Category Archives: Success
Students share
A Certified Barton tutor who recently attended an Advanced Certification session gave me a packet of letters her Barton students had written to me.
I hope these touch your heart as much as they touched mine – and will help you realize that with the right type of tutoring, students with dyslexia can bring their skills up to – and beyond – grade level.
From Matthew, age 10
Thank you for writing the Barton System. You have helped me grow. Thanks to you, I’m now a better speller. I was at below basic on my second grade CST. Now I’m above average on my fourth grade CST.
Gabe, age 17
When I first started tutoring, I could barely read at all. I am now reading high school level textbooks, websites, movie reviews, and more.
Thanks to this program, I passed the high school exit exam the first time – which I thought would never happen.
Samantha, age 12
Tutoring has helped me because I am not in Special Ed anymore.
I used to have trouble reading, but now I can read really good. Last year, I even got a ribbon for reading because I got 100 AR points.
I can now spell words and no longer have to ask someone else how to spell a word.
From Elysia, age 9
My favorite thing about tutoring is reading. Even if I was sick and missed school, I would still want to go to tutoring.
From Chloe, age 9
I used to hate reading, but now I don’t. Now I can catch up in reading with the class, so I’m not the last to finish.
From Aidan, age 9
Barton has helped me in my spelling and reading. I no longer have to pass when the teacher calls on me to read out loud.
Alina, age 12
I am currently on Level 10, Lesson 2, and love it. English is now my favorite subject.
I was so pleased when my teacher decided to have a class spelling bee and I won! I even asked for the origin of the words. I was then picked to represent my school for the ACSI spelling bee.
Scottie, age 15
School has become amazing now that I’ve learned so much. I don’t feel bad anymore when I read or write. I can spell right, and it’s a wonderful feeling.
Bryce, age 25
My aunt was a teacher, and my mom thought she would be able to teach me to read. So she enrolled me in her class.
My aunt had this horrible way of posting grades after every assignment. She would write your name and the grade you got on the board. There were 32 names, and mine was always at the end with a big F – every single week.
I loved my aunt, so that just made it worse.
Then I was put in special ed, and even there, I was at the bottom. People with autism and other disabilities could read better than me. What’s worse is I could comprehend and understand the scope of their disabilities, and I knew I was not like that. But everyone there could read better than me.
I began to think, “I can’t do this. Perhaps I was not meant to learn how to read.”
Now I am 25 years old, and to find a program like this . . . is just amazing. I only wish I could have started this as a child.
Break the cycle
When parents see their child struggle in school the same way they did, they react with fear, panic, and guilt.
The good news is that with the right type of tutoring, the cycle of academic struggle can be broken – as this parent shared in an email to Susan Barton about a nonprofit dyslexia center in Michigan.
During a recent high school graduation ceremony, I was overwhelmed thinking back on my own graduation and the hopelessness I felt as the speaker repeatedly said this was going to be the best time of our lives.
But my ears rang with the words of a teacher, who weeks before, as she threw my final report on my desk with a big red F on it, yelled in front of the whole class, “Only stupid, ignorant, and lazy people can’t spell.”
I remember crying for the next few weeks because all of my classmates were making their big plans for the fall and the future, but I had none. They did not know that in addition to not being able to spell, I couldn’t form a sentence or construct a paragraph. (Or is it the other way around?)
The college rejection letters began coming in, one by one. With little or no direction or support from my parents and family, I was lost. I did end up attending a small local college but survived only one semester.
I blamed the school system for allowing me to fall between the cracks and go all the way through school and graduate as what I thought at the time was an illiterate.
Fast forward 30 years to the day I went to my youngest son’s kindergarten parent-teacher conference. We were heart broken when the loved and respected teacher wept as she told us that something was not right. Although she did not know what it was, she felt it might impede his learning if not identified and addressed.
That day I was hit like a freight train with my past and my own inadequacies. We wandered kind of lost for awhile, grasping at anything for answers.
After receiving the diagnosis of dyslexia, we then began the difficult task of getting help. Along the way, I found the phone number for the Binda Dyslexia Foundation and Mrs. VanZanten. After talking to her and asking questions a mile a minute, I hung up the phone and sobbed — with a hope I had not had in years. I had found the help for my son so he would not fall through the cracks as I had.
Our experience with the the Binda Dyslexia Foundation, which provides tutoring using the Barton System, has been wonderful. In just one year, our lives have changed, our son’s life has changed, and even our extended family (many of whom had such a hard time understanding dyslexia and the steps to treat it) has been impacted in a positive way.
