The Orton-Gillingham Podcast

Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/OrtonGillinghamTraining

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@BrainspringOrtonGillingham

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LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/brainspring/

Linktree: https://linktr.ee/brainspringortongillingham

Hosts: Katie Hodgkins, Esther Moreau 

Production Manager: Michael Flees 

Soundboard: Brendan Kelly 

Podcast Production/Marketing: Morgan MacKew 

Marketing Intern: Elena Martin 

Monday Nov 28, 2022

The Science of Reading (with Penny Ezell)

Monday Nov 28, 2022

Hello and welcome back! On today’s episode, we are talking all about the Science of Reading. But before we get to that, we talk briefly about the “Queen of Halloween” contest, and Katie and Esther share their favorite books in honor of Author’s Day, which was on November 1st.

Katie: Roald Dahl (She also likes the book, The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls)

Esther: EM Forster, who wrote A Room With a View

And we also have a contest winner to announce!

Congrats to Ryan for guessing our Mystery Woman, Ida B. Wells!

Now all about the Science of Reading.

Today our hosts are speaking with special guest, Penny Ezell. Penny Ezell is an accomplished educator with 23 years of experience who has devoted herself to improving literacy for ALL students. Penny is trained in Brainspring’s Phonic First, Structures, and Level II training. She was a R.I.S.E. trainer for the state of Arkansas focusing on the Science of Reading and helped co-author Brainspring’s Science of Reading training. She was also a local LETRS trainer in Arkansas. She is currently working as an independent literacy consultant with Empowering Writers and is a candidate to become a National Professional Learning Facilitator for LETRS. 

After the interview, Katie, Esther, and Penny answer a voicemail question from one of our listeners.

Then Penny shared her favorite author; Andrea Beaty, who wrote Aaron Slater, Illustrator (The Questioneers).

We just want to say “thank you” to Penny Ezell for chatting with us today! Make sure to check out the links below for all the resources mentioned during this episode and follow us on all social media to stay up to date on all Brainspring news. See you next time!

RESOURCES

William Van Cleave Website: https://www.wvced.com/

Latin and Greek Roots: Teaching Vocabulary Using Hands-on Activities and Common Objects by Perry D. Stokes: https://www.amazon.com/Latin-Greek-Roots-Vocabulary-Hands/dp/141640502X/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=latin+and+greek+roots+teaching+vocabulary&qid=1669415289&s=books&sprefix=latin+and+greek+roots%3A+tea%2Cstripbooks%2C142&sr=1-1&ufe=app_do%3Aamzn1.fos.08f69ac3-fd3d-4b88-bca2-8997e41410bb

Writing Matters - Developing Sentence Skills in Students of All Ages: https://www.wvced.com/product/writing-matters-developing-sentence-skills-in-students-of-all-ages/

Equipped for Reading Success A Comprehensive, Step-By-Step Program for Developing Phonemic Awareness and Fluent Word Recognition by David A. Kirkpatrick: https://www.amazon.com/Comprehensive-Developing-Awareness-Recognition-PlayStation-4/dp/0964690365

Aaron Slater, Illustrator (The Questioneers) by Andrea Beaty: https://www.amazon.com/Aaron-Slater-Illustrator-Questioneers-Andrea/dp/1419753967

BRAINSPRING RESOURCES

Prefixes and Suffixes: https://brainspring.com/brainspring-store/prefixes-and-suffixes/

More Prefixes and Suffixes: https://brainspring.com/brainspring-store/more-prefixes-and-suffixes/

PS: Prefixes, Suffixes, Roots: https://brainspring.com/brainspring-store/ps-prefixes-suffixes-roots-resource-of-lists-phrases-sentences-poems-and-stories/

PPS: Advanced Prefixes, Suffixes, Roots, and Connectives: https://brainspring.com/brainspring-store/all-products/pps-advanced-prefixes-suffixes-roots-connectives/

Greek and Latin Roots: https://brainspring.com/brainspring-store/greek-and-latin-roots/

