pure learning
It helps to have the last name "Pure" - it goes with so many nouns - and as a
teacher, it made perfect sense to put "learning" after my name. Pure Learning
started when my triplet children were four years old. As a reading specialist,
who had experience in the classroom and in the private learning center arena,
starting a small tutoring business seemed like the logical next step. I could
set my own hours, focus on working 1:1 with students who had dyslexia and other
learning issues, homeschool my own children, AND I could develop materials along
the way - something I always enjoyed doing as a teacher. When I began working as
a reading specialist at a Montessori school, I started implementing spelling
lessons I had developed. Orton-Gillingham-based lessons with explicit skills
instruction involving letters and sounds AND the use of three modalities -
visual, auditory, and kinesthetic - were the most effective. Some of my students
were strong in one area but weak in another. By presenting all three modalities
in a lesson, each student could find their own strength and I could see how my
student learned best. The teachers saw the difference the lessons I had created
were making in their students' spelling and writing and craved a program that
would teach them how to teach spelling AND make sense to the students. From
that, Working with Words evolved. Fast forward 20+ years and, today, I can look
back and know that this Orton-Gillingham-based, multisensory approach focused on
phonics and the six syllable types has been successful with early, struggling,
resistant, underconfident, AND strong readers and spellers. Teachers who have
used Working with Words better understand the generalizations and rules that
exist in spelling English words and how to teach them. What was consistent at
the beginning of my teaching career and remains so today is my ener
