North Vancouver Organization Launches Campaign

North Shore News August 1 st, 2020

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Newsletter July 2020

So summer is officially here… at last ! We hope you are basking in glorious sunshine and feeling some sort of respite from a very chaotic four months. 

WALK AND TALK THE ‘DYS’ OUT OF DYSLEXIA

is officially launched – and we are SO excited! When something is right, it seems to accumulate an energy all of its own, and our initiative has grown beyond our original idea.

• The first series of podcasts are all ready for Podbean – we will publish one every Sunday and Wednesday in August, and the second series is underway. 

• The walking part is spreading all over Canada like a very positive wildfire.

All the details are here (click here to visit our registration page) so I won’t repeat them, but please DO JOIN IN, just because you can; we will all be walking, biking, running, swimming or even climbing our way through August... skateboarding, sailing, paddleboarding any human powered movement counts.  We are a creative bunch, so photos of strange ways of moving and getting sponsored are all very welcome for our Facebook page and we can do all of the above safely, social distancing if we need to.

PINS

When thinking of a recognition we could provide for our walkers, Sue googled to see if there is a universal symbol for dyslexia, and there isn’t.  SO long story short, we decided to make one.  We have a very talented jewellery designer in our midst, and she was kind enough to consider designing a pin and getting it to the production stage.  One day, I would like to think that she will sell a beautiful silver version of this symbol, as the whole concept of being proud to be dyslexic goes viral !  Our sincere thanks go to her!  More details to follow…

COUNSELLING

I am delighted to be able to introduce Daniela Gielnik to you.  She is the mother of one of my students, a teacher and now is adding counselling to her bow.  I make this introduction because I feel many of you, and/or your children have challenges that she could help with.  There are always ‘knock-on’ effects when a person learns in a different way to the way they are taught. 

Over to Daniela:

 “Over the years I have worked with children, youth, adults and families, helping them navigate their way through difficult situations and unfamiliar territory. The world of the dyslexia is one which I have encountered as a West Vancouver educator and a parent. Over the years I have been fortunate enough to work with Sue Hall in promoting a better understanding of dyslexia as a gift in order to tap into potential as opposed to focusing on obstacles.

My own life experiences bring me to a place of empathy and understanding making me a compassionate, non judgmental companion in the counselling space. My experience of working in a recovery centre and school settings has allowed me to connect with the complex lives of adults, students, parents and their families. My expertise ranges from addressing issues around social emotional issues, anxiety, loneliness, depression, grief and relationships, to name but a few. I like to work together with individuals to explore obstacles, and develop tools for life in the pursuit of mental wellness and life balance.

I like to combine creative influences with evidence based approaches in order to make the counselling sessions meaningful. It is rarely the same thing that will resonate for everyone. I utilize a range of creative inspiration to explore emotions, and offer the client a variety of evocative ways to bring about new understandings. I have experience in Solution Focused Therapy, CBT, Motivational Interviewing, Narrative Therapy, Bibliotherapy and Play Therapy.

If you feel that you could benefit from some help in navigating new terrains, please contact me for a free consultation. I offer a sliding scale in order to reduce potential barriers to those seeking to improve mental health. Check out my website at www.danielagielnik.com,”

TECHNOLOGY

I may have shared my view of technology with some of you, so I apologise for repeating myself, but for the newcomers, here goes.  When a student comes to a Davis program they know they have challenges and they know they have goals.  They take responsibility for their learning by using their focussing, relaxing and energy tools, they free their alphabet of confusions, read with a visual recognition, and fill in the blanks for those trigger words, such as ‘the’, ‘if’, ‘of’ etc.   Post program, whilst continuing the reading exercise and mastering 200+ words, they often have to go back into the school system.  The system is relentless (most of the time) and may make demands on them that are still beyond their reach.

 I am not a fan of the school system’s provision of technology pre-remediation when a student cannot read or write – for me it is a crutch not an empowerment, a third party way of achieving a goal and later on may well become the only way they can survive in the adult world. I also feel, rightly or wrongly, that it absolves the education system of finding a way that does work for all the students (can you hear my bias to Davis Learning Strategies). However, I am a fan of technology being an interim measure while students complete their Davis follow-up, and cope with overwhelming tasks.

 Julie Brewer is the mother of a student who took the program about a year ago and is very involved in his education. She is also a Montessori teacher, working with 3-5 year olds.  She has kindly agreed to share a fantastic personal review of the technology that has proved useful for her son, post-program, see link below. If you would like to contact her, just send Sue an email and she will pass it on – info@thewds.org. We are so grateful for such a comprehensive and road tested list !

Julie Brewer Dyslexia Tech Accommodations

Read More………….

Copyright 2020 Julie Brewer -All Rights Reserved

DAVIS FRIENDLY SCHOOLS

We think its time we made a list of schools that smile kindly on our Davis methods.  We are aiming for a whole Elementary School to be using the Davis Learning Strategies, however, at the moment, we can only list schools where there is one teacher using them, or a school where some of the staff are taking the children through the post-program follow-up, or there is a teacher who is a Davis fan and has referred children to us. I may well have forgotten some, and will keep collecting….

