READING CLINIC IN GHANA; ALL YOU NEED TO KNOW.
1. Reading Clinic Ghana .What is it and who are they?
Reading Clinic Ghana is an Educational organisation Solving Reading Problems Only. (in other words it is an NGO )
All our activities relate to Reading and nothing else!
In fact, if you can read well, we have no business with you.
We use the best methodology, any available means, any available material to make you or your child read.
We can make every child read, every normal thinking and talking person can read with us.
Unless you can’t talk or a doctor has said otherwise.
It doesn’t matter your age or level. Pre-school, primary, JHS, SHS and many more.
There are those who have gone through several attempts to read and a lot of teachers have tried their best. Most teachers and parents have given up on them.
We will make you read in a minimum period of 12 months or 18months maximum.
2. Why Clinic ?
The term Clinic is defined mostly in 2 ways.
One has to do with Physical health and medicine. The other has to do with organizing short training to help solve specific problems.
We have borrowed all the two because, our concept covers all the two.
We are self-acclaimed reading doctors because, just as a medical doctor examines a patience and finds a way, sometimes pragmatically, to treat the patient without complaining, we do the same in our Solve-The -Reading -Problem process. The medical doctor uses several stages in his/her activities.
Sometimes, they will tell you the truth that they do not specifically have a cure but they will do their best .
Sometimes, a doctor will calm you down when the issue is even more dangerous and assure you that your problem will soon be over.
Medical personnel sometimes organize short trainings to help patients know how to deal with some health issues
My personal physician once told me she would never treat a sick person without first, examining the blood and the body at the laboratory.
We are doing a similar thing. Before we start dealing with your reading issues directly, we conduct a reading Survey to ascertain the issues. To look at the level and to know where to start from. Even when the learning disorders are so severe, we assure you of help. We will give you the guarantee of reading.
So, we are running an Educational clinic dealing with reading issues. Our methodology is second to none. We have tested this for many years.
3. What do you do specifically or what are your activities?
In fact, we do a lot ;
a. We do home tuition
b. Centre tuition
c. Learners own school tuition
d. Reading survey
e. Organising Reading Competition in schools
f. Forming reading clinic clubs in schools
g. Organising Reading seminar and training for facilitators who want to learn how to teach reading
h. Helping schools to embrace the new reading clinic methodology.
4. How do you go about your tuition?
The Advanced Reading Clinic Methodology is for one-on-one-tuition and the newly developed methodology is for two or more .
The Advanced Reading Clinic Methodology is what we use for home tuition, centres and their own school.
It’s designed to solve severe Reading Problems.
We don’t sell out or give out. It’s for our trained facilitators.
All the methodologies were developed from it.
It’s indeed our backbone.
It’s dangerously powerful.
It will make everyone read.
Even when you are not ready. Unless we don’t take you through. It has made students with chronic learning disorders read with ease.
Hundreds, uncountable.
It clears the reasons why you can’t read or learn and then from there you would like and learn yourself.
This is because you would now be able to read to learn and to understand what you learn.
The new Reading Clinic Methodology is meant to attack and to solve reading issues at the Preschool level. That’s if possible, every learner must read before getting to the primary school.
However, if you are unable to read at preschool department or you didn’t even attend preschool, you don’t have to worry. We have developed it up to JHS and even SHS.
It’s like a reading curriculum in a form of book.
It’s simple to us. It’s designed to enable teachers and parents or guardians to continue at home after school hours. We wanted a very simple way for teachers and parents to help solve reading problems within our society. It will help the young and the old. Even parents who can’t read would benefit from the new methodology. When the newly developed reading clinic app is ready, we will perform wonders!
5. How much do you charge ?
We do not have specific or fixed charges or fees .Just like the medical Clinic, unless we examine the degree of the child’s reading problem before we can charge something affordable. That is charges come after diagnosis. It can even be free. It also depends on your choice, either Home tuition, centre or even in your school. The most affordable has been when we are invited by schools to run their children through.
You can also give us a contract. In your school, community, area, district, village, town or region and we will give you the small budget and the time we will finish the assignment.
We are still looking forward to getting support from all angles to be able to make children read free of charge.
6. How many times do you attend to a child ? Within a day or a week?
A minimum of 2 or 3 times. Sometimes, It is not about the number or days that matter. It’s about what we do when we are with the students. We usually discuss the number of days after his/her diagnosis. The diagnosis would determine whether the student needs once , twice or 3 times a week. Like the medical Clinic, it’s after the laboratory results that doctor would be able to determine the number of days or weeks a patient would be in admission .
NB : we do not charge according to the number of days. No! Please, we charge for the problem we going to solve.
If we will come once a week, month or year, that should not be your problem. All you need is to have your child’s reading problems solved .
7. How many hours do you spend on a learner/student within a day ?
This is just like asking a medical doctor that, how many minutes or hours do you spend on every patient?
