Empowering Dyslexic Learners: Proven Methods for Rapid Reading and Writing Growth with Russel Van Brocklen

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What if there was a proven way to help kids with dyslexia leap multiple grade levels in reading and writing—using strategies most schools never teach? On this episode of Speaking with Confidence, I dig deep into this question and reveal practical answers with the help of a truly inspiring guest.

Today, we’re diving headfirst into the realities of dyslexia—a condition that affects as many as 15 to 20% of learners, yet is still too often met with “let’s wait and see” in schools and by professionals. I have a personal connection to this topic, both as an educator and as someone with ADHD who faced my own hurdles in the traditional education system.

Joining me for this conversation is Russel Van Brocklen, known as the “dyslexia professor.” Russel Van Brocklen didn’t just study dyslexia—he lived it, spending his early years reading and writing at a first-grade level, even into college, before finally learning to read fluently in law school. He’s devoted decades to translating structured literacy research into practical, bite-sized strategies families can use at home. His story, and the successes he’s helped engineer for countless kids, provide a roadmap out of what can feel like an endless educational maze.

We explored Russel’s personal journey—from academic struggle and institutional roadblocks to academic success and expert status. We talk about the specific-to-general approach that flips how most of us were taught, and why it’s the leverage point for learners with dyslexia, ADHD, and other neurodiverse backgrounds. Russel shares real-life case studies, like Casey, a highly motivated fifth-grader who jumped eight grade levels in reading in just six months by leveraging her passion for Theodore Roosevelt.

Here’s what you’ll take away from this conversation:

• The unique brain-based challenges and strengths of learners with dyslexia and ADHD
• Why most accommodations don’t go far enough—and what actually works
• How to use a student’s “speciality” or passion as the engine for dramatic growth in reading and writing
• The “specific to general” teaching method and why it works where traditional methods fail
• Simple, research-backed home strategies that parents can use tonight
• The critical role of writing in organizing thoughts and boosting reading levels
• Why early intervention is key—and how to advocate for your child in a system that may be resistant to change
• How the right support can transform not just academic skills, but confidence and mental health
• Free and affordable resources for families (like dyslexiaclasses.com) and how to access expert help

You’ll also hear about Russel Van Brocklen’s experience working within state governments, pushing for policy change, and training both teachers and parents to make a measurable impact—sometimes in as little as just three hours of training!

By the end of this episode, you’ll have concrete steps for helping the neurodiverse students in your life succeed, and a new understanding of just how much potential every struggling reader really has. If you’ve ever felt like the system is stacked against kids who learn differently, this conversation will give you hope, strategies, and a path forward.

To dig deeper, get your free guide, or connect directly with Russel Van Brocklen,

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Episode Transcript

Tim Newman (00:10):
Welcome back to Speaking with Conference.
Podcast that helps you buildthe top skills that lead to real
results.
Communication, storytelling,public speaking, and showing up
with confidence in everyconversation that counts.
I'm Tim Newman, a recoveringcollege professor turn
communication coach, and I'mthrilled to guide you on your
journey to becoming a powerfulcommunicator.
Today's guest is Russell VanBrocklin.

(00:31):
Dyslexia touches as many as 15to 20 percent of all learners,
yet most families still here.
Let's wait and see.
Russell flips that script.
As the dyslexia professor, hetranslates structured literacy
literacy methods proven mosteffective for struggling readers
into bite-sized actions parentscan use tonight.

(00:52):
Russell, welcome to the show.
I think this is going to be oneof the one of the most
informative conversations I'vehad in a long, long time.

Russel Van Brocklen (01:01):
Thanks for having me.

Tim Newman (01:04):
You know, you deal with dys dyslexia, and it's a
it's a and as the stat says,it's a it's a common um issue,
but we always just kind of brushit under the under the table,
push it off to the side, don'tworry about it.
They'll figure it out.
You know, I and I've got somefamily members who are dyslexic,
and we're getting better at it,but if you look back to where

(01:28):
we started um you know when wewere younger, I mean, heck, you
you said you went throughcollege reading and writing at a
first grade level beforelearning to even read fluently
when you went to law school.

Russel Van Brocklen (01:38):
Right.
So so everybody knows mybackground.
Um, I was never I was supposedto be a bureaucrat in the state
government, New York State.
I was not supposed to be doingthis.
This is the last thing I wassupposed to do.
So what happened to me is Ijust went to college when I
wasn't supposed to.
Um, I was in AP English, I'msorry, sorry, AP American
history, AP European history inhigh school.

(02:00):
I really, I really did well inhistory.
I I just remembered everythingthe teacher said.
I couldn't take notes.
So I get near the end ofcollege and I want to know how
laws are made, not some idea Iwanted to know.
So I signed up for the New YorkState Assembly Internship
Committee.
Internship got accepted.
I show up and I said, I have afirst grade reading and writing

(02:23):
level.
Now, as an actual collegeprofessor, what are the chances
of somebody do passing yourclass with a first grade reading
and writing level?

Tim Newman (02:33):
Zero.

Russel Van Brocklen (02:34):
Zero, yeah, zero.
So they said, This this is notgoing to work.
Right.
So then they went, they theywent up to the speaker's place
and they said, We we have tomake this work.
They got a committee together.
Remember, this is the New YorkState legislature, okay?
Not some private company.
This is the heart of the stategovernment.
And they put me in, they said,okay, we're going to pull you

(02:56):
out of the legislative officebuilding.
We're going to send you to theprogram and council's office in
the Capitol.
I'm the I'm completelysegregated.
They're concerned, and I said,Thank you, because they didn't
know what to do with anundergrad intern.
They've been dealing with gradstudents for 30 years, which was
a real internship.
They had three administrativeassistants who could take my
slop and turn it into things Icould turn in.

(03:19):
Okay, fine.
For the academic portion, I hadto do a major research paper.
All right.
As a professor, what do youthink of this accommodation for
somebody who can't write?
A multi-hour long grillingsession with hours-long Q ⁇ A,
the whole thing took like overthree hours instead of a big
research paper.

Tim Newman (03:39):
Well, it it's it's workable, but if you can't read,
I mean, how are you still howare you gonna still do the
research, right?
How are you gonna be able totake that information and
condense it and understand itand put it back at a high level
that they're looking for?

Russel Van Brocklen (03:56):
That that's because I've been doing it for
years in college.
Uh there are ways that I foundto spike my reading level
temporarily and painfully.
But if I but but asaccommodation for somebody who
can't write, you are sittingdown and listening to an
hour-long presentation, and thenyou're grilling the student for
a couple of hours.

(04:17):
Complete hard question.
Does does that sound like afair trade-off?
Because none of the otherstudents wanted to deal with it.

Tim Newman (04:24):
Yeah, I could yeah, I I could I could do with that.
I mean, I it it would requireheck, it would require me who's
got ADHD to actually payattention.

Russel Van Brocklen (04:33):
Right.
But right.
So that's yeah, so so theprofessor said, yeah, I can we
can do that.
At the end, they recommended 15credits of A- Okay.

Tim Newman (04:44):
Okay.

