When Lois Letchford walks into the room, you can feel the air charge with her passion for education reform. Her story, a testament to overcoming the odds, showcases the transformative impact a creative and empathetic approach to learning can have on students who've been left behind by traditional systems. Our conversation dives deep into the emotional resilience required to turn educational turmoil into triumph, as Lois opens up about the methods she employed to reignite her son Nicholas's love for learning. Her 'box of wonders' is more than a teaching tool—it's a symbol of the curiosity and confidence she instills in her students. Nicholas's journey from being labeled 'uneducable' to earning a PhD from Oxford University stands as a beacon of hope and a powerful reminder that the right environment can change everything.
As we untangle the socio-economic threads that often predestine educational outcomes, particularly within marginalized communities, our dialogue takes a personal turn—I recount my own crusade for my children's future in the face of systemic barriers. This episode isn't just about academic success; it's a window into the harsh realities of privilege and economic repression that echo through African American communities and beyond. We dissect the crucial role of family support, the weight of societal expectations, and the persistent challenges facing those with disabilities. Our exploration is timely, casting light on the education system's trials amidst a global pandemic, and offering a heartfelt look at the resilience required to not only face these adversities but to emerge enlightened and empowered.
Don't forget to listen and follow on your favorite streaming platform and on Facebook. Subscribe on Your Favorite Platform: https://reigniteresilience.buzzsprout.com Follow Us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/reigniteresilience
Disclaimer: The information provided in this podcast is for general informational purposes only and is not intended as a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. The co-hosts of this podcast are not medical professionals. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition. Never disregard professional medical advice or delay in seeking it because of something you have heard on this podcast. Reliance on any information provided by the podcast hosts or guests is solely at your own risk.
When Lois Letchford walks into the room, you can feel the air charge with her passion for education reform. Her story, a testament to overcoming the odds, showcases the transformative impact a creative and empathetic approach to learning can have on students who've been left behind by traditional systems. Our conversation dives deep into the emotional resilience required to turn educational turmoil into triumph, as Lois opens up about the methods she employed to reignite her son Nicholas's love for learning. Her 'box of wonders' is more than a teaching tool—it's a symbol of the curiosity and confidence she instills in her students. Nicholas's journey from being labeled 'uneducable' to earning a PhD from Oxford University stands as a beacon of hope and a powerful reminder that the right environment can change everything.
As we untangle the socio-economic threads that often predestine educational outcomes, particularly within marginalized communities, our dialogue takes a personal turn—I recount my own crusade for my children's future in the face of systemic barriers. This episode isn't just about academic success; it's a window into the harsh realities of privilege and economic repression that echo through African American communities and beyond. We dissect the crucial role of family support, the weight of societal expectations, and the persistent challenges facing those with disabilities. Our exploration is timely, casting light on the education system's trials amidst a global pandemic, and offering a heartfelt look at the resilience required to not only face these adversities but to emerge enlightened and empowered.
Don't forget to listen and follow on your favorite streaming platform and on Facebook. Subscribe on Your Favorite Platform: https://reigniteresilience.buzzsprout.com Follow Us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/reigniteresilience
Disclaimer: The information provided in this podcast is for general informational purposes only and is not intended as a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. The co-hosts of this podcast are not medical professionals. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition. Never disregard professional medical advice or delay in seeking it because of something you have heard on this podcast. Reliance on any information provided by the podcast hosts or guests is solely at your own risk.
Speaker 1:
In the grand theater of life. We all seek a comeback, a resurgence, a rekindling of our inner fire. But how do we spark that flame? Welcome to Reignite Resilience. This is not just another podcast. This is a journey, a venture into the heart of human spirit, the power of resilience and the art of reigniting our passions.