It’s hard to tell. Let’s not forget that, medically, you may go to see a doctor and he will tell you to go home and rest . It’s sounds disappointing. But only the doctor determines how much medicine you should take . Or how long a treatment should last !
We are running a similar concept. Sometimes, we may attend to a learner for about two weeks. Our trained facilitators ( reading doctors) do know what we do. Sometimes , we spend 10, 15, 20, 30 or 45 minutes on a child. Sometimes, 1or 2 hours.
When we started running this program, l have come to understand why people complain after attending to a doctor that ” he gave me only a paracetamol, the doctor didn’t give me any proper medicine ” sometimes, we want to teach the doctor how to treat us .
That is wrong , in the same way, when you give us your ward, you don’t have to tell us how and when to teach him/her. We are good at what we are doing.
8. Mostly, such children with learning difficulties are very troublesome. How do you control such children?
Easy, simple but difficult! If you can’t control them, you can’t help them. Our strategies work like magic. We teach our facilitators how to control them!
9. Do you cane, insult, slap, kick or shout at them ?
Before you’re assigned to handle a student, you would sign a form indicating that, you will not cane, insult or intimidate or sexually harass a student.
10. How do you monitor your facilitators?
We have supervisors, we have records or forms that monitor the activities of facilitators.
11. Do you do subject teaching?
No, we are purely into reading unless it’s a request.
We are reading doctors and nothing more.
12. What makes your organisation different ?
( 70% psychology). We do 70% psychology.
We work in the minds of the learners. We work on the behaviour, we may use one month working on the psychological aspects of the learner.
We soften the problems using high level psychological games.
13. What makes your facilitators different?
They don’t teach, they help!
They solve problems. They don’t complain. They deliberate, they discuss and suggest. We work as a team! They are at war with reading issues. It’s a world cup affair! They know, if the children assigned to them are unable to read, within the time frame, they have failed.
14. How long does it take a child to be discharged from your reading clinic?
Preferably, 12 to 18 months. After continuous 18 Months and no improvement. You will be asked not to pay again. It means we have missed out target. So we hand the students free after the 18 months. Interestingly, some are discharged within 10 Months depending on the cooperation of the learners and their families because it’s a team work.
15. What has been your fastest recovery record?
The fastest recovery has been 7 months in 2021/2022. Followed by 10 months in 2015 .
The longest however has been 2 years (only one )in 2014 – 2016.
The rest are just normal time frame. And it also depends on how active that child is.
16. Any other record ?
The results have been our biggest records. Over the past 0ne and half decades. Every child we have handled is reading and performing. Even those that could not complete , the little they had is helping them to read.
17. For how long have you been doing this?
We have been doing this for about 17 years. It did not start as an organisation but just home tuition and now it’s an organisation ( NGO)
18. Do you need help?
YES IN CAPITALS! We need money and equipment’s video cameras, cars, volunteers, facilitators and the lots because we have started taking special cases and we are performing there too.
You can pay for the children in your formal school, children in your community, pay for some number of children in your school. Call us and let’s use your school or building as A READING CLINIC CENTRE, If you are an MP, Chief, businessman or woman, anyone with financial support can help us to help the children. We wish we can make all the students with chronic learning disorders read for free. We are making them read in few months. And nothing else. After that we will discharge them and they will enjoy school.
The team has realized that if every child/student can read, the weakest performance in school would be an average student.
In Africa, and in Ghanaian society, many students have committed suicide, dropped out of school, others rendered hopeless and aimless, simply because they could not get the grade their families and loved ones were expecting them to bring home. That is pathetic indeed!
Interestingly, some illiterate have made it in life. So, what level of education do we need?
The picture therefore is clear that, the “most basic Education “that everyone needs is to be able to “read and write.” That is what READING CLINIC GHANA hopes to archive. Many teachers have stigmatized none performing students. Comments from some teachers have psychologically damaged the minds of some students.
Over the past one and half decades, we have come to understand that, every student performs when he or she can read well.
We want these children/students to enjoy going to school. The biggest gift a teacher can offer a student is to make him or her read well. Then they can learn independently to build upon their own.
1. Private Schools are afraid to engage us for several reasons.
a. We may move their students to another school.
That is not true, we want to operate in almost every school. So, if every school is a centre, in what way are we moving the students to another school. Also, we do only reading, not subject teaching.
b. It’s an indictment on the teachers and the school.
They think when they give us the chance to help solve reading problems in the school, it will expose their weakness before the parents. Thus, parents would in the end say “we have paid so much money to you to teach our children and now, you’re bringing in experts to help for additional charges.” In this case parents would be disappointed at them.
Interesting to hear because teachers and school owners are not the reasons why people especially students are unable to read. Reading Problems are like pandemic in Africa. Just because we have not tackled it as a problem. Our concentration has been on subject teaching.
Schools have no room to fear because of another important reason. Currently, most subject teachers are struggling in their everyday teaching because learners cannot read well.
