STRATEGIES TO IMPROVE
Focus and Attention
Central to every student, is the ability to maintain their focus and attention. The world is full of distractions competing for our attention. Our brains are designed to seek out these distractions. The Hummingbird Learning Method® teaches strategies to block distractions and increase concentration.
Reading / Writing / Listening
Phonics is the preferred method of teaching reading in schools but as English is such a complex language, many students struggle with phonics. So much effort goes into sounding out the words that by the time the child reaches the end of the sentence or paragraph they have forgotten the meaning of what they have read. This leads to the child disliking reading because they are reading very slowly. Their writing skills are weak because their vocabulary hasn’t developed. In addition some children have difficulty in following verbal instructions or remembering what the teacher is saying. The Hummingbird Learning Method® uses a visual technique that makes reading easy and fluent. The student’s vocabulary expands, their writing improves and their ability to recall what the teacher is saying improves.
Classroom Performance
Some parents find that their child is not doing as well as they would have thought. Their child is struggling but not to the extent that it warrants a formal diagnosis. The child may be receiving additional resource hours but their confidence in their own abilities is dragging them down. This can be due to variety of reasons including slow handwriting, lack of confidence, fear of making a mistake or the teaching style of the teacher. The Hummingbird Learning Method® is designed to improve confidence and make learning fun and enjoyable again, getting the student back to really developing their potential.
Spelling
Many children learn their spellings off by heart as part of their homework only to find that the next day or a few days later they can’t remember how to spell the word. Using the Hummingbird Learning Method® we change that by using a non-phonics based visual spelling strategy. Spelling has never been so easy. We work with the student’s natural gifts and learning style to reduce stress and increase focus, attention and organisation. Students will also be taught specific strategies for reading, memorisation, note-taking and writing/composition to maximise their natural abilities.
Exam Stress
Test Preparation & Test Taking Strategies are part of the Hummingbird Learning Method®. It includes methods to overcome nervousness and anxiety allowing the student to focus and perform well in their exams, confident that they have the work done and can answer to the best of their abilities.
Studying and Note-taking
The Hummingbird Learning Method® includes speed reading & visual recall along with a template to make study notes easy to create & revise. Handwriting skills are taught to increase the ease and speed of notetaking both in class and as part of homework. A specific homework routine is also established with the student.
Difficulty with mathematics
For some visual thinkers, their difficulty with mathematics may be the result of deficiency in processing symbolic information. For others, their difficulties may be the result of a lack of sequence, order and a sense of time in their thought process. Certain elements of maths (like long division) that require more than 2 or 3 steps may confuse the visual thinker.
Most maths are taught as a series of steps with the assumption that, if a student is taught the steps necessary to solve the problem—essentially the ‘how’ of the problem, then he or she will naturally understand the intention of those steps—the ‘why’ of the problem.
Unfortunately for many visual-spatial thinkers, this assumption is completely incorrect. For these students, a strategy, such as the Hummingbird Learning Method®, for understanding the ‘why’ of the problem is critical to their success.