More Greek and Latin Roots: https://brainspring.com/brainspring-store/more-greek-and-latin-roots/

Writing Matters: Developing Sentence Skills in Students of All Ages: https://www.wvced.com/product/writing-matters-developing-sentence-skills-in-students-of-all-ages/

Structures Courses: https://brainspring.com/structures-1/

Subscribe to our newsletter! https://lp.constantcontactpages.com/sl/S9onxP7/brainspringnewsletter

Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/OrtonGillinghamTraining

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Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/brainspringortongillingham/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/brainspring/

Linktree: https://linktr.ee/brainspringortongillingham

Hosts: Katie Hodgkins, Esther Moreau 

Production Manager: Michael Flees 

Soundboard: Brendan Kelly 

Podcast Production/Marketing: Morgan MacKew 

Marketing Intern: Elena Martin 

Monday Oct 24, 2022

The Halloween Special

Monday Oct 24, 2022

Hello and Happy Halloween! Today our hosts came prepared with their Halloween costumes to discuss their plans for this spooky season.

Katie came dressed as the Grammar Police; a costume inspired by Esther because she does NOT like bad grammar. Esther has arrived in her spookiest witch getup!

Katie loves Halloween and scary movies, but you won’t be catching her in any haunted houses! Esther explored a spooky trail filled with jump scares and lots of screams to be heard.

To start off our Halloween special, Esther and Katie share their favorite scary books, and Esther shares a couple of her favorite quotes from the stories that used to haunt her. Katie reminisces about telling scary stories around a fire, and just how excited her own kids are to retell those stories. We even get to hear from a couple of our behind-the-scenes friends about their favorite scary books and stories!

Halloween is on a Monday this year, so that means teachers and students will be celebrating in the classroom. Looking for last minute Halloween activities for your classroom? Well look no further!

Katie and Esther show us some quick and easy Halloween games we can prepare for the classroom:

Bowling for Ghosts
- White plastic cups
- Draw ghost faces on them
- Use small orange with jack-o-lantern drawn on it!
- Or any ball
Pumpkin Ring Toss
- Pumpkins
- Can use glow in the dark rings!
Halloween Charades
- Create cards with different Halloween characters
  - Ex. Ghosts, witches, mad scientists, vampire, etc.
- Have kids perform the charades
  - Get them up and moving around!
Costume Contest
- Have the kids vote on the best Halloween Costumes!

Speaking of Costume Contest...

The Orton-Gillingham Podcast is launching the “Queen of Halloween” Costume Contest! You guys get to vote for which of our hosts has the best costume. The winner of the contest will win the title of “Queen of Halloween”! Will it be Esther, the Spooky Witch, or Katie, the Grammar Police? Vote at the link below NOW! Voting will be closed by the end of the week and the winner will be announced on Halloween.

As always, make sure to follow us on all social media to stay up to date on all things Brainspring. And don’t forget to vote for the “Queen of Halloween” Costume Contest. See you next time!

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

Vote for the “Queen of Halloween” Costume Contest here: https://forms.office.com/r/1aP2bg4tgD

Source for Games: https://www.teachingexpertise.com/classroom-ideas/halloween-activities/

Subscribe to our newsletter! https://lp.constantcontactpages.com/sl/S9onxP7/brainspringnewsletter

Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/OrtonGillinghamTraining

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@BrainspringOrtonGillingham

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/brainspringortongillingham/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/brainspring/

Linktree: https://linktr.ee/brainspringortongillingham

Hosts: Katie Hodgkins, Esther Moreau

Production Manager: Michael Flees

Soundboard: Brendan Kelly

Podcast Production/Marketing: Morgan MacKew

Saturday Oct 15, 2022

All About Dyslexia Awareness Month

Saturday Oct 15, 2022

Hello and welcome back! In today’s episode, our hosts are talking all about dyslexia, in honor of October being Dyslexia Awareness Month. Before getting into the topic, Katie and Esther announce the “Funniest Back to School Story” contest winner. Congrats to Shannon! Shannon won a Free Self-Paced Refresher course and a $50 gift card to the Brainspring store. Our hosts also shared an honorable mention from Kim. Thank you both for listening and submitting your stories!

