About
Who is KS?
The KS in KS Learning Strategies are the initials of Kellie Stoddart Ph.D, the owner of the company. Right now, the company is a solo operation. Kellie worked for 15 years as a public school teacher in Oakland and Albany. Her lengthy experience (& success!) using Lindamood Bell, and other curriculum, sets her apart from others. For nine years, she ran her own reading intervention classroom for the Reading Clinic in Oakland Unified's Special Education Department. Each school year, nine third - fifth grade students with significant reading disabilities received their language arts, math and science instruction in her classroom. During her tenure, Kellie often increased the reading abilities of her students by 2-4 grade levels. The classroom featured Lindamood Bell multi-sensory curriculum, among others.
In 2017, when OUSD closed the Reading Clinic, Dr. Stoddart became a Resource Specialist teacher with Albany Unified. She worked for one year at the elementary school level and 4 years at the high school level. Kellie continued her work supporting the development of students' success in reading, writing and math. She also supported students with organization, study skills and transition to college. Approximately 95% if the students on her caseload graduated from Albany High School. Kellie worked with her students and families with an eye toward developing student independence at graduation, and beyond. Since 2022, Kellie has focused on applying her extensive knowledge and skills with individual students in her educational therapy practice.
Kellie earned her Ph.D in Human Development at the Fielding Institute in 1999 and a M.A. in Organizational Development in 1996. She also has a Educational Specialist credential from the state of California. She is a member of the Council for Exceptional Children and the Association of Educational Therapists. In her spare time, Kellie enjoys walking Berkeley neighborhoods, biking by the Bay, yoga, reading mysteries and baking brownies and other goodies.
What Learning Strategies?
Multi-Sensory & Explicit Instruction
Students who are struggling often need a different way to approach the material. Perhaps they would do better learning to read, for example, with visual prompts or through moving their bodies. These are the kind of learning strategies that Kellie employs to tutor her students. Kellie uses proven research techniques and curriculum like Lindamood Bell LiPS and Seeing Stars, and Read Naturally. She believes in matching techniques and strategies to the level and abilities of the students. She uses techniques from both phonics-based and whole language based curriculum to meet her students' reading and writing needs. For math, she employs the techniques of Marilyn Burns. Kellie has seen how explicit instruction and a consistent approach builds student confidence and success.
Kellie has honed a number of different learning strategies over her 14 years of teaching. Multi-Sensory instruction -- teaching strategies that use different sight, vision, and feeling approaches -- in central to most interventions. Multi-sensory instruction gives students more than one way to learn and make connections.
Examples
Reading: Kellie may employ "air-writing" for students struggling with reading. By writing vowel and word patterns in the air in front of your eyes you create a kinesthetic (feeling) memory in addition to a visual imprint in your brain.
Writing: Drawing pictures, making a list, or utilizing graphic organizers to develop ideas and craft paragraphs and essays. These approaches stimulate different parts of your brain and help make connections.
Math: From the concrete (using manipulatives, such as counters, to add, subtract, multiply, and divide) to the semi-concrete (dots on a page or graphic organizers), Kellie supports the development of mathematical thinking. Practically, for division (& multiplication), this would look like taking a group of 12 blocks and making three groups of 4. This is the concrete stage. Then, we would move to having 12 dots on a page and circling the three groups of 4 that way. Ultimately, students discuss and integrate the patterns they see into more abstract reasoning.