Stephen's Story - Learning Can Be Learned

(Written in 1997)

Read and re-read.  Read and re-read.  That’s what I had done throughout grade school and high school, only to achieve grades below that of classmates who were studying far fewer hours.  And in college, it was necessary to an even greater, physically exhausting, degree.

The problem was incomprehensible to my parents and friends, to teachers (some of whom dismissed me as “functionally illiterate”), and most of all, to myself.  Despite an innovative private grade school and high school, excellent teachers, and more than a few tutors, I just couldn’t seem to learn.

One particular exam in college seemed to define my problems.  It was a biochemistry class in which I had exerted every effort, only to have earned a “C”... a grade at which any self-respecting graduate school or medical school would have balked.  I had done more than the “right things”:  besides never missing class, I had read and re-read the chapter covered by the exam; I had studied my lecture notes repeatedly; I had outlined the chapter; I had even built some of the molecules presented in the chapter with model kits from the bookstore.  In short, I had virtually memorized the chapter and done enough for anyone with intact learning processes to easily “ace” the test.

Seemingly well-prepared, I encountered no direct recall questions on the exam, but rather, four essay questions asking me to apply what I had learned to imagined hypothetical situations.  The result?  A “D” on the exam and a final grade of “C–” in the class.  Essentially, I had been asked to give back the “whole” or gestalt (as it is referred to at the Lindamood-Bell center).  That is, I had been asked to predict, extend, evaluate, and support what I had learned.  The problem, of course, was that I had not learned anything, but had memorized parts while missing the “whole.”

Despite the fact this was my senior year at a very respectable liberal arts college, which was prepared to go ahead and confer a degree upon me, I was determined to find a way to learn.

Fate smiled on me through a meeting and subsequent assessment with a Louisville, Kentucky psychologist.  He was attuned to successful methods in helping persons with learning difficulties, and he referred me to Lindamood-Bell Learning Processes.  Upon arriving in San Luis Obispo, a second assessment confirmed what the Louisville psychologist and I already knew:  I had a lot of work to do.

Four hours a day.  Five days a week.  Ten weeks consecutively.  That’s what it took for me to learn to perceive the motor actions of my mouth and to “make movies” in my head as I read.  Slowly but surely, these two methods, administered by talented and helpful clinicians, helped me make sense of words, then sentences, paragraphs, and finally, whole texts.  For the first time in 17 years of formal education, I could actually learn from what I was reading.  I was not “functionally illiterate” as I had been labeled, and I was beyond the “smart and capable” description applied by parents and friends; I was smart and able.

I was able to accomplish an “A” and a “B” at a college near Lindamood-Bell where I tried out my new-found skills.  Further, I was able to completely turn around previous results on the Medical College Admissions Test (MCAT).  My reading comprehension score, too low on my earlier MCAT to warrant medical school acceptance, went from the 13th percentile to the 85th.

But that was not all.  Seemingly by osmosis, I began to understand and comprehend class lectures and conversations that previously would have left me baffled.  I began to read and enjoy the stacks of books I had accumulated.  I began to write letters to family and friends which, all of a sudden, seemed to be better organized.  I even found myself explaining complicated movie plots to others who missed what was happening in the movie.  I had learned how to learn.

The author James Covey, in his book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, is a strong advocate of taking the things that have changed your life and teaching it to others as a means of reinforcing those things.  Without knowledge of Covey or his very popular book, I embraced this principle.  I wanted to teach the Lindamood-Bell programs to others, to change their lives as mine had been changed.  I was offered a position as a trained clinician at Lindamood-Bell and began helping others become independent thinkers and learners.

After a year, Claudia Chervenak, who is now my wife, joined me at Lindamood-Bell where she also trained as a clinician.  Desiring to return to family and friends in Louisville, we came back and established The Langsford Center.

The Langsford Center is now in its fourth year and has proven to be as rewarding as it is challenging and complex.  In addition to co-directing the Center with Claudia, I have taken a full load of graduate level courses, and achieved my first 4.0 grade.  Claudia has also realized her ambition of earning a Master’s Degree as a Reading Specialist.

Reflecting on my difficulties in learning and the revolutionary turnaround I achieved at Lindamood-Bell, it’s difficult to express my appreciation and wonder at what has happened.  Maybe it’s best expressed by saying I went from being unable to grasp “the whole” of a chapter in a biochemistry text to being a whole person.  I owe a debt of gratitude to Patricia and Charles Lindamood, and to Nanci Bell, which I hope to repay by helping others.

Stephen McCrocklin

Director

The Langsford Center