I’m so excited! I found this wonderful article called “Dyslexia and international students: supporting international students with dyslexia in English for academic purposes”. It’s only 3 pages long, but has a brief but great overview called “impact of dyslexia on second language acquisition” where she lists difficulties that are often associated with dyslexia, and strategies to help students.

• https://www.academia.edu/6759684/Dyslexia_and_International_Students_Supporting_International_Students_with_Dyslexia_in_English_for_Academic_purposes

You might have to register with Academia.edu which is a “social networking website for academics” in order to read this article. I have been registered, and haven’t had any problem with the website.

The author has multiple articles on this topic, and I can’t wait to read up on them!

As always, I will add this link to my website, https://learningdifferencesinesl.wordpress.com/ , and it will be under Dyslexia.

– Maiko

A helpful reminder that some students might benefit from listening to what they read, while they read. Also a tech tip in the comment area!

• https://www.understood.org/en/school-learning/assistive-technology/assistive-technologies-basics/will-listening-to-audiobooks-make-it-harder-for-my-third-grader-to-learn-to-read?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=understoodorg

I apologize for posting something in Japanese (my L1), but I found a page where you can read about how each case was supported at various universities in Japan. Very comprehensive and informative, as I am curious how LDs and other differences are recognized and supported in other cultures. Please let me know when you find something like this about other cultures (and hopefully, it will be in English)!

• http://www.jasso.go.jp/gakusei/tokubetsu_shien/chosa_kenkyu/jirei/index.html

At the American English Institute, University of Oregon, we have a physical study group on LDs (jealous? Would you like to start one at your IEP? Let me know!) We are very excited because the wonderful Accessible Education Center on campus will be joining us!

At this study group meeting, we will learn/discuss strategies for supporting students with limited/no hearing. I have collected some materials, but I’d like to ask you – Do you have a question we can ask the folks from Accessible Education Center for you and us?  Additionally, do you have strategies that have worked well or a link that you found helpful? Please do share on our Facebook page, so that we can learn from each other. Thank you so much!

– Maiko

Have you ever wondered what it’s like to live with an LD in Saudi Arabia? It’s absolutely fascinating.

This article is a news piece (I think?) on Arab News website. What are your thoughts?

“In Saudi Arabia, we don’t have any valid standardized tool in Arabic that we can use to identify individuals with learning disabilities. However, based on the international prevalence rate, we expect to have a minimum of 215,000 students in our school systems struggling with LD,” says Dr. Saja Jamjoom, Program Manager for the Learning Disabilities Program at the Prince Salman Center for Disability Research based in Riyadh.”

“In 2009, the center established the first Academic Assistance Unit in collaboration with Landmark College in the US at Prince Sultan University in Riyadh. “This Unit is the first unit in the region that provides support services for students with LD at the higher education level,” says Jamjoom.”

• http://www.arabnews.com/node/349021

The link is added on our website, under “LDs in other cultures” as well.

Hello friends and colleagues,

So, I asked my coworker, Sean, what discussion board sites he would recommend. He said, what about Facebook? So, here it is! I am hoping to make this the designated discussion page from now on. I’ll start posting soon, and you are more than welcome to post there!

Hello colleagues,

A new, pretty fascinating (if I may!) presentation and two handouts have been added to Our Presentations page. This presentation is going to be given (in three days!) at the EnglishUSA Professional Development Conference, and is called Learning disabilities in IEPs: proactive approaches for supporting students. For this study, I surveyed more than 50 IEPs within the U.S. about challenges and strategies we have when supporting IEP students with Learning Differences.

PLEASE email Maiko at hata@uoregon.edu to let me know what you think, suggestions, and questions. Also, please consider contributing a link you found helpful or a teaching tip that you’ve been using by sending them to me as well. I will give you full credit!

Hope you find this interesting!

– Maiko

The highlights of the findings of the study I conducted about Learning Differences in Intensive English Programs is up now! Download it from the https://learningdifferencesinesl.wordpress.com/our-presentations/

Again, thank you SO MUCH to my IEP colleagues who participated in this study! I hope you find the study helpful. Please make sure to check out the presentation itself as well, as this will have way more information about the findings and proactive strategies that IEPs have.

I’ll be posting the presentation very, very soon as well on Our Presentations page as well (as I have to present it in exactly a week at EnglishUSA 2016 Professional Development Conference!). Please let me know if you are attending the conference as well – it would be great to connect.

– Maiko

As I read up more on learning differences and supporting IEP students, I realize what we do for our new(-ish) ongoing orientation course is very helpful for this as well. So, I added a new resource page on ongoing orientation ideas. Hope you find the info interesting and helpful!

– Maiko