Fast ForWord Overview

Fast ForWord has very specific exercises designed to build this capacity to perceive speech sounds and then translate that into learning to decode and finally the Fast ForWord programs have built in technology to improve attention skills.

Fast ForWord and Reading Assistant Overview.

We believe practice makes permanent. When neurons of the brain fire together through repeated practice they wire together in networks. When children have learning issues, or learning English as a second language, regions of the brain need extra specifically targeted practice. These regions include the language and reading areas. Students who come from poverty also need to develop or strengthen basic cognitive skills, like attention and working memory that help them learn. "I got an education for kids, believe in education came from a single parent home with all the negative statistics that say that I shouldn’t be here. So I have learned the importance of reading being a high school principal and a high school teacher I saw how the kids came to me and they lacked foundation skills." "We can have negative impacts on the brain’s maturation. Factors like poverty or stress in the environment or even the process of learning a second language. Now when a child learns a second language they not only have to learn the vocabulary they have to learn the sound system for the language, the phonemes of the language." The part of brain that map speech sounds begins in the left hemisphere, later the visual area develops a map for letters. After that, another area will help integrate the speech for sounding out words and reading aloud." "One of the things that neuroscience has done is develop neuroscience based programs that drive the brain the utilize those specific parts of the brain and also the fiber tracts, the big highways that link parts of the brain together to exercise those so they become faster and more efficient and better insulated with something we call myelin." Myelin is an insulating layer, it wraps the axon fiber of neurons that sends information through the brain. Its main purpose is to increase the speed at which impulses propagate along the mylinated fiber with the brains highways. The program that has been developed to do this, is called Fast ForWord. It was developed by neuroscientists, to specifically build the areas that are weak and develop the fiber tracts that link those areas in a deliberate way. "Our students in a semester are, on average gaining 1.72 years of reading which is significant at the secondary level and our students are also 92-95% of them are transferring those skills into the general classroom and actually passing all of their six classes." "As we start the second nine weeks of school, our average across the district from kindergarten to tenth grade is 1 year 1 month of improvement among the 200 students that have taken their pre and post RPI." Fast ForWord has built-in technology that we call glasses for the ears. It takes the different speech sounds of English and fine tunes them. When children struggle to learn to read, it’s like when you lose your cell phone connection. It means some parts of the network is down. "Phonics is the ability to sound words out, depends upon a child’s ability to hear the sounds, perceive them accurately, then be able to map them onto letters." "We have narrowed the achievement gap for thousands of students over the years as a tier 2 tier 3 intervention strategy, it works the best, we have data after data, it shows that narrows that gap and it has been a tremendous asset for those children who have been through the program." Technology can also strengthen memory skills, so students can remember sight words, participate in class discussions, and retain what they have heard and read. Fast ForWord is engaging for K to 12 students because it is similar to playing video games. "So we are really fortunate in that the Fast ForWord program is a game type atmosphere. It doesn’t feel necessary like reading. It is giving them immediate feedback for what they are doing at that moment,exactly to tell them did you make an error, do you need to fix, what can you do better next time?" How else do we know it works? Research at Stanford University and at other major universities showed that Fast ForWord use resulted in fast, enduring positive changes in the brains of struggling learners. Technology, also can help students practice guided oral reading, which is the method that has been proven to build reading fluency. The Reading Assistant program uses the power of speech recognition technology and is the only online reading tool that corrects and supports students as they read aloud. "I am the principal of Highland elementary school, which is a city elementary school in Bristol, Virginia with 188 students who are at 99.4% poverty rating. I feel very strongly about the implementation of Fast ForWord and Reading Assistant and with the implementation in our school at Highland, I am even more a staunch supporter for Fast ForWord because I can see how it scaffolds the learning from the other interventions and it is enabling our students to achieve a greater level." In 2015 after implementing Fast ForWord the 5 th grade reading scores increased from 55.4% to 72.4%. "Seeing some great success stories, some kids do well, test out our products, for some of our students have lost 25%. That’s been the biggest success for them and it continues with them even after they leave." Reading is something that children have to learn, they don’t acquire it naturally and that’s a part of the brain the is very prone and adaptable to reading the kinds of neuroscience based exercises. Fast ForWord has very specific exercises designed to build this capacity to perceive speech sounds and then translate that into learning to decode and finally the Fast ForWord programs have built in technology to improve attentional skills and we have research showing that after students go through the Fast ForWord program they can pay attention in the classroom, to the teacher and learn on demand. To learn more about how the Fast ForWord and reading assistant can help your students go to neuronlearning.com