How did This Website Develop?

As a new parent, I started blogging about parenting, both on my own blog, and at the Silicon Valley Mom’s blog. But I stopped blogging when it became clear that my child learned differently.  Oh sure, I blogged around it, for years, but I didn’t want to talk personally about my child’s life in specifics.  I still feel that way.

 So I didn’t blog.  But as a writer, I started researching.

That was 15 years ago, and  I’ve discovered amazing things about learning how to help your LD child.  Working with startups in the Silicon Valley, I deal with a lot of information professionally, so I have tools for it.  I’ve collected thousands of pieces of research and hundreds of books on this topic.

I also hired all sorts of professionals, as parents do. Teachers, testers, therapists, you name it.  As I went, I interviewed all of them, getting information about their opinions and experiences from the often-brilliant specialists and educators I met.  And of course, I’m surrounded by brilliant moms from around the entire world, who have seen that their children needed something different and have spent years honing their parenting wisdom and techniques.

The World of LD Parenting is Complex

I worked in the engineering world, surrounded by logic and standardized ideas.  (Opposite of the world of LD parenting.) So I’m not a teacher. I’m not a practitioner.  I’m a researcher who has brought her  skills in dealing with complex information to the world of learning disabilities.  With Help My Child Learn, we’re here to simplify the complex LD systems in your world, and to help you succeed.

Navigating Your Pathways to Success

On my journey as a parent, despite my earnest good intentions, I hired the wrong people, did the wrong things, sent my kid to the wrong schools, and just took the wrong pathways, so many times.  I made lots of mistakes.  I lost months and years of my child’s time, paralyzed with questions like:

“Is this really a problem?”

“Is this just me being overprotective?”

“How can my child not just learn this stuff?”

“The school said that my child didn’t need an IEP, but they’re not teaching my child anything.” 

“How do I really request an IEP?” 

“Even with an IEP, the school still isn’t teaching my child. What do I do?”

Like many people I figured out how to do many things as I passed through the exit doorway, and it frustrated me.  It frustrates me even more, because I see new people on help forums asking the exact same questions every single day.

Fine Until Kindergarten: A Parent’s First Guide to Learning Differences

That’s why I wrote Fine Until Kindergarten: A Parent’s First Guide to Learning Differences.

It’s a short, simple book that tells parents what they need to know in order to effectively help their children succeed in school.  Among other things, I describe the IEP process in a way that anybody can understand.    Simple!  With pictures! And now there’s more.

There are many wonderful LD resources, but most of them don’t start at the very beginning. We do.  We start on the very first day that you suspect that there might be something going on.  What do you do?  Who do you talk to?  How does this work? 

 It turns out that the reason dyslexic children don’t memorize disconnected information very well is that they are whole-to-part learners.

For the most part, our educational system is a part-to-whole system.  We teach children a lot of little disconnected things, and then — voila! We show the students how to use that information.  Unfortunately, people do the same thing with learning disabilities. 

Right now, in 2020, we’re building this website, so it’s not finished.  We’ve opened it up to get feedback now, so that we can be as helpful as possible, and we encourage you to sign up for our mailing list, to hear about updates as we produce them.

There are amazing resources out in the world, and our goal is to showcase those resources within their contexts. The ADHD experts have very helpful tips for dealing with ADHD challenges, and some of the home-educating parents (also trained professionals) have created great ways to support learning and brain development at home. We break the pathway up into small bits, and we include tools, techniques, wisdom, and resources that you can use along the way.

In addition to the very first steps that you take, we tell you this:

How can you help your child to learn and find success?

The process that most parents follow is the same, but the children, and the situations are unique.

It’s not just about one set of actions, or one philosophy, or one school. It’s understanding how to put the pieces together. 

Our site supports the multitasking that you do every day, as a parent. You  can read about the process, and then read about a great new tool for teaching spelling.  Read about how to get your child’s teacher to test them, and read about exercises that can help your child concentrate. Because let’s be honest.  Parenting is one issue after another.

Join us as we develop our pathways and provide more information.  If you sign up for our newsletter, we’ll tell you what we’ve finished recently, and we’ll tell you about our latest downloads as well.

Remember:  the early years are the most difficult.  Your child will grow, mature, and blossom. Let’s work together to protect them and support them through these early years!

Catherine

January, 2020