Our role is to make the children read in few months. And nothing more. You read, we discharge you, we don’t do subject teaching. We are rather making it easy for subject teachers to teach.
c . Class teachers are afraid to loose extra- extra classes and weekend classes to reading clinic.
Again, class teachers have no room to fear because, we are only making the learners read and we leave. So, they should just allow us to use few months to solve the reading problems and they can continue with them forever. After all, we are handling only those who can’t read.
And the rest would be available for any form of extra classes
2. Some parents are impatient.
3. Some parents want us to teach in the way they were taught. They have their own method of teaching in mind, if they don’t see it, they find a way for you to stop. That is very sad.
Such parents are mistaken. You are just preventing your wards from this opportunity to read. We have between 12 and 18 months to solve the problems. We also use a methodology. So you have to allow us to operate and see if we can truly make your ward read.
4. Some attitudes and behavioural problems of some students are very alarming, therefore making it very difficult to direct and to shape them.
Some parents doubt if we can actually contain the behavioural life their wards because that has been the main reason why class teachers can’t help them. Some can’t sit or concentrate for 45 seconds. Most of them are very hyperactive. Parents don’t have to worry because, our techniques will work for us . We thank God for the “concentrational chain ”
5. The Reading Clinic Methodology is new in the system, so many parents, head teachers, directors and class teachers doubt if we can really make every child read as we claim. In short words, l would say, we can make every one read. Even adults.
6. Limited number of reading clinic centres and other resources
We need more centres , so that parents would find it easy to find us .
And more Offices as well. We want an office in almost every part of the country especially Accra and Kumasi.
1. What is a reading Survey?
To survey, is to examine, find out, look into an issue, investigate into a person or something.
In this case, a reading Survey is the process of investigating into how good or bad a person can read.
We therefore use some reading techniques to rate that person.
To conduct a reading Survey, you should be at least an English or a language facilitator, related subject facilitator or you must be trained to do so!
2. What are your activities?
Before we start treating anyone’s reading problems we diagnose the learner through, a reading Survey. After all, that is what medical doctors do.
So, as self-acclaimed reading doctors, we also have to examine our reading patient before we correct anything for him/her.
We also conduct a reading Survey in schools. That’s what the survey team is doing mostly.
We rate every student’s problem.
We rate only the problems because, that is what we need to solve.
Problems are in categories :
1. Very severe ….he or she can’t read at all . They can’t even start or they struggle to read even a sentence.
2. They are very close to problem category 1(one) because they also struggle to pronounce. If you give them twenty(20) word, they can pronounce less than 4 or 5 .
3. Here in problem category three 3 , they don’t have much problems . so the serious ones read very well even within 10 to 12 months.
We are looking for three main problems to help solve to allow learners to read well . They are the problems categories 1, 2 and 3 . The rest are normal because with time learners can recover themselves.
4 . What are the benefits of this survey to the learners and their schools as well?
Medically, it’s known as health screening. It helps to know sources and courses of several health problems.
The Reading Clinic survey however will do a similar thing. It will bring out the reasons why there are many good teachers doing their best, yet the children cannot read. The survey would rate how severe or average such problems are. It’s is said that, part of a problem is solved when identified as a problem. The learner now can be assured that his or her problem is solvable.
The school can also explain why some students are chronically not performing though there are very good teachers within. The survey, will give the school an option to tackle when trying to handle academic problems.
Imagine when All 500 students in your school can actually read well. Can you now anticipate their academic performance?
4. Is the process simple or easy?
No! Not at all. Imagine examining every learner thoroughly by using reading techniques. You need to take them through several stages. Some need enough time to prove what they can do.
In fact if you are examining a you need time, commitment, love and patience. You need mental and physical strength. If you don’t diagnose accurately, the reading facilitators wouldn’t know where to start solving learner’s problems.
If you are not careful you would end up given one person’s records to another just like the medical lab.
5. Do you intend to expose the school’s weakness to parents and make them feel they are wasting their time and money in such schools? (Refer to general challenges)
The Reading survey has rather helped schools to know why some learners can not perform. It has helped class teachers to pay more attention to how their learners read .
The Reading survey we have conducted in schools has helped drawn the attention of parents and schools to do more to help make their wards read.
1. The fear of exposing weakness. (Refer to general challenges)
2 . Some Class teachers are afraid feel intimidated, sometimes they feel disrespected.
(Refer to general challenges)
3. Some Class teachers and head teachers think it will expose them .Especially when the survey comes out that most learners in his/her class can’t read. The fear off loosing job. (Refer to general challenges) Additionally, after the survey, we don’t just give reports out. No! We make sure school authorities are made to know why most of the learners cannot read and not teachers fault.
After the meeting with school heads or the authorities, we meet all class teachers and explain the structure of the survey to them. This is because they have been with the learners always so they know them better than we do. So we allow the class teachers to examine the report to agree or disagree before we take to the Office. Class teachers are always made to know that, reading reports does not depict the entire performance of the learner.
Credit : TrendingGhana.net