Next, Katie and Esther talk about Dyslexia Awareness Month, which is currently happening in the month of October. Dyslexia is a language-based learning disability that affects a person’s ability to read. As you can imagine, there are a lot of myths surrounding dyslexia, and our hosts take a crack at them to determine which ones are truthful, and which have been debunked!

Myths:

Dyslexia is a vision problem.
Dyslexia only happens in the English language.
Dyslexia doesn’t show up until elementary school

Truths:

People with dyslexia do not see backwards.
Dyslexia exists all over the world.

May be harder to detect in multilingual kids.

1 in 5 people suffer from dyslexia.

Could be higher now, because we know so much more!

35% of US entrepreneurs are dyslexic.
60% of self-made millionaires are dyslexic.

This may be surprising, but there are a lot of celebrities who have dyslexia! Some of those celebrities include:

Steven Spielberg
Whoopi Goldberg
Henry Winkler
Muhammad Ali
Richard Branson
Jay Leno
Danny Glover
Keira Knightley
Albert Einstein
Leonardo da Vinci
Pablo Picasso

Fun fact: people with dyslexia tend to be more creative and have a higher level of intelligence. They only use the right side of their brain to process language, while non-dyslexics use three areas of the left side of the brain to process language. And when you’re right brained, you tend to be more creative!

A long time ago, there was a stigma around dyslexia because we simply just didn’t know much about it. Now that we know more, it’s something we can talk more about and be proud of!

Help spread awareness by:

Wear red on October 15th for World Dyslexia Day.
Talk on social media and share some facts (helps erase stigma when there is more info out there!).
Donate books on dyslexia to a local school or library.

Dyslexia Awareness is extremely important, so make sure to share what you know, and know that there are resources available for you (especially on our website!).

Have any questions or comments for us? Leave us a voicemail or send us an email at the links below.

Make sure to tune in next time for our super spooky Halloween special!

And don’t forget to follow us on all social media to stay up to date on all things Brainspring. See you next time!

Subscribe to our newsletter! https://lp.constantcontactpages.com/sl/S9onxP7/brainspringnewsletter

Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/OrtonGillinghamTraining

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@BrainspringOrtonGillingham

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/brainspringortongillingham/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/brainspring/

Linktree: https://linktr.ee/brainspringortongillingham

Hosts: Katie Hodgkins, Esther Moreau

Production Manager: Michael Flees

Soundboard: Brendan Kelly

Podcast Production/Marketing: Morgan MacKew

Monday Sep 26, 2022

Homeschooling (with Laura Seymore)

Monday Sep 26, 2022

Hello and welcome back! On this episode, our hosts are speaking with homeschooling expert, Laura Seymore, about her experience teaching her kids at home and how exactly she did it. But first, “Talk like a Pirate Day” is September 19th and Katie and Esther share their best pirate accents and jokes!

Joke #1: Why does it take a pirate so long to learn the alphabet? They spend years at “C”!
Joke #2: What does the pirate say when his leg gets stuck in the freezer? Shiver me timber!

Background on Laura Seymore:

Works at Brainspring as an instructor

Has known Esther for 13 years
Worked at The Learning Center (school)
Amazing educator!
Certified through the National Institute of Learning Development
Worked with kids who were struggling in all areas

Has 7 kids and has homeschooled nearly all of them
Homeschooled her kids for 20 years

How did Laura do it??

Laura says that she never homeschooled all 7 kids at once, and one of the things that helped her a lot was keeping a strict schedule. The kids woke up at the same time every morning, had a set time for breakfast, schoolwork, and breaks. There was even a set time for when they got to do extracurricular activities. Organization is KEY!

What kind of student would homeschooling be best for?

According to Laura, it’s not so much about the student as it is about how you modify teaching that student, not all kids learn the same!

What are good traits a parent should have if they want to homeschool their children?

