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That was an interesting exercise which was very effective as far as showing how students with reading challenges often feel when completing assignments. It felt to me as if the reading passage disappeared before I had a chance to absorb what it was trying to explain. I could barely keep up with the continuous disappearing lines. As far as what I learned from that passage, it wasn't much at all I know that. When completing the exercises I couldn't back to check the passage. I really enjoyed this activity.  I think it gave me some perspective as far as how my students with reading difficulties can feel as far as feeling anxious and overwhelmed. I will have this exercise in mind when planning reading activities in the future. I think it will help me to check in with students more frequently and try to gauge their take on the pacing of similar activities. 

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That was an interesting exercise which was very effective as far as showing how students with reading challenges often feel when completing assignments. It felt to me as if the reading passage disappeared before I had a chance to absorb what it was trying to explain. I could barely keep up with the continuous disappearing lines. As far as what I learned from that passage, it wasn't much at all I know that. When completing the exercises I couldn't back to check the passage. I really enjoyed this activity.  I think it gave me some perspective as far as how my students with reading difficulties can feel as far as feeling anxious and overwhelmed. I will have this exercise in mind when planning reading activities in the future. I think it will help me to check in with students more frequently and try to gauge their take on the pacing of similar activities. 

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Tanya McSorley

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The biggest take away for me was the attention simulation—the student could not focus in the classroom when everyone was talking—I found this simulation to be the most frustrating because I wanted to hear what the teacher was saying and couldn’t.  I cannot imagine my whole day being like this. This completely changes my perspective on my students that truly cannot focus unless the room is orderly and quiet for learning.

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The decoding activity was very interesting. Right away the letter sound chart made me feel a sense of frustration. I knew it would be a challenging task without even seeing the assignment. This made me reflect on how challenging reading groups and activities may be for some of my struggling kiddos. The attention activity started out easy for me but as soon as the letters and sentences disappeared I felt myself become more anxious and inattentive. I could not look back to re-read and then had no idea what I had read. My comprehension was terrible. Both exercises are a reminder to be careful with the tasks I am giving kids and to be mindful of any accommodations or modifications that may be needed. I will need to ask kids to be more reflective and share how they feel after lessons. -Jen Kobrenski

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The decoding activity was very interesting. Right away the letter sound chart made me feel a sense of frustration. I knew it would be a challenging task without even seeing the assignment. This made me reflect on how challenging reading groups and activities may be for some of my struggling kiddos. The attention activity started out easy for me but as soon as the letters and sentences disappeared I felt myself become more anxious and inattentive. I could not look back to re-read and then had no idea what I had read. My comprehension was terrible. Both exercises are a reminder to be careful with the tasks I am giving kids and to be mindful of any accommodations or modifications that may be needed. I will need to ask kids to be more reflective and share how they feel after lessons. -Jen Kobrenski

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I found the decoding activity to be particularly frustrating. As someone who was a very early reader, I have sometimes struggled to understand the difficulties faced by some of my students. This was an eye opening exercise as it truly allowed me to feel what it must be like to try to decode text letter by letter. The attention activity was also quite interesting. It didn't seem like such a big deal at first as it was fairly slow to disappear. Once I realized that the information would not be there to refer to, however, I felt myself getting anxious! I knew that I would be able to answer the questions correctly if I could just refer back to the text. It was a good reminder of how to present information in a way that helps students to feel successful, rather than provoke anxiety and worry.  -Caitlin Carter

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I found the decoding activity to be particularly frustrating. As someone who was a very early reader, I have sometimes struggled to understand the difficulties faced by some of my students. This was an eye opening exercise as it truly allowed me to feel what it must be like to try to decode text letter by letter. The attention activity was also quite interesting. It didn't seem like such a big deal at first as it was fairly slow to disappear. Once I realized that the information would not be there to refer to, however, I felt myself getting anxious! I knew that I would be able to answer the questions correctly if I could just refer back to the text. It was a good reminder of how to present information in a way that helps students to feel successful, rather than provoke anxiety and worry.  -Caitlin Carter

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To me, these activities were a lot like the difference between looking at a picture of snow and actually sticking your hand in it. It's one thing to academically understand disabilities, but experiencing them in this way was something else. So frustrating! I can completely understand why some children display behaviors. I could feel that frustration. It gives me a whole new perspective on working with my students; I will be more aware of what they are actually feeling, and hopefully more patient.

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To me, these activities were a lot like the difference between looking at a picture of snow and actually sticking your hand in it. It's one thing to academically understand disabilities, but experiencing them in this way was something else. So frustrating! I can completely understand why some children display behaviors. I could feel that frustration. It gives me a whole new perspective on working with my students; I will be more aware of what they are actually feeling, and hopefully more patient.

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Jane White

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With both interactive activitiesI felt anxious!!

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With both interactive activitiesI felt anxious!!

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I was starting to get the hang of the decoding activity but it took so much effort, I can really understand how my students lose stamina!! Then the activity with the disappearing text was really challenging for two reasons, I don't have a strong enough background on what I was reading, so I couldn't even guess as to what I was missing.
The second reason, I starting feeling overwhelmed which slowed me down even more because I was trying to remember what I just read!!