Russel Van Brocklen (04:44):
So now this goes back to the political
science department at the StateUniversity of New York at
Buffalo.
These were accommodationscreated by at the heart of the
state government.
This is our flagship stateuniversity.
They've looked at theaccommodations and says we don't
like these accommodations.
So here's your 15 credits of F.

Tim Newman (05:05):
Okay.

Russel Van Brocklen (05:06):
No, think about that.

Tim Newman (05:07):
Yeah.
And I I I can already see themy my my wheels working.
Of course, that's what they didbecause they're the State
University of Buffalo.
Nobody's gonna tell me what todo.

Russel Van Brocklen (05:19):
Right.
You know, that's what thespeaker of the assembly and the
whole group can't come up.
Yeah, so I at that point Isaid, I'm tired of the
discrimination.
So I went to uh I went to my uhother professors.
I said, Where do I force myselfto learn to read and write in
grad school so I can teach otherdysleptics?
And they jokingly said, lawschool.

(05:41):
All right, so I went and theywere joking.
I actually went to law schoolto audit.
I walk in.
And it's the and I literallynow I just had to teach myself
to read like now.
And I did.
So then I walk into my secondday of contracts.
Professor Warner, who's adyslexic professor, called on.

(06:02):
And what they do with theSocratic method is that they
will ask kids, like, you know,when you start a semester,
nobody knows anything.
Right.
They would ask questions likeit's the end of the end of the
year, and they couldn't answer,they keep asking questions to
embarrass the kid to get them toadapt as quickly as possible.

Tim Newman (06:19):
Right.

Russel Van Brocklen (06:19):
Well, that didn't happen to me.
What I found out later is whenyou're a dyslectic and you go
into grad school, you own theplace from day one.
Day one or soon thereafter.
So he called on me, I answered.
Everything slowed down andorganized.
He keeps calling on me andanswering.
Well, finally, he starts reallypushing.
I push back, I'm yelling athim.

(06:41):
He's yelling at me.
I'm leaning forward, shoutingas loud as I can.
He's leaning forward, shoutingat me.
Five minutes, ten minutes,fifteen minutes.
He finally had to say, raisehis hands.
Russell, in the interest oftime, I have to stop.
I gotta move on to the nextcase.
You couldn't be any morecorrect.
All right.
My classmates who graduated,they've been lawyers for

(07:04):
decades.
They still can't do that.
So I learned to read within amonth, I learned to write within
a couple of years.
Then I approached the New YorkState Senate and I said, I want
you to fund my research.
And they gave me an impossiblething to go through.
I did it.
And then what they did is wewent to, I want to be very clear

(07:25):
on this because we're talkingabout high school kids here for
who are dyslexic.
We only took the very smartestand the most motivated with
excellent family support goingon to college, college bound,
and we had their best teacher,Susan Ford.
Why?
Because I wanted to see what wecould do with the ideal.
Right.
We took them from middle schoolwriting in 180 sessions, middle

(07:45):
school writing to average ofentering graduate students in
that time period.
They all went on to college,they all graduated, GPAs of 2.5
to 3.6, no accommodations, costto New York State taxpayers of
under $900.

Tim Newman (08:04):
Wow.

Russel Van Brocklen (08:05):
People asked me how was that possible?
I said, because I have eyes andI used the obvious.
This is the top book ondyslexia.
Overcoming dyslexia by SallyShaywitz, second edition.
Turning it to page 78, figure23.
That's dyslexia.
So do you see how the back partof the dyslexic brain has

(08:27):
almost no neuroactivity?

Tim Newman (08:29):
Yes.

Russel Van Brocklen (08:30):
Now, in yours brain, I'm sorry, in the
brains of a typical student isgoing massive.

Tim Newman (08:34):
Right.

Russel Van Brocklen (08:35):
Now the front part of my brain is two
and a half times more active.

Tim Newman (08:39):
Yes.
Okay.
See that?
Right.

Russel Van Brocklen (08:41):
That deals with articulation followed by
word analysis.
I use the graduate recordsexam.
Analytical writing.
Analytical.
Articulation, analytical, tome, same thing.
All right.
Now that is what made it workthere.

(09:02):
But then we had to do thingswith normal kids.
And it that wouldn't work.
Okay.
I presented those results inNew York City in 2006.
What do we do to get normalkids ready for college?
I'm going to give you anexample of a kid, my most
successful case for this agegroup.

(09:24):
I want everybody to know Inever saw this before.
I will never see this again.
This is a one-off, supermotivated kid.
Okay?
Her name is Casey.
I met Casey when she was infifth grade at the end of the
end of fifth grade.
She was she turned 11 over thesummertime.
She was really interested inTheater Roosevelt.

(09:46):
So I so remember I said aboutthe speciality.
Until the kid is at gradelevel, you have to use their
specialty, the area of extremeinterest and ability.

Tim Newman (09:57):
Right.

Russel Van Brocklen (09:57):
Casey was interested in this guy, Theater
Roosevelt.
So I assigned her the rise ofTheater Roosevelt.
This is the book.

Tim Newman (10:05):
Okay.

Russel Van Brocklen (10:08):
Wow.
That's right.
What grade level would you callsomething like this?

Tim Newman (10:12):
I'd say 12th grade or above.
Honestly.

Russel Van Brocklen (10:15):
Okay.
College professors say firstyear college.
Okay.

Tim Newman (10:18):
Okay.

Russel Van Brocklen (10:19):
High school teachers will say 10th to 12th
grade.
All right.
I'm going to call it 10th gradeto be conservative.
All right.
Casey said she wanted to read,to learn reading.
I said, I do writing first,reading second, because if you
can write it, you can read it.
She says, No, I want to doreading.
I said, okay, I modified theapproach.
I said, there's no way you'redoing this.

(10:40):
Well, you haven't met Casey.
So I started with Casey duringthat time.
I said, yeah, do this 20minutes, 30 minutes a night, you
know, not all the time.
She is in her room two to threehours a night doing this.

Tim Newman (10:55):
Wow.

Russel Van Brocklen (10:56):
I literally had to go to her principal to
say, teachers can't give herhomework.
Because he said, I he knew heinstantaneously got what we were
doing.
He said, Okay, you're solvingthis.
We want her fine for middleschool.
He made the order.
All right.
Six months later, she's in asilent reading class.

(11:18):
Kids come over, get her book.
They can't get past the firstparagraph.
She's finishing up that book.
She can read the entire thing.
She knows every definition ofevery word there.
She jumped eight grade levelsin six months.
Her parents could afford tohire me for fifty for an hour a
month.
So I was working with her 15minutes a week.

(11:39):
Wow.
This is not typical.
But when I say a 10-year slash11-year-old girl jumped eight
grade levels in six months, somepeople say it's not possible
they can.
Now, here's what you need tounderstand.
I had to focus on herspecialty.
But just for the heck of it, Italked to her mom and I said,

(12:03):
She's the most motivated kid Iever met.
What happens if I give hersomething she hates?
Here's the most popular bookthat I use Walt Disney, The
Triumph of the AmericanImagination.
But a thousand pages becausepeople want to know what the
Disney magic is.
It's two universal themes.
Casey said, I hate this book.