Speaker 2:
Welcome back to part two of our two-part interview with Lois Letchford. We are so excited to dive back in. Lois has taken it upon herself to make it a life mission not only to be a lifelong teacher and tutor, but also exploring and looking for new ways for individuals, both young and old, to unfold the magic that comes along with learning and reading. We hope you enjoy part two. When you were working with either the two teenage boys or even with Nicholas, did you have moments where they would have not necessarily frustration with the actual text, but frustration with the process, their experience? Like for the two teenage boys being in this part of this education system for 10 years and perceived as being failing their way through the system, did they have frustration or angst in terms of where they were or had they settled in that this was who they were First off?
Speaker 3:
they've settled into who they were. And it's the same with my student who was 13 years old. She'll never be able to teach me. I just can't do it. And you're right, my boys, they do get angry, they get really frustrated and I respect that and I say it's okay to be like that. But I've got to keep changing things so that you can get it.
Speaker 3:
And the first thing I do is I bring a box with me and it's got. What could be in it, what should be in it, what would you like to find in it? And if students can't read it, I read it for them. And the first thing I'm asking them is do you understand these words could, should and would? And if they can't do it, what could be in this box? Could it be shoes, and it's a shoe box. Could it be milk? Could it be a box of other presents?
Speaker 3:
And if they can't answer accurately and say it's shoes, then you can fall back and say, oh, you know, could it be something else? Shake it and immediately you've broken down the barriers, you've given them a foundation for this is okay. And then you can also say this word is in your backpack, without saying that you do know this word. What's on the side there? Oh, it should be shoes. It should be shoes. Yes, it should be shoes. Of course it should be. So you know, you've got to find ways of what's going wrong, but also ways that's going to engage my children and bring them in and say you're okay're okay, you're of value.
Speaker 4:
Wow.
Speaker 2:
Well, I have to say thank you as an educator, as you continue to do that, and as a tutor as well. I know that you offer that as an additional service because we hear too often the teachers or the stories about the teachers that and we're not putting all the fault. We understand that there are systems and processes and requirements and expectations of educators nowadays, but oftentimes, as adults, when individuals look back at their childhood and they think, well, no one noticed. So I just shifted through or drifted through because no one noticed.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, absolutely right, no one noticed, and we give them a label.
Speaker 4:
Exactly, yeah, and so then they stop paying attention.
Speaker 3:
And then we give them a program yes, and it's the same program. And I did this and I failed.
Speaker 1:
And I did this and I failed.
Speaker 3:
And I failed. You didn't fail. I failed. It's very personal. It's very personal to fail you Absolutely.
Speaker 2:
When Nicholas saw that shift in going to Lubbock you mentioned that being kind of a shift in the avatar that was previously Nicholas. Right and I'm assuming that he took ownership of that as well right, that he was not a person that was not educated or what have you? Whatever nouns or verbs or that were used, whatever was used, yes, so it would have been the adjectives that were used to describe him before, like what, what were those he was able to? To break through that mold, to step into the sense of ownership of I, I can read, I am smart, to accelerating, to being top of the class and and for those listeners now holding a phd, yeah, from oxford, exactly, yeah yeah, yeah, no small feat exactly yeah, I, I take my hat off to the principal of the elementary school Nicholas went to.
Speaker 3:
Okay, because she said you know, nicholas is 11 years old, he's going 11. And he's in the fifth grade in Australia. And she says I think he should go into fourth grade, not fifth grade. This means he will be repeating for the second time. And my husband said well, won't you be old when he graduates? And she said yes, that's a problem, but you know, we've got this program in middle school that allows them to do grades six, seven and eight in two years. So we'll give him longer in the elementary school and he won't be struggling so much because the gap between fourth and third grade is minimal, and then we'll allow him to catch up in middle school and high school and he'll be fine. That's exactly what happened. Oh, my gosh, wow, how many people does that happen to? Not many, yeah, yeah, and he was.
