This week from the 18th to the 24th is Dyslexia Empowerment Week, a very important week in my household as both of my children have struggled with school because of dyslexia. My daughter is driven and ploughed on regardless, not letting negative and unhelpful teachers destroy her self esteem because she got kudos through sport, music and art. My son just gave up and saw the academic battle as insurmountable and most of his teachers gave up on him too. He is bright, an extremely visual learner with an amazing memory and he can fix just about anything electrical or mechanical that is broken. He deserved a much better deal at school. Both love books and are avid listeners. They are more literary than many students I have taught who can read. Thank goodness for talking books. They are expensive but they have been well worth the money. Please watch the clip on the Dyslexia website and think about what you can do to empower people with dyslexia.
From the 19th till the 25th October it is National Bird Week here in Australia and people are being asked to take part in the first Aussie Backyard Bird Count. What a good excuse to sit in your backyard, local park or favourite spot and identify and count birds. I have noticed lots of kookaburras in my backyard over the last few weeks so I hope they are still around this week. The Steve Parish books about Australian birds help the children at school identify the birds they see at home and in the school playground. These books range from simple to detailed field guides so every child is catered for.
And lastly this week in America it is National Wolf Awareness Week from the 12th to 19th October. The young children I teach are fascinated by wolves even though they are unlikely to see one in Australia. Because of one little girl who was besotted with wolves and devoured every factual book I could find my library now has quite a collection of 'wolf' books and when we put them out on display this week more than half were borrowed. See my pinterest page for what the library has about wolves be they real or storybook wolves.
I saw a kookaburra sitting on the power wires tonight as a did a quick walk in the cool evening air. He seemed to be smiling at me. I love this alignment with your blog. We also have so many books about wolves - I need to think about a display. Thanks for this post and for sharing your personal journey with dyslexia.
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