(12:23):
And after we worked on it for awhile, because her mom was kind
of laughing because she's like,Yeah, she really doesn't like
that book.
I said, Okay, Casey, how muchdid your motivation drop here?
She said, Half.
I hate it.
I said, Okay, you're done.
She took him, threw it in thegarbage, and she ripped it up.
Key point for parents.

(12:45):
When you're you know how I likewhen you're teaching college,
especially with the first twoyears, they're going over all
these subjects, the same thingin high school.
Dyslectics and EDD and ADHDkids just want to specialize.

Tim Newman (12:59):
Yes.

Russel Van Brocklen (13:00):
Doctoral stuff.

Tim Newman (13:01):
Yes.

Russel Van Brocklen (13:02):
But we have to do this general.
So the most motivated kid inthe world, we're down 50%.
Typical kids are down 75-80%.
Next thing that that I found, Ithis is for me talking to your
peers who are severelydyslectic.
What I found is we have tofocus, we can't ask them this

(13:24):
question, a general to thespecific.
Because that's how yougenerally teach big picture,
then details.
Yes.
Well, if you ask them thisquestion, what effect did Martin
Luther King's famous I Have aDream Speech have on the
American Civil Rights Movementsin the 1960s?
Your kids would just take thatand run with it.
They don't need to ask you aquestion, they just go and write

(13:45):
the paper.
Right.
Dyslectics, it's like grabbingfog.
There's nothing to grab onto.
We need to learn from thespecific to the general.
So I want you to imagine we askthis question what personally
compelled Martin Luther Kate towant to give his famous speech?

(14:06):
We look up in his biography, wefind the answer.
That answer gives us aquestion, which we answer, which
gives us a question, which weanswer.
That forces us to that thatforces us to organize our
thoughts by using writing as ameasurable output.
Okay.
So again, that forces us toorganize our thoughts by using
writing as a measurable output.

(14:29):
Now, if you ask a dyslectic oran ADD or ADHD, you said you're
ADD or ADHD?

Tim Newman (14:37):
ADHD.

Russel Van Brocklen (14:38):
Okay, so am I.
I'm gonna ask you a question.
First of all, what's yourspeciality?
What's your area of extremeinterest and ability?
It could be anything.
Oh wow.

Tim Newman (14:47):
Um this is the first thing that comes to your mind.
Um creativity.
Creativity, yeah.

Russel Van Brocklen (14:54):
Okay, so when you're thinking about
creativity, do you have ideas ornow or in the past where you
have ideas flying around yourhead at light speed?
Yes, key question, but withlittle to no organization.

Tim Newman (15:05):
Yes.
Okay.

Russel Van Brocklen (15:07):
So what the solution is, is we have to
force your brain to organizeitself by using writing as a
measurable output.
Okay?
Does that make sense?
So now I'm gonna ask you aquestion to see if you're if
you're really dyslectic.
So you're thinking aboutwriting about creativity.
Okay, fingers, keyboard.

(15:28):
Fingers, keyboard.
The ideas in your head that youwant to write about, you take
your fingers, you put them onthe keyboard.
Does the idea fly out of yourhead, leaving you with an empty
brain?
Sound familiar?

Tim Newman (15:38):
Yes.

Russel Van Brocklen (15:39):
Okay, yeah, you're probably dyslectic.
Okay.

Tim Newman (15:44):
Okay.

Russel Van Brocklen (15:45):
Don't you do do you find that it's kind of
weird that I knew that aboutyou?

Tim Newman (15:49):
I I it's creepy.

Russel Van Brocklen (15:54):
I I the kids are like, How did you know?
And one of the parents, I justwent over the questions ahead of
time because their son wasreally serious.
I'm just gonna call him John.
Not his name, just protect hisidentity.
They said, Well, John, we havehidden cameras in the ceiling.
He's like, Where?
Where?
And the parents almost fall outof their scenes laughing.

(16:18):
And I said, Uh, John, I knowthis because I went through this
when I was your age.
Really?
Yes.
Okay.
Let me ask you this question.
Were you ever in elementaryschool threatened to be held
back because you couldn't passsome test?
Yes.
Okay.
So when that happened, let meguess, it was probably around

(16:42):
third grade, fourth grade.

Tim Newman (16:44):
It was second grade, actually.

Russel Van Brocklen (16:46):
Okay, so second grade.
So what they told you was ifyou can't do this academic task,
we're gonna hold you back,you're gonna miss your friends.
Yeah, well, this is well, thisis what's gonna happen.
You're gonna miss the yourfriends, they're gonna move on,
you're gonna be put withstrangers, and this gave you a
huge amount of mental distress.

(17:08):
Yeah.
And then it got so bad, it youknow, you're like, I you were
literally like somebody almostput a proverbial gun to your
head.
You were going crazy trying tofigure out a solution.
You put so much pressure onyourself that it was actually
probably clinically dangerous.
And then the idea came to youand you passed you passed.

Tim Newman (17:30):
Yeah.

Russel Van Brocklen (17:31):
Sound familiar?

Tim Newman (17:31):
Yep, absolutely.

Russel Van Brocklen (17:33):
And that happened so many times that by
the time you reached highschool, this was just like
second nature.

Tim Newman (17:39):
Yeah, and and you know, I don't really talk about
this really at all.
I I'm not even gonna say talkabout it look, I don't talk
about it at all.
You know, when I barely greatbarely graduated high school,
okay.
And understand I was a collegeprofessor and all these other
things.
Barely graduated high school.
Um when I started my doctoralprogram, is when I was the first

(18:02):
time that I ever truly reachedout for help because there was
so much reading that I had todo, I couldn't do it.
Because I I was never taughthow to read.
Let's just put it that way.
And I was married at the timeand and my wife is a is a high
school teacher.
I said, Look, I'm I need help.
I can't do this.
And she taught me, she taughtme how to quickly read for

(18:24):
comprehension, um, to which gotme through.
And it was after I graduatedand got my doctorate that I went
and got tested for ADHD.
So I didn't start taking anytype of medication or get any
type of therapy, airfringer'squote therapy, until I was
mid-30s.

Russel Van Brocklen (18:42):
Okay.
Okay, but this is what I thisis really important.
So we're talking about about uhhigh school college kids.

Tim Newman (18:48):
Right.
Okay.

Russel Van Brocklen (18:49):
Remember when I asked you about ideas
flying around your head at lightspeed, but with little to no
organization?
Yep.
Do you found it kind of weirdthat I knew exactly that about
you?

Tim Newman (18:57):
Absolutely.
It's creepy.

Russel Van Brocklen (18:59):
Did you find it was even more creepy
when I said fingers keyboard,the idea flies out of your head?

Tim Newman (19:04):
Yeah, yeah, and truth be told, okay, my keyboard
is sitting on my desk.
What I did when you startedfingers keyboard, I put my hands
under under the desk.
I didn't even want to comeclose to the keyboard.

Russel Van Brocklen (19:18):
Because the idea that I knew that the idea
flew out of your head, let'sadmit, that's really creepy,
right?
It is now, and even morecreepy, I told you third, fourth
grade, it was actually second.
I told you exactly whathappened.
Yep.
That this was that when we'retalking about this level of
stress that you put under, whenI mean this was clinically

(19:40):
dangerous, looking back, can yousee how if if this was today
and people knew what you wereputting yourself under to pass
that test, they might haveliterally thrown you into the
mental emergency room.

