Let ’ s meet the author
by Daniella De Winter
If you ask an educator or a teacher what would be the most important value in the process of learning , he would probably say encouragement and motivation . But how can you encourage and motivate a student with language based learning difficulties ( LBLD )? How can you empower a frustrated learner into the learning process after he has been failing again and again ? How would you make him gain the necessary confidence to try again ? The answer , according to my personal perspective , is by providing him with hope . Hope is not a dream . Hope is the notion that you can achieve a goal based on factual information and learned experience .
In the words of Vaclav Havel , “ Hope is definitely not the same thing as optimism . It is not the conviction that something will turn out well , but the certainty that something makes sense , regardless of how it turns out .” And , furthermore , as Brad Henry expressed so accurately , “ A good teacher can inspire hope , ignite the imagination , and instil a love of learning .”
How many times in life have we had to face struggles and difficulties , both as teachers and as learners ? Probably many more than we can actually recall . Then how can we incorporate hope in the learning equation to achieve successful outcomes ?
According to my own personal experience , there is no other feeling more related to learning than hope . Whenever I meet a student with LBLD who has been facing frustration and struggles for a long time , my number one priority is to show him or her that there is hope , because most of the time , that is exactly what the student
Daniella set up her own private school of English more than 20 years ago and has been teaching for many more years but never within the traditional ministerial schools . During her first years she dedicated herself to teaching adults only , so her perspective has always been different from the mainstream methods . Over the years , she has developed special methods to teach adults to read English and specialized in providing solutions to dyslectic readers . This working path has led her to also develop a very innovative and extremely successful methodology for teaching the English language based on patterns . These methods have been incorporated into her own brand of books and games .
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