As stated before, organization is a big help! And a lot of the traits needed to be a good candidate for homeschooling your children are traits that are needed to be a good parent; a solid home, no compelling outside requirements, making sure YOU are in a good place mentally to take on the responsibility, and the knowledge to know if you would like it or not.

Last words of wisdom?

Don’t homeschool out of obligation! Don’t push it! And find support if this is what you decide to do. And if it’s not, investigate other options.

To wrap up this episode, Katie and Esther share that August 26th was “Women’s Equality Day.” Women’s equality is so important, and the passing of the 19th amendment allowing women to vote in the United States was a huge step towards reaching equality for women.

To celebrate this day, we are doing a contest! The first person to correctly email us or send in a voicemail of the woman our hosts are sharing clues on, wins a $100 Visa Gift Card!

A final inspirational quote to close out the episode:

“Always be yourself, unless you can be a pirate... Then always be a pirate!”

Don’t forget to follow us on all social media to stay up to date on all things Brainspring. See you next time!

Homeschooling resources:

Timberdoodle Co. - https://timberdoodle.com

Oxford Learner’s Bookshelf – https://www.oxfordlearnersbookshelf.com

K12 Learning Lift Off: - https://www.learningliftoff.com

Subscribe to our newsletter! https://lp.constantcontactpages.com/sl/S9onxP7/brainspringnewsletter

Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/OrtonGillinghamTraining

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@BrainspringOrtonGillingham

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/brainspringortongillingham/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/brainspring/

Linktree: https://linktr.ee/brainspringortongillingham

Hosts: Katie Hodgkins, Esther Moreau

Special Guest: Laura Seymore

Production Manager: Michael Flees

Podcast Production/Marketing: Morgan MacKew

Monday Aug 22, 2022

Welcome Back!

Monday Aug 22, 2022

Welcome Back! - Show Notes

The Orton-Gillingham Podcast is back after a hiatus just in time to start the new school year! Katie and Esther reintroduce themselves by sharing three fun facts about each other.

Three things Esther shared about Katie:

She is a compassionate educator of the deaf
She is a great leader (and mom!)
She is freakishly organized… And always uses a pencil when writing notes (for easy editing!)

Three things Katie shared about Esther:

Esther laughs at everything
She has a huge Sicilian family and is about to be a grandma for the first time (twins!)
Esther enjoys listening to True Crime podcasts (just like Katie!)

Katie and Esther also shared three of their best tips for helping educators get ready for the upcoming school year.

Katie’s three tips:

Keep it simple
Organization is key (caddies, white boards, sticky notes, etc.)
Use the cards instead of blending boards

Esther’s three tips:

Give each student their own expandable folder containing all materials they will need
If you’re a teacher that works with multiple groups, have a set of everything for each group
Download fillable lesson plans and keep them on your computer

In honor of National Tell a Joke Day on August 16th, our hosts told three jokes to help spread the laughter!

Katie’s jokes:

What kind of cheese isn’t your cheese?
- Nacho Cheese!
A joke from her son, Jackson:
- What does Y-E-S spell?
- Yes.
- What does E-Y-E-S spell?
- Eyes!
A joke from her son, Gray:
- What is an astronaut’s favorite part of the computer?
- The SPACE bar!

Esther’s jokes:

What do you call a dog that can do magic?
- A Labra-kadabra-dog!
What do you call a fake noodle?
- An impasta!
Knock knock
- Who’s there?
- Control freak
- Control freak who- (cut off)
- This is when you are supposed to say, “control freak who?”!

Our hosts wrap up our episode with reminders to watch out for the updated website and Member’s Area that is coming in August. They also present the new voicemail option where our listeners can call in and leave questions and messages that will be addressed on future episodes.

We are also rolling out a contest! Call in to the voicemail at the link below and leave your funniest back to school story, and the winner will win a free Self-Pace Refresher Course and a $50 gift card to our store! Don’t feel comfortable leaving a voice message? You can also email us at podcast@brainspring.com.

Don’t forget to follow us on all social media to stay up to date on all things Brainspring.

See you next time!

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