Tim Newman (19:55):
Yes.

Russel Van Brocklen (19:56):
Okay.
Do you find that it's reallyweird that I That I could tell
you exactly that.

Tim Newman (20:02):
Yes.

Russel Van Brocklen (20:03):
Okay.
I I need parents to understandwhat's happening here.
Okay.
Because when I work with thekids that are, you know, these
are very highly motivated, veryhighly intelligent kids.
All right.
When I say back the answer yesto the first two questions, then

(20:23):
I'll ask that third one.
It's what I call their secret.
They don't want you to know.

Tim Newman (20:28):
Right.

Russel Van Brocklen (20:29):
I have literally had pet kids tell
their parents, get out, someusing foul language.
All right.
And then I tell them that andI'd go into even more detail.
And a lot of times they startto cry because they desperately
don't want their parents to knowwhat they put them through.
They literally will say tothemselves something to the

(20:50):
effect of, if I don't pass this,my parents won't love me
anymore.
My friends will hate me.
They'll leave me.
And the that stress, thatextraordinary amount of
irreputable stress, thentriggers an epiphany.
And the solution presentsitself.

(21:10):
Basically, it happened in yourcase.
No, I'm talking about back whenyou were in second grade.

Tim Newman (21:25):
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Remember what I said?
You had to pass the test.

Russel Van Brocklen (21:28):
I had to pass the test.

Tim Newman (21:29):
Right.
Right, right, right, right.

Russel Van Brocklen (21:30):
And because of that extraordinary pressure,
the epiphany came and you youpassed.
Yes.
And that happened so many timesit became normal.

Tim Newman (21:39):
Over and over again, right.
And I I attribute it to justfiguring it out.

Russel Van Brocklen (21:43):
Right.
But that's not what happened.

Tim Newman (21:45):
Right.

Russel Van Brocklen (21:46):
What was happening is, because I've
studied this for 20 years.
What has happened is when youwere doing this, you were
essentially doing doctoral levelwork when you were seven years
old, eight years old.

Tim Newman (22:01):
I knew I was smart.

Russel Van Brocklen (22:02):
Here's what I mean by doctoral level.
You had to pass that test.
Right.
Nobody could help you.
The solution presented itself,you passed.
You created knowledge thatallowed you to make a
significant gain, and it worked.
To me, that's grad level work.

Tim Newman (22:18):
Yes.

Russel Van Brocklen (22:19):
Does that make sense?

Tim Newman (22:20):
Yeah, I'd agree with that.
Absolutely.

Russel Van Brocklen (22:22):
Okay.
Yeah.
When you were seven or eight.
So then by the time youfinished college and then you
walked into your grad your PhDprogram, how long did it take
you until you generally had theidea that was the crux of your
dissertation?
The thing that the just theidea that could that made it a

(22:45):
real contribution.
What how long did that take foryou to develop?

Tim Newman (22:50):
Not long.

Russel Van Brocklen (22:50):
I mean it's like for professors generally
tell me the first day or soonthereafter.
Yeah.
In your case?

Tim Newman (22:57):
Yeah, it's yeah.
And you be and here's it wasabout how academic success.
That's what it was about, too.

Russel Van Brocklen (23:08):
But once you had that idea, did you
notice everybody treated youcompletely differently?

Tim Newman (23:13):
Yes.

Russel Van Brocklen (23:14):
Now you were the star of the show
because your idea was reallyworth something.
Now you just had to go throughall the other PhD stuff to
develop it, write it up.

Tim Newman (23:25):
Right.

Russel Van Brocklen (23:25):
Which is for the gen ed people, the easy
spot part.
They can't come up with theidea generally as well as we can
coming up with that.
So so for me, I didn't have allthat time.
I did mine in less than twoweeks.
I got the professor to writeout excellent A within less than
two.
Why?
I didn't have the time.

(23:46):
I was involved in theuniversity-wide business plan
competition.
I got 15,000, and then I usedthat to test a bunch of kids,
and then I got funding from thestate.
Okay.
So I I had less than 14 days tomeet the professor to get his
approval.

Tim Newman (24:02):
Wow.

Russel Van Brocklen (24:04):
Okay.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So but but but here's what Iwant everybody to understand.
So when you so in general, didyou ever have a professor that
taught from taught you from thespecific to the general, ever in
your education?

Tim Newman (24:22):
No, not no.
Because that that would thatwould have stood out to me.
But so no.

Russel Van Brocklen (24:28):
As generally, people like us, your
peers who made it, you know,they said when they had the
people that taught from thespecific to general, they
learned so much more.
So that's what I'm doing duringthe intervention period.
And the other thing is thefront part of the brain, I flip
that to most kids.
I do word analysis followed byarticulation.
But how does this work?

(24:49):
So for most kids, what I needyou to understand is I use a
book called The Craft ofResearch.
And this is what everybodyshould understand.
Um, the craft of research tellsyou how to find context, put
everybody up, put get everybodyon the same page, come up with a
problem statement, then come upwith a solution to that problem

(25:10):
where you try to come up withsomething original.
And when we talk pre-show, yousaid the kids should know how to
do that in high school beforethey come to college.

Tim Newman (25:19):
Yes, they should.

Russel Van Brocklen (25:19):
Tell me, tell me why you strongly feel
that way.

Tim Newman (25:22):
Because if to to be able to graduate high school and
come into college and besuccessful, number one, you have
to to know how to think, youneed to know how to take
information, process it, andthen be able to communicate
that.
And if you can't, if you can'tdo that, because theoretically
the the pace at the collegelevel is is so much quicker, and

(25:46):
we're depending on you to to dosome work on your own to be
able to understand thoseconcepts and be able to apply
them.

Russel Van Brocklen (25:52):
Okay.
So let me is as I was told ingeneral the difference between
high school and a real college,where you actually teach like a
college, yes, is they will dotwice the work, they will do in
one semester of college whatthey do for a year in high
school, and you're only meetingfor 45 sessions.
So you're meeting like half thetime.
Right.
Okay.

(26:12):
Correct.
So what I do is for context, Ishow you how to write.
Uh I show you how to write, Ifind a quote, and we answer who,
what, when, we're how why.
This is what I do with theelementary school kids.
Okay.
So can you see how I get me aquote and I discuss who, what,
when, we're how why, and kind ofgiving you a version of

(26:33):
context.
Okay.
What's the effect on that?
Taught Reed, taught Reed'smother how to do this over a
little under six months.
Okay.
How um 15 minutes a night foruh seven nights out of the week
or an hour and a half a week,roughly.
He went, he jumped not two totwo and a half points for the
for half the school year, likehe was supposed to, he jumped 20

(26:55):
points.
He went from the 11thpercentile to 65th percentile in
reading, fourth percentile tothe 64th in writing.
In class, doing fine.
Now, once he can do that, weneed my next step is we do body
paragraphs.
I call it senior year of highschool.

