Multi-sensory Instruction:

We teach using multi-sensory, classical direct, Socratic instruction and dictation, thus teaching through the stronger avenues while remedying any weaker avenues without the necessity of pre-testing. Direct and Socratic instruction includes presenting the concepts through questioning rather than exclusively telling, illustrating those concepts, helping students to practice the concepts, using teaching charts which are created with the students, then assigning and assessing work to determine mastery. Dictation is prominently featured in this method to build comprehension and the requisite auditory and phonological awareness and processing skills necessary for students to think, spell, and write on their own.

The most important component of this program, which enables virtually every learner to learn, is the multi-sensory methodology used to teach it. Each student’s “learning style” is addressed, neurologically, through four avenues to the mind:
• Sight
• Sound
• Voice
• Writing

Students SEE the symbol(s), HEAR the teacher SAY the sound(s); they repeat or SAY the sound(s) an WRITE the symbol(s) from dictated, oral instructions. Thus, the teacher teaches through each student’s stronger learning avenue(s) while, simultaneously, remedying the weaker ones. The instruction is identical for individual or classroom instruction. This multi-sensory technique is used throughout the program to:
• Accelerate the learning process
• Avoid discrimination against any student’s individual “learning style”
• Provide “an EQUAL and OPTIMAL learning opportunity for each student”

Additional Methodologies Used (to replace visual worksheets/workbooks):
• Direct Instruction Techniques (I need your attention; Object of today’s lesson; Why do you need to learn this? Watch me do it. Let’s do it together. Check your work with mine. Now, you try it alone; Practice to mastery)
• Dictation (cognitive skills are developed thoroughly and much more quickly through dictation rather than copying or completing worksheets),
• Illustrating through student-built resource materials (students develop self-confidence & self- esteem when they acquire independent learning skills with the use of resources they understand & which are handy for immediate use),
• Socratic Instruction (Q & A) Student/teacher Socratic dialogue promotes thinking and
analyzing with teachers asking rather than telling.
• Parsing & Diagramming Relates to teaching grammar & syntax through composition, and, orally and kinesthetically through naming the properties of the parts of speech (parsing) and graphically separating them in sentence construction (diagraming).
• Appropriate Sequencing (beginning at speech & oral comprehension levels), allows students to build one skill upon another, always moving from the known to the unknown. They are presented with a limited number of concepts (or information) in a given period of time, then practice them in a variety of ways until they are mastered.

© Riggs Institute