reading comprehension

If your son’s receptive to working with you, this is really something, the V/V, that you can do with him yourself. All you need to invest in is the book and it’s extremely readable and easy to understand. The materials that LMB says are required can all be procured cheaply. In fact, all you really need are a handful of felt squares about 4 or 5 inches diameter. All the other black line masters are in the back of the book. And if you don’t even want to bother with the felt squares, you can use construction paper.

If he’s not able to accept you as his tutor, and if you can’t find someone experienced with V/V in your area, consider finding a reputable tutor who’s willing to learn this program. It really IS easy to teach and something any tutor who’s willing to spend the time perusing the book can take on. It’s to the tutor’s benefit, anyhow, because LMB is becoming so popular that they SHOULD be learning what it’s about.

THe book is very straightforward and every step is spelled out. You’ll want to go through it first, not rely on being one step ahead, and of course it’s often better to find someone besides MOM to be doing it, but it’s just not as involved as LiPS is.

Thanks Joan
I might do that I know some friends who are finishing their master in special ed but have know experience at least one would be interested in learning the only problem is the only women my son is willing to work with is me ( he has all men teachers) His teacher agrees that a parent can’t work with a child

Also could somebody do the samething with seeing stares. Is it worth buying the videos for either program

Freyda

Freyda,

Yes, Seeing Stars is exactly like V/V in that it’s very easy to learn. In fact, Seeing Stars really is just the V/V program applied to symbol imagery. The philosophy is identical.

LIPS is really the only LMB program that’s harder to learn straight from the book. In that case, the video would be very helpful. But for SS and V/V, if money is an issue, then you don’t need the video. If money isn’t an issue, it might be nice to have the videos. But really, I’ve seen all the LMB videos - there’s nothing in them that you wouldn’t get from working straight out of the books.

Can Visualizing and Verbalizing or Seeing Stars be used in small groups, or is it really a one-on-one program? Another mother and I have been discussing the thought that this might be a good program for both of our NLD sons. Since they get along well with each other, and we were thinking of doing it during summer vacaction, we thought that they might like the “moral support” of doing it together. What do you think?

Karen

The book includes ways to use it in classroom settings (very small groups of course) — so working wiht two folks shouldn’t be too hard!

I paid for my own LMB training as a parent because of my daughters speech and language issues. In the video’s Nanci Bell shows VV done in a small group. It is actually kind of fun in a small group as the kids can work on the imagery together. I use it in a classroom when I read aloud to kids who have speech and language issues. The other day I was reading Number the Stars by Lois Lawry. I stopped every paragraph or so and we talked about what we were seeing in our imagination. I was also illustrating on the white board what I saw as I read and we stopped to make predictions of what was to come. Some of the words like “stock” the soldier prodded her backpack with the stock of his gun. They were clueless as I asked questions, what is a stock of a gun? Anyone have any ideas? They were clueless so I drew a picture of a rifle on the board and pointed to the stock. They finally got it. Another word that was tough was hoodlum. Pictures speak a thousand words along with dialogue to help them really understand what they are reading and remember as well.

Don’t be afraid to try VV with your children. It helps them to be more expressive.

I’ve used both programs in small groups.. I tried LIPS with 8 first graders my first year teaching it - what a disaster! For LIPS, I now prefer only two kids at most.

But I use Seeing Stars with spelling groups of 10 or 12 kids at a time and it works very well. I think that V/V’s success is diluted with each additional child but two at a time ought to work out OK.

Thanks all, that’s what I wanted to know!

Karen