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This was a eye opening exercise to do! I felt very anxious and overwhelmed with the text disappearing so fast and not being able to decode or comprehend the words on the page. My heart was breaking thinking about how my students must feel during the whole school day. Plus, my self confidence grew smaller as I was struggling through the reading passage and I was doing this activity in private. I can only imagine what I would feel like if my peers were seeing me struggle with both activities and not having a clue what I was reading! I will keep these activities in mind as a do future planning for all subject areas in my classroom. 

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This was a eye opening exercise to do! I felt very anxious and overwhelmed with the text disappearing so fast and not being able to decode or comprehend the words on the page. My heart was breaking thinking about how my students must feel during the whole school day. Plus, my self confidence grew smaller as I was struggling through the reading passage and I was doing this activity in private. I can only imagine what I would feel like if my peers were seeing me struggle with both activities and not having a clue what I was reading! I will keep these activities in mind as a do future planning for all subject areas in my classroom. 

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In the summers growing up, we would go visit family in Italy.  I learned the language orally from being submerged in it growing up, but unfortunately never learned how to read or write in Italian.  These activities reminded me of what it felt like to be in a foreign country trying to read their newspaper, signs, billboards and understand people that were far more fluent (and spoke much faster,) than me.  I remember being frustrated, trying so desperately to read the pink soccer journal.  I had the luxury of returning home and finding comfort in being able to read and understand everything that surrounded me.  Students who struggle often do not have the opportunity to return “home” and find that comfort.  These activities reminded me that for some students, that the discomfort is what they feel everyday, desperately trying to read and understand something that seems to be in a foreign language, with no opportunity to return to the comfort of home.

Mia Gaska

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I agree with many others who expressed frustration over trying to participate in both the decoding and memory activities.  For me, this frustration soon led to a bit of anger building up that I was having such difficulty, and this soon led to feeling not smart enough to complete the activities well. The simulation really does help one become more empathetic to those who have the difficulties illustrated.  It also made me feel sad for students who aren’t given the tools and strategies for helping to overcome or compensate for the challenges, as they are missing out on so much important and interesting learning.  It is easy to see how students facing these types of challenges may be feeling a lack of self-esteem, sheer exhaustion during academic tasks, and decreasing motivation to learn.  The simulations illustrate the need for teachers to be knowledgeable about methods to meet all students’ needs to help optimize interest, motivation, and ability to learn. 

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I agree with many others who expressed frustration over trying to participate in both the decoding and memory activities.  For me, this frustration soon led to a bit of anger building up that I was having such difficulty, and this soon led to feeling not smart enough to complete the activities well. The simulation really does help one become more empathetic to those who have the difficulties illustrated.  It also made me feel sad for students who aren’t given the tools and strategies for helping to overcome or compensate for the challenges, as they are missing out on so much important and interesting learning.  It is easy to see how students facing these types of challenges may be feeling a lack of self-esteem, sheer exhaustion during academic tasks, and decreasing motivation to learn.  The simulations illustrate the need for teachers to be knowledgeable about methods to meet all students’ needs to help optimize interest, motivation, and ability to learn. 

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~ Ellen Commito

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Reflection:  The first activity was challenging for me, as reading is not a huge strength and then to try to substitute letters for other letters was challenging. I found the p b switch was the easiest as I do that all the time on my own. The q for either a d or t was the most difficult for me. It was frustrating and annoying so I definitely can see how my students would feel it that is something they struggled with. The second activity was hard too, as I read slowly, I tried to speed read to keep up, thankfully I'm a science teacher and understood what was being talked about so I could do the quiz. If I didn't have the background knowledge that would have been extra hard. As a teacher, I think allowing more time and help for my students who struggle with reading is important. I also have then work together, taking turns reading things with peers and we read a lot of information outloud, this will help students that struggle with reading. 

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Reflection:  The first activity was challenging for me, as reading is not a huge strength and then to try to substitute letters for other letters was challenging. I found the p b switch was the easiest as I do that all the time on my own. The q for either a d or t was the most difficult for me. It was frustrating and annoying so I definitely can see how my students would feel it that is something they struggled with. The second activity was hard too, as I read slowly, I tried to speed read to keep up, thankfully I'm a science teacher and understood what was being talked about so I could do the quiz. If I didn't have the background knowledge that would have been extra hard. As a teacher, I think allowing more time and help for my students who struggle with reading is important. I also have then work together, taking turns reading things with peers and we read a lot of information outloud, this will help students that struggle with reading. 

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Sarah Gilbert

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I found both of these activities to be very frustrating. I can't imaging feeling this level of frustration all day everyday, as students with reading disabilities and working memory challenges do in school. I was not able to understand or really access any of the information presented on the two activities. This assignment has definitely taken my understanding of the challenges that these student's face to a different level and will certainly try to accommodate more in my lessons with these types of kiddos.

Leslie Jennings

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I found the reading/attention simulation eye opening. It was anxiety provoking knowing that the lines were disappearing as I was reading. I ended up being more concerned about reading quickly than understanding what I was reading. I feel confident I bombed the quiz at the end even though I can't know for sure because I got an error message. I also read through all of these passages and took lots of notes. I was encouraged that many of the suggestions about what we could do were so affirming. For example, the demystifying strategy is something we have been doing right along but I hadn't had it so clearly defined. The organized lists of suggestions for strategies were fantastic. I can see referencing them during a training of paras or to help parents understand what we are doing, specifically, to support their child. Loved this assignment! Thank you.