Interior Fieldworker report
(Jan Seedhouse)

I've been busy responding to requests for training and have been fortunate to be invited to several new communities. The word is spreading and I will continue to respond to all requests. A new community wanting to form a Laubach council needs half a dozen people interested in tutoring a and someone willing to be student-tutor coordinator.

The number of Apprentice Trainers is growing too, and these volunteers work with me to provide training. I couldn't do it alone. I hope to have a number of trainers certified before my job disappears and I become a volunteer trainer myself.

This will probably happen within a couple of years unless we can find some provincial money to pay some of the salary for myself and Anne Knott in Vancouver. Any suggestions for ways to find funding would be gratefully received.

Learning Disabilities Workshop

In November of 1996, Howard Eaton from the Orton Dyslexia Society in Vancouver was invited to Kamloops by the Kamloops LLC to give a public presentation of Learning Disabilities and a workshop for Laubach tutors. We were able to invite tutors from councils in the area and had tutors from Clearwater, Barriere, and Ashcroft attend. Howard has serious learning disabilities himself and his first introduction to Laubach was when we invited him to the Western Development Conference last May to give a workshop for students on self-advocacy. At the workshop in Kamloops he gave us some background on learning disabilities and some practical tips. We hope to have him back again.

Orton Gillingham Training?

There is a possibility of a workshop in Kamloops this fall to train Orton Gillingham tutors. The Orton Gillingham methods are used widely to teach students with serious Learning Disabilities. The workshop is a total of 10 days of class time but we hope to have it spread out so it is easier to absorb the material. The course is not cheap, about $600, but it is one-of-a-kind. Parents who want to help their children can take the course. There is often call for Orton Gillingham tutors and once qualified the Orton Dyslexia Society in Vancouver would refer calls to you. If interested in the course, call Jan Seedhouse.

LLC Distributorship

If your council hasn't received the new catalogue of books and videos (the one with the Mountie on the front) give Anne or Jan a call. They are also having a sale on discontinued items include Taking the Mystique out of Learning Disabilities, Handbook of Cultural Awareness, Jazz Chants, and many others.

New in the latest catalogue is another in the Winners series: Winners Two, stories about ten Canadian award-winning athletes. Exercise materials to accompany Winners Two are also available if you wish to use it for other than recreational reading.

Tutor Tips

For a beginning reader, it is rewarding to have a list of words he/she can now read. One way to keep track of these words was suggested by Janet Harris of the new Northwest Laubach Council. She suggested giving your student a small, cheap address book that has tabs for each letter. That way they can find the word again if help with spelling is required. Suitable books can often be found for $1.