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Guest blogger Liana Heitin has taught students with special needs for the past five years as a public school teacher, reading specialist, and private tutor. She has a master’s degree in cross-categorical special education and is a freelance Web editor for LD OnLine, the leading website on learning disabilities and ADHD. LD OnLine offers research-based information and expert advice for parents, students, and educators. Liana’s writing has been featured in such publications as Education Week, teachermagazine.org, and the recent book, The Ultimate Teacher (HCI Books, May 2009).

While most kids (and many adults) are eagerly awaiting the 31^st of the month, we here at LD OnLine are enjoying every day of October or — as we know it — LD Awareness Month! In Canada and the U.S., this month is dedicated to educating the public about learning disabilities in order to build acceptance and understanding.

If you’re in the know about LD, spreading your knowledge may seem like a daunting task. But LD Awareness Month isn’t necessarily about setting out on a campaign to inform the world. It’s about starting in your world and watching the knowledge proliferate beyond.

As usual, the best place to start is in your own home. If you have a child with a disability, it’s important for him or her to understand what that disability is all about, in order to find comfort and learn to self-advocate. If your child does not have a disability, there is inevitably someone in his or her class who does and is in need of supportive peers.

There are lots of great children’s books out there that explain what it’s like to have LD and promote the idea that everyone has different strengths and needs. Thank You, Mr. Falker by Patricia Polacco and I Wish I Could Fly Like a Bird by Katherine Denison are great options for younger kids. Both have pictures and tell a story that allows you to connect and empathize with the main character. Older students may like Shirley Kirnoff’s The Human Side of Dyslexia or Kinko’s founder Paul Orfalea’s Copy This! Lessons from a Hyperactive Dyslexic who Turned a Bright Idea Into One of America’s Best Companies, both of which offer hopeful yet realistic first-person accounts about living with LD.

For young students, stories featuring characters with LD can also be effective classroom read-alouds. Consider passing a book about learning disabilities on to your child’s teacher or offering to come to school and read one to the entire class. Kids are surprisingly receptive to classroom guests, and the message behind a visitor’s reading is likely to stay with them.

To find more titles of books about LD, check out our LD Resources page.

Guest blogger Liana Heitin has taught students with special needs for the past five years as a public school teacher, reading specialist, and private tutor. She has a master’s degree in cross-categorical special education and is a freelance Web editor for LD OnLine, the leading website on learning disabilities and ADHD. LD OnLine offers research-based information and expert advice for parents, students, and educators. Liana’s writing has been featured in such publications as Education Week, teachermagazine.org, and the recent book, The Ultimate Teacher (HCI Books, May 2009).

Last week, on a whim, I began to re-read my favorite book from middle school: Lois Lowry’s The Giver.  As I turned the pages, I kept expecting to have a new adult reaction to the story—to see the allegory as simple or recognize the protagonist’s dilemma as trite.

Instead, I experienced just what I had as a 6th grader. I felt the excitement of entering the science fiction world and exploring its rules. The main character’s curiosity and loss of innocence became my own once again.  And upon reaching the abrupt ending, I had a familiar emotional rush—shock, a twinge of frustration, and ultimately satisfaction.

Lowry is an adept storyteller, but I’m pretty sure that’s not the only reason I reverted to my 6th grade self. When I first read The Giver, it changed me. It made me think and feel in a way words on pages never had—and guided me toward many other books, many more ideas and feelings.  It made me into a reader. I will never outgrow The Giver because it was part of such a formative moment in my life.

A few years ago, I was teaching a gifted 9th grader with a learning disability in reading. Demetri had never finished a chapter book on his own. The two of us had been working on fluency for months, starting well below grade level, when I brought in Of Mice and Men.  We began reading together, making slow but steady progress.

Over spring break, I asked Demetri to read at least five pages a night. I gave him a homework chart and a pep talk but worried he wouldn’t follow through—Demetri was a hard worker but some days it could take him 20 minutes to finish a page.  He returned the next week and sat down, a quiet grin spreading across his face.  “I finished it,” he said, and launched into an explanation of how the book had become a movie in his mind and he hadn’t been able to stop reading. “The end was such a surprise! I never would have guessed!” Of Mice and Men had changed Demetri, like The Giver had me. We began to make a list of other books he would enjoy.

