Alfabeticians, my clients, ask THE most amazing questions during our sessions. Last week, one of the younger humans asked, “Why is the Letter <z> at the end of the alphabet?” “What an awesome question,” I replied, “Let’s have a look at one of my trusty resources to find out.” So, out came my trustyContinue reading The Letter Z (Zed)
The beginning of 2024, also marks the beginning of Alfabetico’s tenth year of business. In the world of small business, that’s no small feat! It’s been an amazing journey so far, and although we’re only a few days into the New Year, there have been some chance meetings, and promising signs that 2024 isContinue reading Alfabetico: Heading into its tenth year of business
It’s been a tumultuous week in terms of world events, and sometimes, what’s going on in the wider world can feel overwhelming. Rather than feeling down about events that are not within my immediate sphere of influence, I’ve chosen to focus on all the wonderful things that I feel grateful for this week; thingsContinue reading Joy – ‘feeling of pleasure or delight’
This week’s blog post is about ‘Literacy’. Helping students and other educators build their literacy capacity through a greater understanding of our language’s Orthography (the conventions of a language’s writing system) is my passion. It’s important to show students that our writing system helps us to: – convey ideas to others through writingContinue reading Literacy – The Ability to Read ‘and’ Write
One of my students loves the Netflix show, ‘Brooklyn Nine-Nine’. As luck would have it, I do too! I’ve watched every episode. This particular student came to me feeling quite despondent after a Science exam at school last week. The student thought they’d done really well in the main part of the exam, butContinue reading ‘Brooklyn Nine-Nine’ – Getting Forensic to Detect the Spelling of Scientific Words
The letter <e> gets such a bad rap in the teaching and learning process. I commonly hear it called names like, ‘Bossy-E’, or ‘Magic-E’. I prefer the more technical, linguistically correct term: ‘Single, final, non-syllabic <e>’ I’m aware that the definition above, on first hearing, may sound like a mouthful, but let’s takeContinue reading For E’s a Jolly Good Fellow!
This morning, I came across a little note I’d written down for myself late last year to remind me of a student’s understanding of the process arrow used in a morphological word sum. The note had been made on an evening when I’d been explaining to the student, for the first time, that wordsContinue reading The Morphological Word Sum
Looking back at the week that’s passed, I’m reminded of a quote, which I believe was coined by Pete Bowers of WordWorks Kingston (Canada), “Nothing motivates like understanding.” I’ve seen so much learning and understanding take place with the students I work with in my private therapy practice, primary school teachers I’ve been working withContinue reading Motivates – mote + ive + ate + s –>
When I work with teachers and they tell me that using the International Phonetic Association (IPA) symbols will be too hard, or too complicated for students to understand, I know that’s simply not true. How do I know? Well, apart from seeing my previous students get the hang of it, I just met a lovelyContinue reading Eye, Pee, Aye (IPA) all the Way!
Help – ‘to support, do good to’. I’ve been so lucky to have lots of practical help from my beautiful family over the summer holiday break at a time when I’ve not physically been able to do very much. A major job, completed by my wonderful step-father, and husband, was the building of a retainingContinue reading Help
