Student Testimonials
Kovack, M. (2022). Structured Literacy Success. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qdNhPSswmG0
In just over 18 months, this 11 year old non-reader went from feeling deeply distressed to being able to read at grade level with ease, speed & fluency. His mother noted that structured literacy lessons with me had been "truly transformational for him".
Kovack, M. (2022). More Structured Literacy Success. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3loD7gunlhE
And here is another student describing what it felt like to be taught to read using the 3-cueing system. With profound dyslexia, she did not have the opportunity to learn about the structure of English using systematic and explicit approaches that would have helped her. Instead, she was taught that you just "look at the word and know what it says".
Kovack, M. (2025). Structured Literacy Testimony!. Retrieved from https://youtu.be/bZOBLxI0d3c?si=KpkPoqrb2yEoxyCv
This grade 3 student was very frustrated at the beginning of our structured literacy work together. He had tried many times to learn to read and write. But 40 lessons later, he was impressed with how much he had improved!
Kovack, M. (2022). More Structured Literacy Success. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xucxEs0sQyw
In just over 40 lessons, this 13 year old felt that school (and anything to do with reading or writing) was "torture" to the point of refusing to attend school. He says that reading is now "easy peasy", and school is "a million times better". His mother noted that she "cannot tell [me] how long it's been since [she] saw him have that much fun with friends".
Kovack, M. (2024). Structured Literacy Makes a Difference! Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YT1c-g0kXNk
This Grade 5 non-reader (now confidently a "reader"!) shares his thoughts and feelings about his struggles in school before and after structured literacy lessons. The difference that this makes in a child's life can change their whole attitude and trajectory in life. Two years after the Ontario Human Rights "Right to Read" inquiry recommendations, I am genuinely feeling hopeful (because I am seeing and hearing about so many changes in the general classroom at the K-2 level!) that fewer grade 4, 5, 6, 7, etc... students will have to go through years of feeling like they are failing.
Kovack, M. (2025). Encouragement for those who feel like Learning to Read is Impossible. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=koc-iuOyVO4&t=6s
This student struggled profoundly with learning to read. After 134 hours/lessons, and just over two years of hard work and relentless effort, he has enough skills to make it through the day, reading slowly, but accurately. Even words like differential/potential/confidential, etc. are now possible for him to read. He may still have a way to go, but he now knows that he can do anything he sets his mind to.