Specific Learning Differences, What Teachers Need to Know (Second Edition)

• Pages: 272
• 228 x 152mm
• ISBN: 9781839977084

Press Reviews

• Sharon Hodgson MP, Chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Dyslexia and Other Specific Learning Difficulties

  This book is a resource that embraces neurodiversity, supports students and emboldens teaching staff, school administrators and parents to strive for the best for their neurodivergent child. This guidance is key to making schools more equal and diverse places where all children can thrive. Every school should get a copy.

• Bex Tear, Executive Head Fulham School

  A go to guide – readers can swiftly hone in to gain understanding and find practical advice. Diana has curated the information here to be an effective toolkit for supporting a range of Specific Learning Differences.

• Prof. Justin Dillon, University College London

  We have moved beyond seeing neurodivergent students as having specific learning difficulties; it’s much more helpful to recognise specific learning differences. Diana Hudson explains a range of conditions and how they can be manifested. Just as importantly, she gives practical and realistic advice that all teachers and schools can implement. This book provides essential reading for beginning teachers as well as those with years of experience.

• Katrina Cochrane, MA, PGCE, PGDip( Dyslexia) APC, FRSA , Director www.positivedyslexia.co.uk

  Anyone like me who trained as a classroom teacher, will know how little information there is about SEN on training courses. Yet, 3 out of 4 children in each classroom will have a specific learning difficulty. This book is a must for anyone who wants to know how to identify and support those children more effectively. Diana Hudson has a wealth of experience in special needs and conveys this with passion in a book that is accessible to both teachers , teaching assistants and parents.

• Olivera Raraty, Educational Consultant an ISI inspector and former Headmistress at Malvern St James Girls’ School (September 2016 – January 2024)

  Di Hudson’s second edition to her first book Specific Learning Difficulties – What teachers need to know has been neatly updated with a more contemporary title ‘Specific Learning Differences’ which is pitched at embracing neurodiversity in the classroom. As a society we have come a long way in our understanding of brain function and neurodivergent thinking since her first book was published nine years ago: recent scientific advances and understanding about brain differences have gathered pace so this update feels not only fresh but bang on cue. This is a handy, short, well-paced and highly accessible book to dip in out of, that is sympathetic both to the teacher as well as the child. Keeping abreast of all the different types of emerging neurodivergent thinking can feel bewildering to anyone who is not a Special Educational Needs specialist and yet that is what the modern, often time short classroom teacher is increasingly called upon to be. This book offers such well-considered advice on the range of divergence that is child, indeed adolescent, focused and aims to celebrate their specific strengths alongside offering sensible strategies for what can help day to day in the classroom. It contains important new sections on PDA, SPD and Tics and Tourette syndrome (if you don’t know what these mean, the glossary provides a useful definition of terms), a quick check list for helping initially to identify a struggling neurodivergent child, useful tips about the whole school context as well as coping with stressful exam situations. As a teacher and parent of a neurodivergent child, I found this guide wonderfully reassuring and supportive. It is clear that Di Hudson is on a mission to help bridge the learning in the classroom with an environment that supports holistically whether at school, at home or indeed in the workplace. Although pitched for classroom practitioners, this is surely a must read for anyone who wants to be an enlightened and supportive employer, colleague, parent or teacher, as it’s all about how best we can embrace the young person in our midst to build their confidence and personal toolkit to help them make the most of their talents and thinking differences. Given that approximately 7% of us will fall into this category and is not something we ‘can grow out of’, and intelligent employers increasingly value neurodivergent thinkers on their teams for their originality, perspective and balance, it is vital that we get the support right at the beginning in the classroom where it can make such a difference to the ‘confidence, self-esteem and success of the child’.

• Sue Penton-Voak – Chair of Trustees, Adult Dyslexia Centre.

  This book should be an essential handbook is for every teacher. Every learning difference is clearly explained with lots of practical advice about how students can be best supported. Helpful illustrations to accompany the text with interesting quotes from those with lived experience. I love the clarity of this book.