(27:15):
We'll see what you call this.
What I do for the bodyparagraphs is we want I want to
give them enough to pass thestate assessment.
So in New York State, it's thestate regents exam.

Tim Newman (27:25):
Okay.

Russel Van Brocklen (27:25):
We use two quotes per paragraph.
For each quote, I try to tellthem look at for that piece
something from the beginning ofthe story, one for the end, get
a lot of quotes for thatuniverse.
We give them a universal theme.
They find the two quotes.
What's the best one?
And then what I do is I add awarrant, which is a which is
from the craft of research fromthe University of Chicago, what

(27:48):
it basically means is it takesthe facts and it connects the
facts to the topic sentence inan analytical conversational
way.
Yep.
And I use two of those plus afew other steps.
Would that be enough, in youropinion, to get the kids to pass
their high school final Englishtest for for, I mean, just

(28:08):
passing it?

Tim Newman (28:10):
It should be.

Russel Van Brocklen (28:11):
Okay.
Now, once we do that, now wehave to come to a solution.

Tim Newman (28:16):
Right.

Russel Van Brocklen (28:17):
So when I'm doing the solution, uh, you
may, may or not like this.
And if we discussed this beforeat any time, or am I giving
this to you brand new?

Tim Newman (28:26):
You're you're giving it to me brand new.

Russel Van Brocklen (28:29):
Okay, so here we go.
So when I'm doing that, therehas been a big change in the
hiring market now.
The companies want you to beable to go in and play with the
$200 version of the artificialintelligence when you start now,
when you're out of college.
That's their demand.
So I'm using that here.
And what we do is when we'reusing the PhD version, we're

(28:52):
coming up with a solution.
But I'm going to use Itypically do this for English
class because that's the biggestweakness of a dyslectic.

Tim Newman (29:00):
Okay, yeah, I that's makes sense.

Russel Van Brocklen (29:03):
Okay, so I want you to think back to high
school.
What's a book that everybodyreads that you still kind of
remember?

Tim Newman (29:10):
Oh, yeah.
Oh boy.
The uh the the Iliad?
Um the Iliad?

Russel Van Brocklen (29:21):
Okay.

Tim Newman (29:21):
Yeah, that's one of the Iliad.
Yeah, that's when we weresupposed to read.
We were supposed to read that.

Russel Van Brocklen (29:26):
Yeah.
Yeah, homework, right?
Yeah.
So so what do you think thechances of a student writing
something completely original onthe Iliad?

Tim Newman (29:36):
Almost none.

Russel Van Brocklen (29:37):
Okay.
I show people how to do thatevery time.

Tim Newman (29:41):
Wow.

Russel Van Brocklen (29:42):
And I'm not talking about high school, I'm
talking about grad school.
Wow.
Now, this is why.
How is that possible?

Tim Newman (29:50):
How is it possible?
Yeah.

Russel Van Brocklen (29:51):
Just be I want you to imagine, imagine
you're taking you're a sciencekid.
And do you know how freshman uhuh calculus-based physics,
you're using those graphicalcalculators?
Yes.
You're not doing the mathanymore on your own, but you
know how to do it or you can'tdo it.

Tim Newman (30:08):
Right.

Russel Van Brocklen (30:09):
So would it would it surprise you that when
I took calculus-based physics,people asked, well, the rich
kids can use the graphicalcalculators.
Can we bring in our notes?
And the professor said, Youknow what?
Bring in your notebook.
I'll give you eight hoursinstead of three.
All right, it's not gonna makeone iota of a difference because
in engineering, in science, ifyou can't apply what you've

(30:31):
learned, it doesn't matter.
Doesn't matter.

Tim Newman (30:33):
Doesn't matter, right?

Russel Van Brocklen (30:34):
Okay, so what I do is I'm now using the
craft of research and theartificial intelligence, the pro
version.
And yes, it's $200 a monthbecause it takes five to 30
minutes to do anything.
Okay, and I and we do we gothrough at least five or six
drafts.

(30:55):
Okay, and you're now guidingthis thing, and it's doing the
grunt work because you alreadyknow how to do the grunt work,
and at the end, you're left withan essay that is truly
original.
That's what I show people.
Okay, and you can go andremember what we mentioned you
should know have these skillsbefore you go to college?

Tim Newman (31:16):
Yes, absolutely.

Russel Van Brocklen (31:18):
Would it surprise you that no private
school in New York City doesthis?

Tim Newman (31:26):
Um no, it would it it it would not surprise me
based on one students have had.

Russel Van Brocklen (31:35):
Right, but I want but when you think these
are the most competitive privateschools on the planet, and
they're not doing this craft ofresearch thing.
And you expect the kids to comein from high school doing this,
how do you explain this bigdisconnect?

Tim Newman (31:56):
Well, I d what there there's there's two two ways.
I I number number one, I Idon't think that I I think we've
gotten away from from truly uhteaching because of all the
automation that we have, right?
And it's there there's no pushto uh to actually um make it

(32:20):
happen because like you said,whether it's AI or w whether
it's Google, I mean you couldGoogle anything, you you and
just we'll just do that so wedon't necessarily have to push
them to do it, and it's not it'sthe there's so much pushback
from pushing them to do it, it'snot worth the the time and the
effort.
We'll just accept it and letthem move on.

Russel Van Brocklen (32:39):
Okay, so just from a practical
standpoint, I want you toimagine you're back work.
Uh you said you worked atGeorgia Tech.

Tim Newman (32:47):
George Georgia State University.

Russel Van Brocklen (32:48):
Georgia State, okay.
So you're you're Georgia State.
Let's say you're going backthere.
A kid comes in, freshman, yourfur, you know, your freshman
class, and they write a paper,and you're like, I actually
learned a little something,nothing groundbreaking, but you
actually learned something thatwas reasonably substantive on
some little small area, and youstarted, and the papers kept

(33:11):
going like that.
Does that kid now have yourattention?

Tim Newman (33:14):
Yes.

Russel Van Brocklen (33:15):
Okay.
Now, as we all know, going intohigh school, going into
college, the admissions officerules, but going into graduate
school, would you agree with methat for most kids, a college
four-year degree is not theoptimum anymore?
A PhD is a bit too specific.
It's usually the master'sdegree, master's degree, right?

Tim Newman (33:34):
Yes.

Russel Van Brocklen (33:35):
How important is uh very having a
professor picking up that phone,calling the department chair of
where the kid wants to go andsaying, I I really recommend
this kit.
I'm not writing arecommendation letter.
I'm telling you you ought totake this kit.

Tim Newman (33:53):
It's it's it's that's gold.
That's that's gold.

Russel Van Brocklen (33:57):
Okay.
Does that override pretty mucheverything else?

Tim Newman (34:01):
Yes.

Russel Van Brocklen (34:02):
Okay.
So a kid to get that level ofcommitment from you as the
professor is to come in and tolearn something almost every
paper to go through that actualprocess.

Tim Newman (34:13):
Yes.

Russel Van Brocklen (34:14):
Okay.
How often in your career as aprofessor teaching
undergraduates, how manyundergrads could do that?

Tim Newman (34:23):
Oh, wow, over 25 years, less less than less than
100.

