Reading ASSIST Institute - Unlocking the written word... one sound at a time

Louisa Moats, Ed.D., has been a teacher, psychologist, researcher, graduate school faculty member, and author of many influential scientific journal articles, books, and policy papers on the topics of reading, spelling, language, and teacher preparation. After a first job as a neuropsychology technician, she became a teacher of students with learning disabilities, earning Master’s degree at Peabody College of Vanderbilt. Later, after realizing how little she understood about teaching, she earned a doctorate in Reading and Human Development from the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Louisa spent the next fifteen years in private practice as a licensed psychologist in Vermont, specializing in evaluation and consultation with individuals of all ages and walks of life who experienced reading, writing, and language difficulties. She spent one year as resident expert for the California Reading Initiative; four years as site director of the NICHD Early Interventions Project in Washington, DC, and ten years as research advisor and consultant with Sopris Learning. 
Louisa was recently a contributing writer of the Common Core State Standards. In addition to the LETRS professional development series, her publications include Speech to Print: Language Essentials for Teachers (Brookes Publishing); Spelling: Development, Disability, and Instruction (Pro-Ed); Straight Talk About Reading (with Susan Hall, Contemporary Books), and several programs for teaching spelling. In addition to LETRS (Language Essentials for Teachers of Reading and Spelling) a Pre-K-8 reading curriculum series.

Afternoon Keynote:
Anita Archer, Ph.D., recipient of ten Outstanding Educator awards, serves as an educational consultant to state departments, county agencies, and school districts on explicit instruction and literacy instruction. She has taught elementary and middle school students and has served on the faculties of San Diego State University, the University of Washington, and the University of Oregon. She is nationally known for her presentations and publications on instructional procedures and literacy instruction and has co-authored numerous curriculum materials with Mary Gleason including REWARDS PLUS, REWARDS Writing and Skills for School Success. Most recently, Anita wrote a textbook on explicit instruction with Charles Hughes entitled Explicit Instruction: Effective and Efficient Teaching (Guilford, 2011). 

Dr. Maria Elena Arguelles:
Dr. Arguelles is an educational consultant who provides support to states, districts, and schools in their implementation of effective instruction for struggling learners and English language learners. Dr. Argüelles is the co-author of several publications and a consultant to publishers developing programs for struggling readers and English language learners. In addition, she has teaching experience at the public school level as well as at the undergraduate and graduate level. Her primary areas of interest are early vocabulary development, students with reading difficulties, and reading instruction for English language learners.

Concurrent Session Presenters:
Judi Dodson
Judi Dodson, M.A., consults with schools, state departments of education, and school districts on issues related to school change, teacher knowledge, and literacy achievement. She speaks at conferences and gives workshops on topics related to reading intervention and activities that support increasing student achievement, and is a National LETRS (Language Essentials for Teachers of Reading and Spelling) trainer. Judi believes that working to empower teachers with knowledge about literacy can make a real difference in their work and help them change and enrich the lives of the children they teach. Judi worked for 20 years as a special education teacher, working primarily with children with reading problems and, as an educational consultant, conducting diagnostic assessment of learning disabilities. She is the author of Fifty Nifty Activities: Five Components and Three Tiers of Instruction, and is currently writing a curriculum of activities that will enhance oral language skills. Her second book has just been published by Sopris West titled 50 Nifty Activities for Speaking and Listening: for Oral Language and Comprehension. Judi is on the board of the Rocky Mountain Branch of the International Dyslexia Association.

Susan Ebbers, M.Ed:
Susan M. Ebbers specializes in morphological awareness and vocabulary development. She taught primary grades and also intensive reading in middle school and was awarded outstanding middle school teacher and A+ Literacy Leader. She is a national literacy consultant and author of Daily Oral Vocabulary Exercises: A Program to Expand Academic Language in Grades 4-12 (with coauthor Jill Carroll); Vocabulary Through Morphemes: Suffixes, Prefixes, and Roots for Intermediate Grades; and two sequential decodable series that promote vocabulary, morphology, and comprehension—Power Readers and Supercharged Readers. Susan lives in California with her husband and two backyard bunnies. Visit her website Reading Way and explore the goodies at Vocabulogic. This year, her first full-color children’s book was released on Amazon: Jamie’s Journey: The Savannah.

Linda Farrell, M.Ed:
Linda Farrell is a founding partner at Readsters, where she is immersed in the world of beginning and struggling readers. Linda designs and presents workshops, writes books, and develops instructional materials for effective reading instruction. She has coauthored several publications, including Phonics Blitz, Phonics Boost, the Diagnostic Decoding Surveys, Teaching Reading Essentials Program Guide and Coach’s Guide(coauthored with Louisa Moats), and DIBELS: the Practical Manual. Linda was also a National LETRS Trainer for seven years. Linda has been presenting workshops and giving speeches on reading instruction throughout the country since 2000. She taught junior high English and was a high school and elementary school counselor. However, it was only when Linda volunteered to teach adults to read that she understood older struggling readers’ needs for explicit phonics and phonemic awareness instruction at the most basic levels. Linda keeps her skills fresh and innovative by working one-on-one with struggling readers of all ages whenever she has time.