Speaker 3:
You know, you're always finding in teaching that proximal zone of development. Where's the sweet spot for teaching between the challenge and the ability to do something? And they hit it for Nicholas and going into fourth grade. Yes, he's old, but he's a foreigner, he's tall and he's got this blonde hair and everyone wants to talk to him. I mean, it was just a combination of factors that helped so much, helped him grow. And then they had the Accelerator Reader Program. Many people hated that program. Nicholas comes home and he says Mum, I've got to read a book and take a test. He takes over 10 hours to read one Goosebumps book. He's reading at a snail's pace, yeah, but Nicholas read. He got, you know, three AR points for his one book and I thought this rate is never going to catch up. But that's when the audio books came in. Yes, yeah, wow beautiful.
Speaker 2:
I love that and nicholas.
Speaker 3:
You know he he started to do a phd at when he was 11 because of the discipline that was required for him just to go from the bottom to the top. The resilience, yes, yes, and he needed it through his PhD. You know, that was really really tough, yeah.
Speaker 4:
He learned those skills as a young child and a huge part to you and what you did with him.
Speaker 3:
Amazing and never give up, never give up yeah.
Speaker 2:
What keeps you going? Because, again, we share. You haven't. It wasn't just Nicholas that you've helped. You've helped, I would venture to say, hundreds of thousands of children just with your outreach and with the book and the continued ripple effect of the book and everything what continues to motivate you and and drive your drive to want to help that privilege should never be a reason a child learns to read.
Speaker 3:
Never should privilege be a reason a child learns to read, and that's why my son learned to read. I read a paper once and I can't remember the context, but it talked about economic repression and how this. You know, in America we often use oppression, exploitation and slavery to keep people down, and I felt we belonged in that basket and the only way out for many people is because of the extreme privilege not only privilege, we had extreme privilege because at anywhere that journey could have changed and to just leave people there. And then I look at you know the African-American history and you look at the brilliance of the people that have been left behind or who managed to get out, and my mind gets blown away by the quality of person that we leave behind.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, that's when we look at those combined adversities right. There are a variety of adversities that individuals are overcoming simultaneously. That is huge and thank you for being so vulnerable and sharing that, because it's true. I think, if we don't pause to take those moments to acknowledge the privilege that we have and whatever scale you want to rank that on it definitely played a role in terms of overcoming this adversity, for Nicholas, at least in this story story, huge, huge role.
Speaker 3:
Because here's the other extreme. Nicholas, you know, completed his high school in Lubbock, texas, and then he goes to Tasmania, australia, to study and do his undergraduate degree and he wants to do an honours degree and to do that he's got to write at a particular level and I thought he had struggled with that. So we take him to get him tested. You know again, thought he'd struggle with that, so we take him to get him tested. You know again, because you need support to say you've got a problem. On the mathematics and science scale he's from the 85th to the 99th percentile. On anything related to language, phonemic awareness and whatever else he's on the bottom fifth percentile. So that extreme, you know, problem that he has is still there. It's still there and it will stay forever. Now, what was your question? Why did I say that?
Speaker 2:
No, that's perfect. No, that was looking at like the privilege that we have and how that helps in kind of pointing the or penning the narrative, and what that looks like.
Speaker 3:
Yes, and people when they see Nicholas, even today. You know the first thing you do is talk to someone and Nicholas is really can be slow in taking in the information, particularly if it's something you know, a general conversation, and he doesn't have any interest in it. He looks like his acceptable label, second percentile speech, language impaired. And people do say to him well, you know what's wrong with you and they don't see the brilliance and anything else because you're seeing this the stutterer, the incoherent conversation and thinking and sentence structure. It's a problem that lives with him forever, but now he's working within a field that you know. He's working more within his strengths, but it's still there.
Speaker 4:
So you are Louis. I was going to say you're no longer in Texas, so you are in New York. So what's on your horizon?
Speaker 3:
I continue to work with students as much as I can, and I have a grandbaby, so I'm spending time with grandbaby because I don't want my children to be alone in this. Yeah, you know it's really tough.
Speaker 1:
Mm-hmm.
