Struggling Learners: Who are they and how do they learn
Hani Zohra Muhamad
Lead Educational Therapist
This presentation emphasises the importance of literacy intervention for “Struggling Learners” – students who lack formal diagnoses yet require additional academic support. These learners often face challenges mastering essential literacy skills due to factors like learning difficulties, cognitive delays, ADHD, autism, or adverse environments.
Students who read effectively are more likely to succeed, while those who do not meet reading benchmarks struggle with spelling and writing. Mastering reading involves developing phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension, alongside cognitive skills like working memory and sustained attention. This case study focuses on two students with cognitive delays, highlighting their initial struggles with attention, phonemic awareness, and vocabulary.
Interventions include phonics instruction and explicit grammar teaching, using the principles of Orton-Gillingham (OG) and Mediational Intervention for Sensitizing Caregivers (MISC) to build confidence. Weekly monitoring of their progress helps foster positive learning habits. Despite significant challenges, both students are eager to learn and show progress with the right motivational strategies.