Russel Van Brocklen (34:27):
Less than 100.
Now, the ones that could do it,did they ever come and ask you
for a recommendation?

Tim Newman (34:34):
Yes.

Russel Van Brocklen (34:35):
What happened when you recommended
them that you get in?

Tim Newman (34:39):
Yes.

Russel Van Brocklen (34:40):
Okay.
What everybody needs tounderstand.
I remember I had a professor.
His name was uh ProfessorBarnett, he was the chair of the
communications department, SUNYCenter of Buffalo.
He called up at a topuniversity, said, This is my my
student.
I'm recommending them, youknow, fund them.
Get I'm telling you, this is,and they said, Okay, okay, we

(35:03):
I'll take care of it.
Because the admissionscommittee didn't like it for
some reason.
He and he got upset and got onthe phone.
He said, This is what myrecommendation is worth.
They they knew him very well.
That's how important this is.
So everybody out there, this iswhat you need to do in high
school so you can do this incollege.
Right now, even if the kid wentthrough the process, but you

(35:27):
didn't really learn uh somethingnew every time, but you could
see they went through thatprocess.
Does that still kind of count?

Tim Newman (35:33):
Uh it that that counts almost as much because
you know, because you you cansee that they're working, you
see that they're applyingthings, and you and you see them
improving.
Because even if they don'tlearn something every paper,
every assignment, you still seethat improvement and that desire
to uh to to get better.

Russel Van Brocklen (35:53):
Okay.
So what I'm just trying to tellpeople is they're not going to
teach this to you in highschool.
They're not going to teach youthis at an elite private school.
I know because I've done myhomework.
What I'm telling you is I showparents that it's not like you
need some expensive tutor.
Parents can teach this to theirkids, even if you haven't gone

(36:14):
through this.
I've taught parents with highschool diplomas to teach their
kids this.
It just takes a bit longer, andthat's fine.
All right.
So, what I'm just trying to sayis this is something that I've
been doing for the past 20years.
It's not that hard to do onceyou sit down and work on it.

Tim Newman (36:30):
So, so how how how does it work?
Because uh again, I I'm numberone, I'm I'm blown away having
this conversation.
I'm uh to to begin with, howdoes it work?
Because to me, and maybe thisis the first time I'm here, and
because it makes so much senseto me, it to start with the
specific.
That's to me, that's just whatis just what makes sense when

(36:53):
you're dealing with a littlekid, right?
Start with something specificthat they like.
Why why would you start withsomething that they they don't
like?
And you you see where I'm goingwith that, right?

Russel Van Brocklen (37:04):
Yeah, I I I see exactly where you're going.
And why is it I've been trying,just so everybody knows, we met
on podmatch.com, which is thebiggest matching service.
There's 4,800 guestsapproximately.
I was number one last month,I'm the number one this month
doing this very niche area.
Uh- all right.
I'm trying like this month, I'mdoing like literally 50

(37:25):
podcasts.
I'm trying to get the word outbecause it's just so impossible
to get get into the publicschool.
So for so, for parents, if youwant to know how to do this,
simplest thing, just go todyslexiaclasses.com.
That's dyslexiaclasses with anSplural.com,
dyslexiaclasses.com.
There's a little button therethat says download free guide.

(37:46):
Click on it, you get a reportthat says three reasons your
child's having trouble at schooldue to dyslexia.
Just fill that out.
Most important thing, justclick on the the calendar, set
up a time for me to speak withyour child for about 30 minutes,
no cost, and I show you whattheir speciality is.
You get their book and theiraudio book.

(38:06):
I can't teach this.
That's the one thing I have todo myself.

Tim Newman (38:10):
Right.

Russel Van Brocklen (38:10):
All right, but make sure you do that, and
you know, it's no charge.
We show you how to do this.
But the main thing I justwanted to go back to on,
remember those three questionsthat I asked you and you
answered yes to them again?

Tim Newman (38:22):
Yes.

Russel Van Brocklen (38:24):
That level of understanding, there is no
other researcher out there thatcan ask you those questions and
really understand why.
Because they haven't beenthrough this.
Right.
I can tell you when I was thatage, I picked up a box of
crayons and I learned to read bygoing through the colors.

(38:45):
The system was completelyunstable.

Tim Newman (38:48):
Right.

Russel Van Brocklen (38:49):
Okay.
But I I had a concussion, andI'm trying to explain to a
medical doctor who's on, who's afaculty member, teaches
residents.
And in four years, she stillcan't even figure out how I how
I read the letter A.
All right.
So yeah, so the fact that Icould answer those questions,

(39:14):
you know, ask you those, andnobody I'm sure has ever asked
you anything like that before,and just know what it means.
That's my level ofunderstanding of what your kid's
going through because I've beenthrough this myself.
And just so everybody knowswhat my really my base reading
and writing level is, this NewYork State government paid their
top psychologist, Dr.

(39:35):
Holichka.
She was a 20 hours with her,the smartest woman I ever met,
and 20 hours with her.
And she wrote up a report.
She's and this has come fromdata that she happened to have a
few years beforehand because Ineed a neuropsych to take my
grad entrance exams.
First grade reading and writinglevel that jumps up to grad
level and back down againbecause I'm going from a

(39:56):
dysfunctional area to afunctional area.
Right.
Here's the five pagesexplaining it.

Tim Newman (40:05):
So let me let me ask you another question.

Russel Van Brocklen (40:10):
Have you ever worked with somebody and
this hasn't worked because it ohyeah, uh yeah, I I I'll I'll
tell you exactly where I was anunqualified failure.

Tim Newman (40:21):
Okay.

Russel Van Brocklen (40:22):
It was a very wealthy family in New York
City where their parents were inthe service business, okay,
working at the absolute highestlevel of service with the most
complicated things on the world.

Tim Newman (40:36):
Okay.

Russel Van Brocklen (40:37):
And the kid only cared about Rocky.
He's in seventh grade, and hewould only write about Rocky.
I couldn't get him to doanything.
Parents had no control overhim, and I don't work with that.

Tim Newman (40:52):
Okay, but that that to me, that's that's not the
system not working.
To me, that that that's otherout outside things.

Russel Van Brocklen (41:00):
But I mean, if you're if if they file the
system, if if the kid yeah, if Ihave to have a kid who halfway
wants to care about doing this,and the parents have to give a
reasonable try of doing it.

Tim Newman (41:12):
That that to me I think is is is the real real key
in this.
You've got to want it, right?

Russel Van Brocklen (41:17):
I mean Yeah, if you don't want it to be
a good one.
Yeah, for people now, what whatI recommended that they do with
their son, and they couldafford this, is they have these
places like Winward in New YorkCity.
I would just go and hire them,and they will do an amazing job
with your child.
Absolutely amazing.

(41:38):
Or if you're not near New YorkCity, you could send them to the
Gowell School, G-O W.org.
They celebrate their 100thanniversary next year.
They will do a brilliant jobwith your child.
Okay.
It's $86,000 a year retail.
If you get the $26,000, noyears college, it's $60,000.

(41:59):
Okay.
And you're gonna want to dofour or five years.
Oh my goodness.
Okay, but they will do abrilliant job.

