is a key foundational skill for young learners and those who don’t have it, struggle from early on. When it is hard to figure out what 7 + 4 =, a child will become easily frustrated, leading to the oh so often felt and heard, “I’m just no good at math.” It isn’t about memorization and speed (puuuhhhleeeease – stop with the timed tests!) with basic addition and subtraction – it is about developing strategies that lead to fluency, automaticity, and understanding.

    There are a number of ways to accomplish this, but one thing I am passionate about is making sure instruction is developmentally appropriate. Research tells us that learning through play is most appropriate for early childhood students (and that designation goes through age 8 or 9 depending on where you look) and the kids are way more engaged when they’re playing games. To develop strategic thinking, use lots of concrete representations to start, then move to the more abstract (for example, start with dot dice and move on to numeral dice). So, here are 13 ways to practice simple addition and subtraction that are sure to please.

    Way 1. Dice –

    There are so many different kinds of dice you can get now and if you can’t find the ones you want, there’s DIY wood block dice!  Place value blocks, ten frames, dots, numerals of any range with any number of sides, big and wooden dice, colorful dice, foam dice… Just search for dice online – but be prepared to get lost in that rabbit hole! Lots of work with making five and ten is required in K/1 and this can easily be done with addition (and frankly, subtraction, too – think fact families) and dice. Tenzi is a great way to have multiple players with a target number in a fast-paced, fun game.

    2. Deck of Cards –

    Pull out the numbered cards and only use those. You can use them in a number of ways – simply flip two cards and add or subtract, play make five or make ten go fish, addition/subtraction war (flip two cards each, whoever has the most/least wins all four cards, repeat) or any of a number of other card games.

    3. Dominoes –

    This low prep way to practice addition and subtraction involves simply giving students a bin of dominoes and having them pull one at a time. Then, they either add or subtract using the two sides of the domino. It is important, as with all of these ideas, to encourage strategy use. They should subitize the numbers, use counting on strategy, think about a rekenrek or a ten frame – playing these while simply counting all the dots won’t improve their skills at all.

    Way 4. Hopscotch  –

    Need to get some wiggles out? Go out to the playground or make an indoor tape hopscotch board and give each square a number 0-10. The directions can vary based on your students’ abilities and be used to find the missing addend or subtrahend (“What goes with 6 to make 10?” and they hop to the 4) or to do more basic addition and subtraction (toss two small pebbles or sticks and add/subtract the two numbers). Ready to up the challenge factor? Have kids make the target number a different way after they give you the first way or make a target number with three addends.

    5. Musical Chairs –

    This is another movement activity for math where you simply put number models on index cards – one per chair. Then play musical chairs like you always would, but kids have to answer their problems correctly to stay in the game as well!

    Continue article here:

    https://educationtothecore.com/2021/01/13-simple-ways-to-practice-addition-and-subtraction/

  • Close the Learning Gap: Learnedy now for free!

    Close the Learning Gap: Learnedy now for free!

    CLOSE THE LEARNING GAP: Just because one should / must stay at home at the moment does not mean that learning and practicing should also stop!

    The Dyslexia Research Center has 25 years of experience with distance learning and, in cooperation with the American Dyslexia Association, wants to help parents to design meaningful lessons for their children at home!

    We offer the new online learning platform Learnedy free of charge for parents. Learnedy is an educationally useful online diagnosis and learning platform for English Language Arts and mathematics in the early and elementary school years. Success in three steps: educational diagnosis, individual program with exercises for practicing and regular re-testing.

    Parents can now gain free access to Learnedy until the start of the next school year, so that lessons can be meaningfully continued at home over the summer. Most of the time, parents don’t know where to start. With Learnedy, the child can continue learning exactly where he/she stands.

    Parents can register here free of charge: https://parents.learnedy.com/register/