Each New Year begins with new resolutions for many people. Once the newness of the year proceeds, many of us fall back into the old and familiar way of doing things. The resolutions spoken are lost to procrastination. The spirit of procrastination can be overcome with a little work.

Students with learning disabilities are often faced with challenges and disappointments along their journey of pursuing life’s challenges. With each failure, the level of motivation to complete certain tasks is decreased. This lack of success leads to lack of positive self-motivation.

Students with learning disabilities often experience problems with reading. Reading strategies and accommodations can be used to improve decoding skills, increase reading retention and build vocabulary. Simple reading strategies can make reading meaningful and fun.

The potential for learning increases drastically when lessons are driven by purposeful objectives. The objective specifies the desired outcome of the lesson. An objective driven lesson moves the attainment of information to the use of information.

Sharing can be learned with patience and perseverance. It is important to teach children to share at an early age because it is not a natural process. It can be learned by modeling the ideal behavior. Sharing builds social and emotional skills.

Students are often asked to write in the classroom. Writing can be made easy by combining three small steps. Creativity, past experience, and curiosity can spark an interest in writing.

Adjustments to the general education curriculum can be made to accommodate students with learning disabilities. Supports, such as organizational skills, extra structure, and adjustments in classroom activities can be made to provide balance in learning.

Students with learning disabilities are expected to learn material presented in the classroom regardless of their abilities. All children have the ability to learn. Universal Design for Learning can be used to adapt the curriculum in order to accommodate the individual needs of learners.

Prior knowledge is used to make real-world connections to the material that is unknown. All children learn at different rates. They also come into the classroom with various experiences. Prior knowledge can be used to frame the information to be introduced.

Weekly newsletter from the Learning Disabilities site at BellaOnline.com.