Creating Self Advocacy Pamphlets

To say that there is a lot going on in a student's life in grade eight would be an understatement. There are the challenges of being a teenager, harnessing the feelings of being the biggest fish in the pond, and of course the transition to high school - just to name a few. I want to be sure that my students have a smooth transition to high school so I have asked them to create a pamphlet to describe their strengths and needs as learners.The pamphlets the students created surprised me!  It wasn't how good they looked that surprised me, I knew they would create greatness, it was the students' mindfulness of how they learn that I found to be most amazing! My students all live with a learning disability and they are challenged by their LD day in and day out as students. I am a big proponent of mindfulness in the classroom. We are all very open and inclusive in the classroom.  The fact that every student in my room is full of grit and resiliency has made them so successful in working to overcome their LDs.

Here is an explanation of the activity we did written by the students for the LD@School website.

"We started by going over York Region’s Understanding Learning Disabilities - How Processing Affects Learning chart, WE call it “The Waterfall Chart” [http://ldatschool.ca/classroom/executive- function/york-waterfall-chart/].  We went through the waterfall chart with our teacher and jotted down our strengths and needs into an app called Popplet [http://popplet.com/].  Some of you may have already seen Denver’s Popplet presentation [https://twitter.com/Mr_DzzzClass?lang=en]!"


After finishing the activity, I found this assignment to be extremely empowering for students. They are better at explaining exactly what they need in order to overcome their LD, which makes them better self-advocates. I am excited to learn about these students' successes in high school.

Below is a sample of what the students have created. You can see why I am so proud!