Dyslexia Association visits Holy Rosary School

“We educate one child at a time,” said School Sister of Notre Dame Paulette Tiefenbrunn, principal at Holy Rosary School, a co-educational, Catholic school in New Orleans that serves students with learning challenges through 12th grade. “We look at each child and see how we can help. Whatever we teach, we use as many of the senses as possible.”
    How the school helps students reach their potential – knowing that each child learns differently – was showcased Nov. 6 when delegates at the 64th annual International Dyslexia Association Conference in New Orleans visited the Uptown campus.
 

  Morning and afternoon tours explored a variety of teaching methods employed in English, science, social studies, American literature and physical science for elementary and high school students.
Technology helps
    “We rely heavily on technology,” Sister Paulette said, citing Smart boards, HATCH early literacy and math programs, Kurzweil software and more. “We feel like technology has really helped us address individual needs.”

    Conventioneers got a first-hand view of the newest addition for high school students – sign language – as they watched students practice sentences with each other before they presented their finished assignment to certified sign language teacher Katie Dunn.
    “They love it and want to use it all day long,” Dunn said about sign language. “They catch me in the hallway and sign to me. They teach their brothers and sisters and even other students. Every time I introduce something new, they are eager to learn. (They gravitate toward it) because it is visual and something new. It’s their success. They get it.”
  
 International Dyslexia Conference attendee Rama Tandon, a certified dyslexia therapist from Vasant Valley School – a kindergarten through 12th grade school in New Delhi, India – said her school didn’t have sign language but she thinks it could be incorporated to help the nonverbal autistic students.
     “This is an advanced level, but if they (students) know the sign word for water, for toilet, for thirst or hunger and their emotions and can’t speak, they can use it to communicate,” Tandon said.
    In another classroom, third- and fourth-grade teacher Cathie Kinabrew was brainstorming with students to generate ideas for a creative writing assignment. She was asking students to tell her things (nouns) they were thankful to taste and see.
    “Butterflies,” said one student, writing them down on an Elmo projector.
    “Flowers,” said another.
    “Bugs,” said a boy, followed by sand, grass, the sky and friends.
    The lesson will be expanded to get students thinking about adjectives to describe the nouns and how they can express ideas using their five senses.
    Conventioneer Claudia Koochek, head of school at the Charles Armstrong School, a school in California specializing in education for children with dyslexia and attention deficits, was also on tour at Holy Rosary. She said her top-rated school uses similar teaching methods as Holy Rosary with small group instruction and a highly skilled, dedicated and empathetic staff that meets the needs of students both academically and emotionally.
Different learning styles
    “We transform the life of students and give them the opportunity to develop advocacy skills for themselves, resiliency, the ability to believe in themselves and to know that we all learn differently,” Koochek said. “They are not broken. They are unique individuals like everybody else. It is up to the rest of society to accept that they learn differently.”
    Sister Paulette said the tours reaffirmed what her teachers are doing in the classroom.
    “It gives them a sense of pride and appreciation for how wonderful our students are,” she said.
    Sister Paulette received nods from her fellow educators worldwide when she said her biggest asset at the school was not technology but her students.
    “To know them is to love them; to see what they struggle with and watch them do their very best.”
    Christine Bordelon can be reached at cbordelon@clarionherald.org.