Welcome to Literacy Lighthouse and thank you for taking the time to explore my website!
Literacy Lighthouse was born from a desire to continue on my career pathway supporting young children where a literacy, language and/or communication difficulty is causing a barrier to learning and affecting emotional wellbeing.
My ambitious and creative nature has meant that I have had many different and exciting opportunities during my career as SEND teacher, beginning as an Early Years and KS1 language unit teacher at Stepgates Primary School, Chertsey. It was the children here that I thank today for helping me mould my career. Since this time I have had the privilege of teaching in a school for children with moderate learning difficulties, been a SENCo in a
mainstream primary school as well as a centre manager for an alternative provision, a specialist teacher for the local authority and, more recently, a family wellbeing coordinator for the National Autistic Society.
I have worked with children with a range of different additional and special educational needs including Development Language Disorder, Dyslexia, Dyscalculia, Autism, ADHD/ADD and Global Development Delay, many of which have overlapping difficulties.
As you can imagine, I have met some wonderful children along the way and I feel immensely proud when I think of the number of lives I have touched and made a difference for. The trusting relationship between pupil and teacher is at the core of learning for any child, but this is magnified for children with SEND. I am able to make meaningful connections with children and with the consistent use of calm encouragement and meaningful praise I have been witness to children's growth in confidence and independence.
Central to my practice is working with parent/carers and professionals alike, and this is at the forefront of Literacy Lighthouse. Having a child that is developing more slowly than his/her peers can be worrying. I want to be able to provide reassurance, share my expertise and help to identify the gaps.
The role of language in literacy development
It is widely recognised that language forms the building blocks for literacy development. We must appreciate the foundation skills needed to recognise and decode words and understand what we are reading. By doing this we are allowing children not only the opportunity of developing a love of reading, but also the chance to access the curriculum meaningfully.
Most children acquire oral language with little difficulty. Some children, however, will have problems developing language and will demonstrate an impairment in either their use of language or their understanding of language. There are many factors that could contribute to this and it is important that children get the support they need as soon as possible.
The pre-school & early years
Improving oral language should be a central goal during a child's pre-school and early years. This means that we need to allow them opportunity to talk, engage in two way conversation, listen to stories, sing nursery rhymes.....the list goes on! Despite these opportunities some children will have difficulty with, for example, pronouncing words, acquiring vocabulary and/or acquiring the grammatical rules of language. Idendifying children early and close involvement of families in decision making is key to providing the support children deserve.
Dyslexia/Specific Learning Difficulty (SpLD)
Also complex in nature, dyslexia/SpLD is sometimes described as a language-based reading difficulty. Some children feel disappointed, frustrated and consequenlty give up on reading. It is likely that a child with with dyslexia/SpLD will have difficulty identifying the sound structure of language and may also exhibit problems with short term verbal memory resulting in reading and spelling difficulties.
We need to acknowledge that if a child is making slow progress with reading and/or writing despite robust and intensive intervention, that it is important to understand the underlying nature of the difficulty so that the child's needs can be addressed effectively. The difference between a child giving up and providing him/her with different options to facilitate the process of learning to read can be life changing.