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Lake Oswego Professional
Development
Day
s
For more than 700 teachers and staff in Lake
Oswego School District, the Thanksgiving Holiday week included two full days of professional development training with a myriad of breakout sessions available.
This year, nearly 100 of these educators chose to attend the Dyslexia Simulation & Student Panel training sessions, provided by the IDA, Oregon Branch. Teachers, administrators, and school psychologists experienced simulations of round-robin reading, writing composition, mirror/visual-motor, and dysgraphia -- all designed to create the feelings of anxiety and frustration that dyslexic students may feel in the classroom.
Following the simulations, a Student Panel comprised of four teenagers with dyslexia, answered questions about their real-life experiences. Participants found the training "very impactful" and "the student panel was a wonderful and meaningful addition". Teachers were keenly interested in hearing directly from the students, and asked for examples of helpful classroom strategies in a variety of subject areas, including language arts, math, and physical education. As one teacher summed it up,
"Thank you for thinking of having a student panel -
they are the experts on the front lines!"
Thank you to the 3 board members and 5 volunteers who staffed the 4 sessions and to everyone who made this possible. Special thanks to our Student Panel for their bravery in sharing their stories!
If you would like to set up a simulation at your school or school district, please contact us at [email protected].
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