October Recap: Awareness Month 2023

October 2023 made for a very successful Learning Differences Awareness Month. Learning Differences Awareness Month is where we raise awareness for learning differences, share informative resources, and celebrate making strengths count for our bright Spring Valley students.

Over on Spring Valley's social media platforms, we shared information throughout each week of October. Every Monday was "Mythbuster Monday" where myths about dyslexia, dysgraphia, and dyscalculia were debunked. Every Wednesday was "What to Read Wednesday" where some of our favorite titles on learning differences were shared. Every Friday was "Famous Friday" where inspirational quotes were shared from famous celebrities and entrepreneurs who identify with dyslexia, dysgraphia, and/or dyscalculia.

Gallery of social media posts from #LDAwarenessMonth

Lots fun events happened in the month of October! Our lower school classrooms had multiple mystery readers from the SVS Board of Directors including Board President Dr. David Finn and members Hettie Johnson and Dr. Erica Jewel Littleton. Samford University Athletics also read to the fourth and fifth grade classes, and visited middle school in P.E. During Spirit Week, students and faculty dressed up for a variety of different themes including pajama day, student and teacher swap day, favorite character day, decades day, and Halloween costumes for Trunk-or-Treat. CEO of Dunn Construction, Bo Walters, spoke our upper school students about understanding our value and doing everything with excellence. Founder of Executive Landscape Management, Andy Felts, also shared his dyslexia journey.

Gallery of events throughout October

Spring Valley was also represented well throughout the state and region during Awareness Month. SVS Head of School Dr. Laura Fiveash presented on the topic of student and faculty wellness at the Southern Association of Independent Schools conference alongside Eric Gobble (Director of Athletics, The New Community School) and Christy Zawadzkas (Lower School Director, Delaware Valley Friends School.

On October 23rd, Alabama's Certified Academic Language Therapists (CALT) were honored at Governor Kay Ivey's mansion for successfully acquring their CALT credentials. Congratulations to Spring Valley School's Tiffany Borden, Misha Alexander, Angela Gillespie, Anna Levy and Gladys Schaefer on this outstanding accomplishment!

First image: Dr. Laura Fiveash (left), Second image: Tiffany Borden, Misha Alexander, Angela Gillespie, Anna Levy and Gladys Schaefer (left to right)

Two blog posts were contributed by our SVS faculty. Maggie Raburn teaches middle school mathematics and, in her post, she discusses multi-sensory resources for math teachers.

The second blog post was written by one of Spring Valley's speech language pathologists, Abbie Wood. In her post, Abbie shares her recommended routines and habits of successful students.

Link to Maggie's Blog: Resources for Math Teachers

Link to Abbie's Blog: Routines of Successful Students

Lastly, Cedar Creative came to Spring Valley and created this wonderful awareness video that encapsulates what we are all about. You can help raise awareness of our mission to give students with learning differences a bright future, year-round, by sharing this video on social media and within your networks.

Until next Awareness Month, follow along with Spring Valley School Alabama on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and Twitter to be the first to know about resources from our specially trained faculty shared throughout the year!