Demitri was 15 years old when he found the book that inspired him—the one he’ll read with equal fervor and delight if he picks it up a decade or two down the road.  Some people find their book at a younger age—and some unlucky readers never find it at all.  If you know a child who hasn’t discovered her The Giver or Of Mice and Men, take the summer to explore topics and genres that interest her.  Read together. Talk about your own favorite childhood books.  Comb through library shelves. And guide your child toward the book that will turn him or her into a reader.

For more tips on summer reading and learning activities, particularly for students with learning disabilities, check out the LD Online Summer Beach Bag.

Guest Blogger Dale Brown is the Manager of LD OnLine, a website designed to improve the lives of people with learning disabilities. LD OnLine features expert advice on learning disabilities and ADHD and a library of research-based information on learning disabilities. Dale is also a well-known author in the learning disability world and her work includes Job Hunting for the So-Called Handicapped as well as hundreds of articles.

Books are on my gift list and as I do my holiday shopping, memories of my own first book flood my mind.

I have severe learning disabilities—and had a hard time reading at school. At home, my Mom would read to me while I spoke the words out loud and pretended to read.  She would point to the words, and show me the letters and sounds.  Mostly we just read.

My parents were always reading, providing a good model for me and doing things at home long before research suggested ways parents can help their children with reading. I noticed that they valued books and enjoyed them.  So, I wanted my OWN book.  One I could take to my OWN bed and look at the pictures and “read” it.

I didn’t think I would get a book of my own, because money was tight in our house. One day my Dad came home. He had a bag.  In the bag were several wrapped gifts. “I don’t know how I did it, Dale,” he said, “but I think you’ll like this.”  I tore open the paper and six books fell out!!!  My favorite—the one I consider my “first book”—was Ann Can Fly, a book about a girl whose father finally allows her to sit on his lap and “fly” a plane.  I wore those books out—they fell apart from my “reading.”

Books generate a lot of magic for the reader, but teaching reading and learning how to read takes real work.  For some children with dyslexia or other learning disabilities, reading is even more challenging.

It was a challenge for me and my early reading experiences have definitely influenced me as manager of LD OnLine.  Just as much as First Book wants to give a child that magical experience of book ownership, LD OnLine (and our sister projects Reading Rockets and AdLit.org) want to be there at the critical time that a parent, teacher or person wants information to teach the right way and help give a child the skills needed to enjoy the magic of books.

I hope you have many magic moments in 2009!

Guest Blogger Rachael Walker is the Outreach Consultant for Reading Rockets, a national multimedia initiative which aims to inform and inspire parents, teachers, childcare providers, and others who touch the life of a child by providing comprehensive, accessible information on how to teach kids to read and help those who struggle. Rachael began her career in literacy outreach at Reading Is Fundamental (RIF), has also served as a consultant to the NEA’s Read Across America campaign, and was most recently the Executive Director of Reach Out and Read of Metro DC.

Teaching reading is a hugely complicated task Kind of like rocket science! So what better way to support the efforts of parents and educators to launch young readers than to have a multimedia initiative called Reading Rockets which looks at how young children (preschool through grade 3) learn to read, why so many kids struggle, and what can be done to help.

The Reading Rockets project is comprised of PBS television programs (available on the web, videotape, and DVD), the websites ReadingRockets.org and ColorinColorado.org, and professional development opportunities. Reading Rockets reaches out to local communities through more than 40 national partners, including First Book.

There’s also the folks at WETA (the flagship public television station in our nation’s capital), who along with a group of expert advisors, make the Reading Rockets project fly. Our mission is to provide the best resources on how to prepare and teach children to read – and inspire a joy for reading. We are excited to share some of those resources and the latest and greatest in children’s literacy with you on this blog!

Every month, you’ll hear from me or my colleague, Reading Rockets manager Tina Chovanec. You’ll also get to regularly hear from one of the Reading Rockets sister projects: LDOnline.org, the world’s leading website on learning disabilities and ADHD; AdLit.org, which focuses on helping students from fourth through 12th grades to read and write better; and ColorinColorado.org, a comprehensive bilingual website for Spanish-speaking families and teachers of English language learners.

Right now we’ve all got summer reading on our minds. If you’re looking to help families get ready for summer and to launch kids to fun, enriching summertime experiences, Reading Rockets, AdLit.org and LDOnline have put together “virtual beach bags” of activity ideas and materials to download and distribute.

This summer I’m looking forward to catching up on some of the recently published books for children and teens, like Rick Riordan’s latest Percy Jackson adventure, The Battle of the Labyrinth. And I can’t wait to find out what happens with Jeanne Birdsall’s Penderwicks when they are back on Gardam Street.

What’s on your summer reading list?