Mill Bay Nature School, Cowichan Valley School District – for those of you on Vancouver Island, I am excited to announce that a teacher who took a Davis program for herself, will be working at this school as of September 2020.  Always good to know that there is an empathetic presence for those with this wonderful way of thinking. info@thewds.org.

Wildflower School, Nelson, BC has one of their teachers using DLS.

Heritage Christine Online School – one of their learning support team has taken a DLS workshop and taken a student through her trigger words.

St. Michael’s Catholic School, Burnaby – have sent students to Sue, and four teachers attended a DLS workshop.

The Sacred Heart, Delta – have sent students to Sue and they assist them to complete the trigger word mastery at school.

St. Anthony’s Catholic School, West Vancouver – have sent students to Sue, and allowed us to host a DLS workshop there.

Donna Doerksen is the teacher/librarian in the Burnaby School  District where 5 teachers took a DLS workshop.

So there we are, we wish you a wonderful summer, very much hope to see many of you, and thank you for your support as we support as many like-minded people as we can. Warm sun-filled wishes, your Board, Sue, Laura, Denny, Carole, Paddy, Nadine, Gisa and Tristan.

Newsletter June 2020

Here we are in June – half way through a year that we might look back on as sort of never happening!  We all hope that your adjustment to our new circumstances has been as easy as possible, and that we are on our way to a slightly more normal life – maybe keeping some of the silver linings – not having to be so many places and do so many things – and making the most of the time in our own bubbles! The WDS bubble has been busy:

COMMUNITY

• This weekend some of us would have been at Camp Elphinstone for the Family Summer Camp weekend… and we take solace in the fact that we might have been a little wetter than planned – however, they are keeping May 29-31, 2021 for us, so we all have plenty of time to pre-order sunshine, and put it in our calendars, so we are hoping for a full house!

• Jan Hagedorn, a teacher, a homeschooling mom, was one of my students who became a Davis Facilitator for a brief period. She very kindly put this guide (click here) together, such a great idea, we are so grateful because not all parents were not designed to be homeschoolers.

OUTREACH

• Sue was extremely excited to be presenting a session at the Learning Ally’s Virtual Conference – Spotlight on Dyslexia, June 5, 2020.  She had no idea it was a worldwide audience, over 9,000 people registered.  The organisation has permission to scan any book and attach an audio recording to it, and apparently they had requests for Fish Don’t Climb Trees to be recorded.  They give audio books to their learning challenged members for free along with a scanned version of the text, with a highlighter that shows you where you are.

• Her session will be available on-demand session through September 30, 2020 to earn up to 16 CE Certificates. Click here to register

• Tristan and Sue have been busy recording a series of podcasts – apparently everyone listens to them these days!  They have recorded 6 already and we think you will really enjoy them; all from people who are sharing all their insights, stories, and the true knowledge gained for experience.  They aim to have 8-10 ready for August as they have more impact when released once a week or fortnightly in conjunction with our Walk and Talk Fundraiser (see below).

• Sue was asked to present two sessions to the UK Davis Facilitators at their virtual Professional Development Day.  Despite the fact that it required a very early start, it was lots of fun, and should any of the facilitators take up her support documents, she suggested they could donate to the WDS.

• Sue and Carole have put in an application for the UVic Conference to be held on October 28 which is very likely to be online. 

FUNDRAISING

• We need to fill our bursary fund. The programs we advocate are not available in the public sector, yet, and it is likely we will receive more requests for bursaries following the CoVid financial hardships. To this end, Gisa has worked tirelessly to send off an application to the Canada Post Foundation, asking them for $15-25,000 for our bursary fund. It was a lot of work, and we are so grateful to her. Grant writing is hardly ever fun !

• At our last Board Meeting it became evident that we also need more funds in our general account. The foundations who are often able to help us are struggling with their own fundraising, no events, no tins at cash checkouts, no car washes etc. SO:

  • We are registered with Canada Helps and for the month of JUNE they are giving us a chance to win $20,000 for our Society – every $1 donated to us is an entry to the competition. Click here or the donate button below to help us win $20,000

  • AND, we are delighted to announce our very own WALK and TALK the DYS out of Dyslexia initiative for the month of August…Read More.

PREVENTION

• We do have funding in our account for Davis Learning Strategies and are looking to hold another workshop in 2021.  We feel teachers have enough to cope with this year just being online and adapting to the new guidelines.  We will be in touch with them before the end of the summer term to see if they need a refresher before September. Details are always to be found at www.davislearn.com.

We wish you all a wonderful summer - we hope to be in touch with many of you as we all walk across Canada - and thank you SO much for helping us to do all we need to do!

Sue, Laura, Denny, Carole, Paddy, Nadine, Gisa, Tristan.