Joelle Nappi

Dyslexia Therapist and Structured Literacy Interventionist, Freehold Township Schools - New Jersey

Winning Them Over: Practical Tips for Helping Students and Families Embrace Dyslexia and Adopt a Self Empowerment Mindset

Participants will explore the social-emotional impact of reading difficulty, develop language to talk with families about dyslexia, and get ideas for classroom activities to help students embrace their dyslexia and promote self-advocacy. I will use several videos from Learning Ally and some of the self-advocacy tools on Learning Ally's website. I will offer practical strategies such as the Dyslexia Empowerment Plan. I will also talk about developing strengths and celebrating success through events like the Great Reading Games. 

Joelle Nappi is a Dyslexia Therapist and Special Education teacher in the Freehold Township School District, and Dwight D. Eisenhower Middle School in New Jersey. She earned her Bachelor's Degree in Elementary and Special Education from the University of Delaware and is a Level II Certified Wilson Reading Instructor. She teaches Structured Literacy Intervention and provides literacy support to students and teachers of all grade levels. Combining her passionate advocacy for students with dyslexia and her 20 years of experience with approaches such as the Wilson Reading System, Just Words, Visualizing and Verbalizing, Framing Your Thoughts, and others, Joelle is on a mission to transform literacy practices and ensure that every child can read. 

Joelle serves on I&RS team and from 2012-2019 she served as an elected member of the Board of Education in her hometown of Matawan, NJ. 

Joelle is a past presenter for her district and well as for various organizations such as Learning Ally, EdWeek, Decoding Dyslexia NJ, on topics ranging from assessment, orthographic mapping, phonemic awareness, assistive technology for reading and spelling, and the social-emotional impact of dyslexia in the school setting, the use of evidence-based reading instruction, and translating research to practice. Joelle is currently working on a Master's Degree in the Literacy/Reading Specialist program at Fairleigh Dickinson University. 

Track: Culture of Literacy

Audience: All Audiences

Level: Intermediate