Susan, you are invited to our son’s high school graduation in 2016. He is now full of confidence and hope for a wonderful future.
Much to be thankful for . . .
Letters like this make all of our hard work worthwhile.
Dear Susan,
Today as I sat at the table with my family to celebrate Thanksgiving, I realized how much things have changed over the last year.
Just a year ago, my daughter cried about school and hid in the chicken coop to try to avoid going. She often returned from school with blisters on her fingers (from gripping the pencil too hard due to her dysgraphia), and she was soooo frustrated by reading assignments and spelling tests.
Needless to say, it was a very hard time for our family.
Fast forward a year. We are now homeschooling using the Barton System, and she is happy.
She draws her chickens and writes poems about them. Her poems don’t always rhyme, but not all poems need to rhyme. 🙂
She feels successful in her reading assignments and in her ability to spell the words in the lessons. There are no more tears and no more blisters. She is happy and making progress!
I deeply appreciate the program you put together. To me, it is way more than a reading program, and I thank you for creating it.
Tutoring is only half the answer
Parents ask why I often state that private schools (such as Montessori, Waldorf, Christian, Catholic or Jewish schools) can be better places for children with dyslexia than public schools.
Private schools often do not know any more about dyslexia than public schools, but they are much more willing to provide free simple classroom accommodations — which are as critical as the right type of tutoring.
A parent of a child in a public school recently sent me a BCC of this email that she sent to her child’s teacher.
Dear Mrs. Smith:
It is 1:45 a.m. and I am not sleeping . . . again.
I am frustrated and hoping for your help.
I waited a few days since Lynn’s IEP meeting before writing this.
I do not want to come off as unreasonable or angry. But I cannot help but feel like the last 2-3 months of the school’s assessments were a massive exercise in futility. I came into the IEP meeting assuming that we were finally going to get Lynn some help and put some modifications and accommodations in place.
Instead . . . well, you were there. We simply restated what had already been established 2 years ago: Lynn is a bright little girl who does not qualify for special education help. I get that. I got that 2 years ago. My question is: what next?
I have spent countless hours and thousands of dollars getting Lynn officially diagnosed. I am paying to have her tutored after school by a Certified Barton tutor. I just need a 504 Plan put into place so we can get some simple free classroom accommodations.
I have been requesting that since the first day of school. It is now March. March !!!
I am more than willing to do my part. I will redouble my efforts to find support outside of school. But how do we get some classroom accommodations?
Compare that to this email from a parent whose child attends a private Christian school.
My son was formally diagnosed with moderate dyslexia in third grade — after a teacher at his private Christian school suggested dyslexia might be the cause of his struggles.
Timmy has hated school with a passion ever since he started Kindergarten. He would wake up every day crying, banging his pillow, and begging not to go to school, saying the work was “just too hard.”
Daily homework assignments went on with hours, and I mean hours, with temper tantrums, constant tears, anger and frustration beyond the roof as I am sure you can imagine.
Before school, Timmy’s personality had always been quiet, content and a deep thinker. You can imagine my horror to see his wonderful demeanor turn into such anger and frustration as each school season progressed.
He had all the early signs of dyslexia, but of course, we never knew what we were looking at. He went through school as this very angry, frustrated child, until finally, his third grade teacher recognized a very obvious problem, and led us to what he so desperately needed.
I am so thankful that he goes to a private school. Although legally, they do not have to provide accommodations or intervention, his school feels a moral obligation to provide both.
I am starting to see Timmy’s anger and frustration level drop as his reading and spelling is getting better, thanks to his Barton tutoring.
Homework time has become a million times better, thanks to the accommodations he is entitled to when needed.
His creativity is also flourishing. I am blown away by what he understands or creates out of his own observations.
He also has an amazing maturity well beyond his years, and his incredible insight to see and understand things is jaw dropping.
Parents, if your child’s public school refuses to provide accommodations, consider moving your child to a more flexible private school.
Early Intervention Works
If you catch dyslexia early, and provide the right type of instruction, you can prevent the emotional scars that usually come with dyslexia — as this Barton tutor shares:
I am tutoring a severely dyslexic boy who was retained in kindergarten. At this time, he is near the end of his second time through kindergarten, and he has just finished Level 3 of the Barton System.
His kindergarten teacher shared that when the class is introduced to new words, he always tells the class the reason for the spelling of the word and then shares the spelling rule.
The class wants to know if they can stay another year in kindergarten — so they can be as smart as James.
He is so PROUD !!!!
Bright Solutions for Dyslexia 