How We Teach

Everything that we do at Lawrence is rooted a multisensory approach. This highly structured style of teaching uses sight, hearing, touch, and movement to help students with dyslexia and other learning differences retain new information, make the connection between what numbers/letters represent, and better understand advanced concepts.

Multisensory Approach for Language Arts

Many parents are familiar with the Wilson Reading System. Much like Wilson, our signature language arts curriculum CodeBreakers, is based on Orton-Gillingham principles and uses multisensory activities to teach the rules of phonics in a step-by-step, explicit process. Each concept systematically builds upon the next and mastery is required. Phonetic segmentation is stressed throughout each lesson giving students exposure to a “part to whole” strategy. Using the curriculum, teachers are able to take students through all the speech sounds and syllable types one by one. Our goal is to get students away from the guessing game.

We also utilize the Lindamood-Bell Visualizing and Verbalizing curricula K-12 to teach reading comprehension.This program helps students to develop concept imagery—the ability to create a “movie” in their mind’s eye as they read. This is the foundation for comprehension and higher order thinking. 

Additionally, we spend time each day encouraging students to write, both with the goal of refining their handwriting as well as becoming strong and fluid masters of the written word. We teach writing using Framing Your Thoughts® Sentence Structure, as well as Step Up to Writing. These are both evidence-based approaches designed to provide clear strategies, methods, and supports.

Multisensory Approach to Mathematics

At Lawrence School, we teach math using a multisensory approach and the Concrete-Representational-Abstract (CRA) sequence. Concepts and skills are taught systematically from simple to complex with review and reinforcement to develop mastery. Just like our language arts instruction, new information is always introduced through visual, auditory, and tactile modalities to ensure students form a deep conceptual understanding of mathematical operations and language.

Mathematical concepts are mastered in a phased process, including: introduction, practice, review, and application. The mastered material then becomes a foundation for future learning. Our careful approach to assessment provides opportunities for teachers to adjust their teaching strategies, integrate support, and otherwise personalize the delivery of the above curriculum.