Dr. Vicki Gibson:
Vicki Gibson, Ph.D., is a national educational consultant, author, teacher trainer and speaker. She has been teaching children and adults since 1975. Her areas of specialization include assessing learner’s needs, planning instruction, curriculum development, instructional methodology, and classroom management and discipline. Vicki was a kindergarten teacher and learning disability specialist in public schools for 10 years before opening four private schools for children ages 2–12 years. Vicki earned three degrees, including her doctorate, from Texas A&M University, where she served as a Lecturer and Adjunct Professor for 10 years. She is the author ofWe Can!; I Can Draw; and Letters, Sounds, and Strokes, a phonics program. She is the co-author of Treasures, a reading program; Differentiated Instruction: Grouping for Success, a supplemental college textbook; andDifferentiated Instruction: Guidelines for Implementation for presenters of professional development. She continues to write training manuals, administrator guides and booklets to support professional development and help educators change practices in schools. Vicki is the Chairman/President of Gibson Hasbrouck & Associates, an educational consulting group.

Dr. Susan Hall:
Dr. Hall is a consultant specializing in teacher training and early reading. She is founder and president of an educational consulting and professional development company called 95 Percent Group Inc. The company provides consulting and teacher training to districts and schools for Response to Intervention (RTI) in reading. 95 Percent Group specializes in how to use literacy screening data to place students in groups for tiers of intervention, as well as instructional strategies to address specific skill deficits. Susan is a nationally certified trainer of DIBELS® and LETRS®. She is author of Implementing Response to Intervention: A Principal’s Guide;I’ve DIBEL’d, Now What?, and Jumpstart RTI: Using RTI in Your Elementary School Right Now. Susan is coauthor with Louisa Moats of two books, Straight Talk About Reading and Parenting a Struggling Reader, as well as LETRS Module 7: Teaching Phonics, Word Study, and the Alphabetic Principle, Second Edition.

Dr. Lucy Hart Paulson:
Lucy Hart Paulson, Ed.D., CCC-SLP, is a speech and language pathologist and literacy specialist with years of experience working with young children and their families in public school, Head Start, private, and university settings. Currently, she is on the faculty of the Communicative Sciences and Disorders Department at The University of Montana sharing responsibilities for teaching, supervising, research, and service. Lucy presents a unique and broad-based perspective blending areas of language and literacy together resulting in effective and engaging language-based literacy interventions for children. She has provided professional development for a variety of audiences across the United States and internationally. Lucy is the lead author of the Language Essentials for Teachers of Reading and Spelling (LETRS) for Early Childhood Educators; Building Early Literacy and Language Skills, a resource and activity guide for young children; and Good Talking Words, a social communication skills program for preschool and kindergarten.

Dr. Jan Hasbrouck:
Jan Hasbrouck, Ph.D., is an educational consultant, trainer and researcher. She served as the executive consultant to the Washington State Reading Initiative and as an advisor to the Texas Reading Initiative. Jan worked as a reading specialist and literacy coach for 15 years before becoming a professor at the University of Oregon and later Texas A&M University. She has provided educational consulting to individual schools across the United States as well as in Mexico, Peru, Guatemala, Honduras, Jamaica, and Germany, helping teachers and administrators design and implement effective assessment and instructional programs targeted to help low-performing readers. Her research in areas of reading fluency, reading assessment, coaching, and second language learners has been published in numerous professional books and journals. She is the author and coauthor of several books including The Reading Coach: A How-to Manual for Success, The Reading Coach 2: More Tools and Strategies for Student-Focused Coaches; and Educators as Physicians: Using RtI Data for Effective Decision-Making, as well as several assessment tools. In 2008, she and her colleague, Vicki Gibson, partnered to form Gibson Hasbrouck & Associates, with the mission to provide high quality professional development to educators nationally and internationally.

Nancy Hennessy, M.Ed:
Nancy Hennessy, M.Ed., LDT-C, educational consultant and past president of the International Dyslexia Association (IDA), is an experienced teacher, diagnostician, and administrator. While in public schools, she provided leadership in the development of innovative programming for special needs student, a statewide revision of special education code and an award winning professional development initiative. She has delivered keynote addresses, workshops and training to educators nationally and internationally. She has co-authored Module 6 of LETRS, Digging for Meaning: Teaching Text Comprehension (2nd edition) with Louisa Moats and the chapter Word Learning and Vocabulary Instruction, in Multisensory Teaching of Basic Skills (3rd edition). She is a national trainer for Language Essentials for Teachers of Reading and Spelling (LETRS) and an adjunct instructor with Fairleigh Dickinson University. Nancy was recently inducted as an honorary member of the Delta Kappa Gamma Society and is the 2011 recipient of IDA’s Margaret Rawson Lifetime Achievement Award and NCIDA’s June Lyday Orton Award. 

Dr. Joan Sedita:
Joan Sedita has been an experienced educator and nationally recognized teacher trainer for 35 years. She worked at the Landmark School for 23 years as a teacher, administrator, and founder/director of the Outreach Teacher Training Program and Landmark College Preparation Program. She was one of three lead trainers in the Massachusetts Reading First Program. She is a LETRS author and trainer and a founding partner of Keys to Literacy. Joan is the author of several content literacy professional development programs, including The Key Comprehension Routine and The Key Vocabulary Routine.