SOI CFU: Filling in the Blanks

What’s the big deal about CFU? Ask Brian.

“Brian can’t tell the difference in a 5 and a 3 and he sure can’t begin to read! He’s severe! Good luck on that one!” That was my first introduction to a very “special” student as I began my career in education.

Brian had a problem with CFU. CFU is just one of six intellectual abilities that you have to have to be ready to read. What does that mean? And what does identifying a picture tell me about being able to read?

In the world of the Structure of Intellect, CFU stands for Cognition of Figural Units. It is the ability to look at a picture or representation of an object that has been partially erased and to be able to tell what that object is. In other words, it is the ability of your brain to fill in the blanks and make sense of what seems at first to be only random marks on the page. This skill, when applied to letters or symbols, makes up the gateway to reading.

Remember picture finding in your “Highlights for Children” magazines? It wasn’t just a fun activity, or a not so fun activity if you were unsuccessful. There was a reason for it! I now know that each of Brian’s eyes were seeing something different. That “dreamy” look he had when I looked at him now makes sense. How do you tell the difference in a 5 and a 3 when one eye places the right angle at one spot on the page and the other eye places it elsewhere? And, maybe it doesn’t place it in the same place the next

2016 Summer Workshop Review & Announcements

This summer’s Advanced and Associate workshop was full of information!

The Meeker Paradigm, auditory processing, vision issues, interpreting profiles, the ALA-PLA tests, Certified Learning, IPP, American education, and more were presented.

We are grateful to have been able to use the Diane Hochstein’s Up for Learning center for the training. The center has been in operation for one year and has had a positive effect in our community!

UPCOMING TRAININGS

If you have not yet been trained in SOI, Dr. Meeker and Jody Brooks will be hosting several Basic and Intermediate workshops this coming year. Both workshops will be held at our location in Springfield this October. Dates and details will be decided soon, so if there is a specific weekend that would work best for you, please let us know!

NEW PROGRAM LAUNCH

Our biggest project of 2016 will be released this September! The ALA and PLA tests will be going ONLINE – available to practitioners, teachers, and schools! This is going to be a wonderful way for people to be tested with SOI that otherwise wouldn’t be able to because of distance, time, expenses, etc. People will be able to take the SOI test at their own pace from the comfort of their own home. Some practitioners also plan to have clients take the test online in their clinic or learning center. Remember that the ALA and PLA are available in paper format, too!

Learning To Read: Essential Skills and Abilities

How many intelligent children are failed each year because they fail to learn to read? How many teachers blame themselves because their students do not thrive under their tutelage?

If one says it takes intelligence to learn to read, everyone would agree. Therein lies the conundrum – what is meant by intelligence? We know that general intelligence is not the answer.

What if we asked a different question – not how much intelligence but what kind. If we ask what kind of intelligence is required for learning to read, we have a much better chance of understanding how intelligence is related to reading.

In order to answer the question, though, we must look to a theory of intelligence that validly and reliably reflects the functions of the human brain as a basis for designing tests that will allow teachers to diagnose the kinds of intelligence a child brings to school and match those to what kinds are needed for successful learning.

It is much easier to include intelligence training in the earlier grades, and it is much easier to teach children than to “fix” adults who have failed to succeed in school.

With studies, the specific and different abilities as they related to different aspects of reading began to unfold like a picture book – specific and basic abilities like:

• Visual memory for details
• Visual closure
• Visual attending
• Conceptual classification
• Visual discrimination

Each of these intellectual abilities took precedence in importance over