Tim Newman (42:07):
They better.

Russel Van Brocklen (42:08):
Okay.
I'm kind of the person, if youwant to solve the problem, you
want to do it at home, and youdon't want to use house money.
Okay, because we've been ableto really drive the price.
People ask me, can you workwith everybody?
I I work with lower middleclass families all the time.

(42:28):
The biggest increase I get byfar and away are upper, I'm
sorry, are lower middle classfamilies.
Okay, then it's upper middleclass.
And then for the super rich,it's either they're they're
extraordinarily successful orcomplete.
I can't touch it because theyknow they got a $20 million

(42:48):
trust fund and they're not goingto do anything.
Right.
And the middle class kids, I'mI'm iffy.
It's basically uh if theparents have to want it, the
kids have to want it.
The lower middle class kids,why I think it's so successful
because they know if they don'tput in the effort, they want to
do better than where theirparents are.
Right.
Right.
And they're willing to put inthe effort.

(43:10):
And the upper middle class kidsknow, well, I don't have a
trust fund, but I have theeducational opportunity.

Tim Newman (43:16):
Right.

Russel Van Brocklen (43:17):
All right.
And then for the middle classkids, I typically a lot of them
like to go on for a two-yearcommunity college head-and-hands
job.
So I I just show them how to dobasic body paragraphs and it
gets them through.
Um, and then the wealthy kids,either they're brilliant or
they're the just really toughbecause again, they don't have

(43:37):
to do any uh they don't have todo any work.

Tim Newman (43:39):
Right.

Russel Van Brocklen (43:40):
So because they have these huge trust funds
that if you and I had that, wewould be retired on the beach.

Tim Newman (43:46):
Right, right.

Russel Van Brocklen (43:47):
But then we would still do things.
So yes.
Exactly.

Tim Newman (43:49):
That's that's that that that's that's the other
thing.
And I and I think that ultultimate ultimately it comes
down to uh anybody that's gonnabe successful, they've you've
got to want it.
It's it's this isn't somethingthat's is just gonna happen.
Things aren't just gonna behanded to you.
And um what what so what do weneed to do to move these to move

(44:11):
this initiative forward so thatit uh you know may maybe we we
ch we ch we change the way thatnumber one we we look look at
and deal with people with dysldyslexia um in in the public
school system.
Um that they're gonna be ableto do that.

Russel Van Brocklen (44:28):
Oh no, oh no, it's it's so much easier
than that because remember, thistook me it takes me a while to
train parents because this isn'ttheir profession.

Tim Newman (44:37):
Right.

Russel Van Brocklen (44:38):
Okay, but with teachers, I work with
Evelyn White Bay, New York Statehad a dyslexia task force in
2024.
She was one of the three orfour teachers on it.

Tim Newman (44:47):
Okay.

Russel Van Brocklen (44:49):
The state education department literally
chased her down and put pressureon her to come on because she
was three to four X moresuccessful than a typical
teacher.
So we present, we show teachershow to take this for first
through fifth grade reading andwriting.
We can go in and show them howto give the teachers what they
need to solve this in threehours.

(45:10):
And we do that online.

And here's the key thing (45:14):
the teachers will look through this
and they'll say, We don't likesomething with this.
And we say, Great, change thisto meet your teaching style and
who you're working with.
So, literally, in the past, Iwould have two teachers in the
same di the same buildingteaching essentially very
similar students, doing it incompletely different ways, and

(45:37):
they still got the results.
Why?
Because teachers already knowwhat to do, right?
I'm just putting it in a bit ofa different order, so we're
using the front part of thebrain so it actually works.

Tim Newman (45:47):
Works.

Russel Van Brocklen (45:48):
And they've I taught the entire state of
New Jersey, the New JerseyAssociation of Learning
Consultants in October of 2022.
They had all these people theycould go to for writing
assistance, they came to me, andthis was too fast.
I did the whole thing in twohours.
Yeah, that was a bit insane.

(46:08):
Wow.
So we want three.
Okay, okay.
We can do this online.

Tim Newman (46:14):
Okay.

Russel Van Brocklen (46:15):
Okay.
Now try getting this intopublic schools.
It's uh it's proven to be a bitcomplicated.

Tim Newman (46:25):
Well, there's reasons for that.
Um, and I don't know of anygood reasons, but but you know,
it's complicated.
Right.
Yes.
Yeah.

Russel Van Brocklen (46:36):
So what I try to do when I'm dealing with
school districts is what I do isI said, listen, I'm the
researcher.
You don't want to hear from me.
You'll hear part of my story.
You want to talk to Evelynbecause she's your peer.
And she did this, and she justtold me it was something like
five months, and she got a kidto go up by like sixth grade
levels.

(46:56):
Okay.
That's Evelyn.

Tim Newman (47:00):
That's amazing.

Russel Van Brocklen (47:02):
Well, I mean, I want you to imagine
she's like the Michael Jordan ofspecial ed teachers.

Tim Newman (47:08):
Okay.

Russel Van Brocklen (47:08):
All right.
That's why she was on the statetask force.
Right.
So, and just you know whathappened with New York State
when they did this.
We I I didn't get any realreason why it wasn't passed.
The conjecture, and that's allthe conjecture was, is there was
never a budget bill.
But this was going to be quiteexpensive.

(47:30):
And the teachers' unions werekind of fighting back because
they're saying, you already puta lot of stuff on this, and this
is going to take a lot longerto learn.
All right.
So I don't know what's comingup about it, but it makes all
the sense in the world to getthis done by the end of fifth
grade because then you may notget the kid out of special ed,

(47:54):
but you're going to probablyreally, if you did this, what
they recommended, really reducethis.
So you might be saving 10, 5,10, 15 grand a year per kid for
the rest of the year timethey're in school.
You're spending a lot more fora special ed kid.

Tim Newman (48:09):
Right.
Oh, absolutely.
With with with everything thatthey've got to do and all the
all the services, yeah.
And and I think I get it itcosts money and somebody's got
to pay for it.
But again, like you say.

Russel Van Brocklen (48:34):
Oh, we we could go and train the 600
school districts for that.
No problem.

Tim Newman (48:38):
Easy.
And and and and and again, mymy my point being, you know, are
aren't we supposed to be doingwhat's best in teaching the kids
so so that they can besuccessful?
And you know, and and if I knowI know I shouldn't probably be
thinking that way, but you knowdoing it, like you say, before
fifth grade, so that they theyhave it and they can they can

(49:01):
then use it, and it it's onlygonna get better, they're only
gonna get better at it the morethat they do it.

Russel Van Brocklen (49:06):
Right, but but here's the problem.
I'm going to go back to the youknow, to the brains.

Tim Newman (49:14):
Okay.