Speaker 3:
And you know you talk about. Yeah, we were privileged, I was a stay-at-home mother. We can't do that anymore, right? So how do you deal with a child who's got a learning disability?
Speaker 4:
Mm-hmm.
Speaker 3:
You can. So how do you deal with a child who's got a learning disability? I couldn't have come home from work and then dealt with Nicholas, and in fact it took all of my thinking during the day to have something ready to show Nicholas and have for him so that he could do it and feel okay, and then stop it and go on, and then I could think again for another 24 hours. What else do I have to do? So I want to support my children and grandchildren.
Speaker 4:
I love it Because it's too hard. That makes me think about the pandemic when kids weren't able to go to school and you had parents that still some of them had to go to work and then kids were at home and I just think about what happened during that period of time to these children. I don't think we'll see the repercussions of it for years to come.
Speaker 3:
I read an article on that recently, on a mother who was a professor trying to deal with her work and her children. Because you can't do it, it's impossible. So I feel for mothers. I feel enormously for mothers and families who are struggling and who are then forced to trust the system.
Speaker 2:
Right and I think that's such a key piece is there is a tremendous amount just depend on the education system to tell me that they're doing great or they're not. And there was only one moment in my youngest daughter's career education career that I had to step in to be the advocate for her, because there was that the question was posed is there a challenge with reading and do we need to scale back and have her repeat or do some type of remedial reading course? And I said well, this is interesting because we've never been given this information before. We don't see this as a challenge at home and we read at home, and so we again. When we talk about privilege, I said if we see challenges or struggles throughout the year, we'll get a tutor to help in the learning process, but not everyone has that possibility, so they kind of just lean 100% into okay, well, if you say this is the case, then this must be the reality. I'll own that as the truth, and it may not necessarily be the truth.
Speaker 3:
Yes, yeah, I totally agree with that. Yeah, I totally agree with that. And people underestimate you know how long it takes for a child to go from non-reading to reading on grade level and above. One day a week, $20 an hour, I'm sorry. And when I first took my student in Lubbock, Texas, they said to me now how often would you like to teach him? Three days a week, an hour and a half a day. I said I will teach this boy five days a week, two hours a day.
Speaker 4:
Yeah, Because anything less than that we're not going to make progress. Absolutely, right, absolutely. And you think about these households today where typically moms aren't able to stay home. So now both are working. You get home, it's dinner and I just remember doing it with my kids and being able to fit that time in. It's like we have to read tonight and it's a struggle for parents to do it and then throw in being a single parent.
Speaker 3:
A single parent or a learning disability, a significant learning disability.
Speaker 4:
Yes, yeah, and a parent not having the tools to be able to know even how to help their child and assume that the school is giving them the resources and the tools that they need at school.
Speaker 3:
Trusting that, yeah it's an incredibly hard basket for families to be in. But you know, what I don't understand is that if we don't let our children read and write effectively early on, we pay the price down the track, absolutely. We pay it some other way. So why aren't we doing absolute best to teach our children to read and write and make them and give them the social skills that they need to be successful in life? Blows my mind.
Speaker 2:
And Lois, your own personal journey just in your learning and reading and that process for yourself as you're stepping into the role of being grandmother and being there to support the grandkids and your kids. How does that look for you right now? Is it still an intentional practice that you have to take yourself through?
Speaker 3:
No, I read widely, I read and I read academic papers enormously, because you know we've had this switch from reading to science reading now, haven't we? Yes, and I just shake my head because I don't think people realise what research is, and research across a very difficult group of matching. You know you want a control group and experimental group yes, and the test group yeah.
Speaker 2:
I say test, that's right.
Speaker 3:
No, no, you're right, test group you know, and matching them on age. So anything you read is a millimetre forward. It's work for this group of students at this time, in this situation. Then we'll try it with another group and another group. Well, that funding runs out, doesn't it? So every paper you read is only one tiny component of the reading process and trying to account for everything else which you can't do.
