I’m passionate about helping kids to be successful learners, especially kids who struggle with language, literacy, and learning problems. I have worked with students with both language problems and learning disabilities in both schools and clinical situations, As the original Director of the Graduate Level Special Education/Learning Disabilities Program at St. Michael’s College, I designed and implemented a program focused on preparing graduate students to work in schools to diagnose, assess and provide intervention for students with learning disabilities. I have continued during my career to work in schools as a researcher, observer, practicum supervisor, and resource for professional development of both classroom teachers and special educators.

After having focused on communication disorders during the early part of my career, I continued my own professional development with an emphasis on learning and development by earning a Ph.D. in Learning and Development at the University of Vermont, completed in 1980.

My Ph.D. resulted in an unpublished manuscript focusing on Dx Teaching, titled Learning and Individual Differences. This text describes a way for classroom teachers and specialists, using seven developmentally relevant dimensions of learning, to identify the nature of a learner’s learning challenges.

More recently, along with two other colleagues, we produced a Teacher’s Manual and Student Handbook to address reading comprehension problems of middle school and older students. This work is highlighted on a wiki
http://explorience.pbworks.com/w/page/19411524/FrontPage  It is being updated to incorporate information and ideas related to Common Core Literacy Standards.

A second wiki on “learning to learn” is
http://tinryurl.org/Explorience–learningtolearn.org/

A third wiki is “Grow and Learn” about Language, Literacy, and Learning

http://growandlearn.pbworks.com/w/page/112457719/FrontPage

I also continue to work on 3 blogs
http://wanttolearn.edublogs.org/
https://classroomdiscourse.wordpress.com/

http://frantoomeytalk.blogspot.com/

Curating on Scoopit and Pinterest

Posting on Facebook as Pep Toomey https://www.facebook.com/FToomey/?ref=bookmarks

Frances@Learn21st