Russel Van Brocklen (49:14):
Okay, okay.
I'm gonna say 80 plus percentof the students are like the
back part of the non-impairedbrain, right?
They have all this massiveneuroactivity.
Okay, it's not like the schoolsystem is trying to make things
difficult for neurodiversestudents, it's just the fact
that they do things for a reasonbecause if you're a gen ed kid

(49:37):
and if you're smart and if youplan well and you work really
hard, you're gonna do very well,generally.
Not in every class, butoverall, you're gonna do very
well.
Right.
Okay.
If you don't plan well, if youdon't work hard, well, it's a
different story.
It's all within your control.
But as you can see, when you'relooking at the brains, we're

(50:02):
completely different.
Yes.
We have the massive activity inthe front part of the brain,
which, as we discussed,articulation, word analysis.
I'm really oversimplifyingcomplex neuroscience to the
point of breaking things, so youcan draw this out.

Tim Newman (50:21):
Right.

Russel Van Brocklen (50:22):
Dyslectics do good in grad school because
that's the part of the frontpart of our brain where we have
two and a half times theneuroactivity, as we discussed
with you.
You can't you came up with youridea relatively quickly and
you're treated like the rockstar because you have the idea
that's publishable, right?
That allowed you to become anassociate professor.

Tim Newman (50:43):
Right.

Russel Van Brocklen (50:44):
Okay, that is these original ideas are the
currency of the realm inacademia.
Okay, so we're just different.
And that's the issue.
What the other thing is Dr.
Orton was the Einstein, he wasthe Disney, he was everything to

(51:09):
my field.
And they find it.
I I know this because I'm areviewer for the big
international dyslexiaassociation conference for
several years.
They are now refining his stuffso it is a small fraction of a
vein on a leaf.
I'm offering a completelyoriginal idea, right?

(51:29):
But based on what came out, Ihate to say this, this book came
out 22 years ago.
That's my field.
Dr.
Collins' book that I based thison came out 28 years ago
in '97.
Okay.
That's my field.
So what I'm trying to say isit's a new idea.

(51:50):
And you know, of course,anytime you have a new idea,
it's not the easiest thing toget in the school systems.
That's what Evelyn's working sohard on.
And that's why we're goingdirectly to the parents now.
So they can just take care ofit, just solve it and move on.
Because once your kid's ingrade level, yeah, you can put
them back in and they can takeReed is taking all of his

(52:11):
classes and he's doing justfine.

Tim Newman (52:17):
That's awesome.
I you you know, I I I I wish wehad this when I was growing up.
And it you know, for for me forme sitting here still thinking
about how you knew all thatstuff about me, it's still

(52:38):
creepy.
But if you've if you just dothis for your students, do this
for for your for your kids.
It's good.
Everything's gonna be betterfor them.
Their school experience, theirschool experience is gonna be
better, their mental health isgonna be better, they're gonna
be they're they're gonna, youknow be sm be smarter.

(53:02):
I mean, they're they're goingto be they're gonna be able to
think better.
You know what I'm saying?

Russel Van Brocklen (53:10):
I wasn't trying to creep you out.
No, I know, I know.
But uh, but but here's why I dothat.
Because I want you to imaginekids like you.

Tim Newman (53:20):
Yeah.

Russel Van Brocklen (53:20):
The ones who and let's be very honest.
When you you made it toassociate professor at good
schools, good colleges, can yousee how very few entering PhD
students could ever reach thatheight?

Tim Newman (53:35):
Yes.

Russel Van Brocklen (53:36):
Okay.
So what I'm trying to say iswhen we f when I have these kids
in high school and I ask thosequestions, especially for the
third one, your kids don't wantyou to know the hell they put
themselves through.
They desperately don't.
It's as I said, I know it, Icall it your secret.
All right.

(53:57):
And but once I go, and why do Idiscuss it with them?
Because these kids are soskeptical.
That's why I went through whatI went through with you with you
today.
Because I want you to know inyour bones, I know what I'm
talking about.

Tim Newman (54:13):
Right.

Russel Van Brocklen (54:14):
So when I ask you about that, then I say,
here's how, based on what yousaid, this is how we're going to
overcome things.
Your speciality, specific tothe general word analysis,
followed by articulation, whichwe really didn't have time to
jump into today.
Do you see how I got yourattention that this does work
because you now you know?

Tim Newman (54:32):
Absolutely.
Absolutely.

Russel Van Brocklen (54:33):
That's why I do that, because these kids
are so skeptical.
They are the hardest audienceout there, and they're like, How
did you know me?
I know it was kind of funny.
Parents think it's kind offunny when I said, Yeah, we have
these hidden cameras.
Where?
Uh-huh.
You know.
Um, but for me to really knowyou at such a deep level and

(54:54):
what you went through and how todevelop it from that.
And then some of the kids wouldgo out to these other, you
know, let's just say people whoknow their names that are in
this field and ask them, andthey have no idea about anything
like I just asked you.
Not no idea.
And it's not because I'm somegenius, and it's not because I'm

(55:15):
some world-renowned researcheron this, it's because I went
through this.

Tim Newman (55:20):
Done it.

Russel Van Brocklen (55:20):
And after I presented this in New York
City, I didn't go and spend thenext 20 years trying to figure
out how to explain things toPhDs.
I spent the next 20 yearsfiguring out how I can explain
this to teachers and parents,and make this so simple that I
could have literallyeighth-grade AP English students
teach it successfully.

(55:41):
That's awesome.
I had to make it that simple.

Tim Newman (55:45):
And and you and you had and you did, and it and it's
working.
And I knew when we started thisconversation, it was going to
be one of the best we've everhad, and and it lived up to
that.
Russell, I I can't tell you howmuch I I appreciate what you're
doing, um, how much you'vetaught me on on this subject.
Uh, and uh so where where canpeople connect with you to get

(56:09):
more information and if if theyif they need to pass these pass
this information on to somebodythat they know?
Because I think my guess is weall know somebody who could use
this resource.

Russel Van Brocklen (56:22):
The easiest thing to do is just go to
dyslexiaclassesplural.com.
It's with an S,DyslexiaClasses.com.
It's the button there that'sthis download free guide.
We ask you three questions.
You get a free guide, the threereasons your trouble your
child's having trouble at schooldue to dyslexia.
Then the most important thing.
Actually go ahead and fill outa time to speak with me and set

(56:49):
that up so that I can speak toyou and your child and I can
find out your speciality.
And I asked the questions thatI went over with you today, and
that's because your child isgoing to be the hardest person
on the planet to convince.
And once we go through thosequestions, they know on their
bones I know what I'm talkingabout.
I get them like nobody elsedoes, and then I can show

(57:12):
parents how to go through thisat an affordable rate.
We work with families on ayearly basis, and yes, we do
give discounts when likecolleges give discounts,
scholarships.
Uh it's based on financial needwhen they come in.
Why?
Because I don't want people togo through the hell that I went
through.
I want this solved.

Tim Newman (57:34):
Russell, again, thank you so much for spending
some time with us.
If there's anything I can do tohelp you, you know, pushing
this initiative pushing thisinitiative forward, please don't
hesitate to let me know.
Anything I can do, I'll behappy to help.

Russel Van Brocklen (57:47):
Okay, thanks for having me.

Tim Newman (57:48):
All right, buddy.
Take care and we'll talk to yousoon.
Be sure to visitspeakingwithcome podcast.com to
get your free ebook, toptwenty-one challenges for public
speakers, and we can alsoregister for the forty public
speaking.
Always remember your voice iscoming to the episode.