Speaker 3:
So the science of reading is a riot to me. But I read academically a lot and I just I read as much as I can, and you know. But I and I read to children as much as I can in my channel. I read to children and I try and share my knowledge. I've talked at reading conferences and at learning disability conferences, because the failure is often so basic and teachers forget about this. I mean, we talked about the word sore, the word to T-O. Students come to me and I say to them give me a sentence with T-O. One mother, 16-year-old child, spent $100,000 on reading programs. I've got two lizards the same T-W-O. You can't read and comprehend if you have failed to understand the word too, and that's where most of my students fail Most not all, but most. It's mind-blowing, isn't it?
Speaker 4:
Absolutely. Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2:
Well, lois, you mentioned this and I'd love for you to share with the listeners that you do read to your audience, and so I know that on YouTube, you offer some reading opportunities. Where can our listeners find more about you? I?
Speaker 3:
have a YouTube channel so you can listen to lots of books. My son does a lot of reading. Listen to books on there and you can hear me talk on there. I've got a website. I'm on LinkedIn. Sometimes I'm on Twitter. That's about it.
Speaker 4:
I'm everywhere.
Speaker 2:
And Facebook that's the other one. And Facebook, okay, formally known as Twitter. We call it X, right, it's now X, yes, formally known as Okay, beautiful. And we will make sure that we drop direct links to all of Lois's contact information LinkedIn, instagram, facebook and then to the YouTube channel as well. And those are. There are videos there that you can listen to Lois and have those experiences. So thank you for putting that out there because, again, it's a free resource, a free tool to anyone that is just looking for a tool, a resource, help, or just enjoyable conversation and listening. Yes, that's for sure, that's it.
Speaker 4:
I love it. I love it and the thing that I wrote down privilege should never be a reason a child learns to read. I just think that is such a powerful thing, and if we will share all of these resources or places where people can find you, because it's needed. It's needed in this world, especially today, especially with what we've gone through and the classrooms getting fuller and fuller. Yeah, it's an uphill battle and you're a glimmer of light, and so I'm grateful for what you're doing and making a difference in this world.
Speaker 3:
Thank you so much. I'm delighted to be talking with both of you and sharing our experiences. Yeah.
Speaker 4:
I love it.
Speaker 3:
I love it that was amazing.
Speaker 2:
A ton of ahas, and thank you, lois, for your work and for the book. We'll also put a link to the memoir as well, so that our listeners can purchase a copy of that if they're interested in that. But to take your own personal journey and make it a mission where you are helping so many other people around the world is huge, so thank you for your commitment and your dedication. It started with Nicholas and here it is trickling worldwide, so thank you, thank you for that.
Speaker 3:
Yes, oh, thank you both. It's just wonderful to be here.
Speaker 2:
Well, my goodness, Well, Pam. I've had a ton of takeaways. We hope the listeners have as well. As we mentioned before, we will make sure that we drop access information and links to all of Lois's contact information so that you can connect with her, learn more about her. If you'd like to learn more about Reignite Resilience and what we have going on in the VIP community, head on over to reigniteresiliencecom or follow us on Facebook and Instagram. We do have a masterclass. That's the masterclasses that are coming up periodically throughout the year, so if you're interested in getting updates about those masterclasses, also head over to reigniteresiliencecom. We have an upcoming class here in the next couple of weeks about goal setting for success, something that we don't necessarily look at in detail Awesome.
Speaker 4:
Thank you Until next time. We'll see you all soon.
Speaker 2:
Bye. Thank you for joining us on today's episode of Reignite Resilience. We hope that you had amazing ahas and takeaways. Remember to subscribe on your favorite streaming platform, like it and download the upcoming episodes, and if you know anyone in your life that is looking to continue to ignite their resilience, share it with them. We look forward to seeing you on our future episodes and until then, continue to reignite that fire within your hearts.