ABOUT
S&S
Heya! I'm Teacher Shaun!
Heya! I'm Teacher Shaun!
I set up Swords & Stationery to help young people with dyslexia overcome their learning challenges. Having worked in the Dyslexia Association of Singapore from 2013 to 2017 as an Educational Therapist, I had come to realise even the Orton-Gillingham methodology was insufficient to spur many dyslexic students to achieve their fullest potential. There was a missing ingredient.
In 2014, I trialed incorporating tabletop games into my lessons. Surprisingly, students started to become more motivated to do better, not just academically, but behaviourally too!
To date, I have taught over 80 dyslexic students, many of whom still keep in touch with me to reminisce about the “good old days”. Want to find out more about the S&S approach? Drop me a text and let’s chat! 🙂
Teacher Shaun
Principal Educational Therapist / Chief Happiness Officer
What others are saying about us
What others are saying about us
Our core beliefs
Our core beliefs
Mission
To establish Swords & Stationery as a regional institution, known for its avant-garde but highly effective practices.
Vision
To help learners with dyslexia perform to the best of their abilities in English Language-based subjects.
Values
Grit
Inquisitiveness
Tenacity
Graciousness
Understanding
Determination
Our 65" interactive Smart Board from SMART Technologies allows us to write over videos, documents, and scanned assignments. It even functions as an HD TV! Technology ho!
Each student has a file to store his/her work. These files grow in size faster than one can say "Forzare!"
A secondary display for those special occasions, like when we're conducting serious role-playing game sessions. Fancy!
We provide fancy stationery and fidget toys for the kids to use. Why should learning be a drab affair when it can be a colourful blast?
When technology fails, we always have a whiteboard to fall back on. Nothing beats tradition!
Our digital game board for role-playing game sessions, painstakingly handcrafted by by our friends from CraftyKobolds. Within it is a 43" UHD TV. We want nothing but the best for the S&S kids.
Frequently Asked Questions
Frequently Asked Questions
Swords & Stationery (S&S) is a Singapore-based specialist tutoring / educational therapy programme for children and youths with dyslexia. Our curriculum mainly deals with English Language and Social Studies (secondary school), and directly integrates games into lessons.
The most suitable age range of students for the Swords & Stationery programme is 9 to 17 years, though we do accept learners outside of this range on a case-by-case basis.
S&S is not a tuition centre, nor is it an enrichment centre. It is an educational therapy programme based on the Orton-Gillingham (OG) method that helps students bridge learning gaps caused by dyslexia and other potential co-morbidities such as ADHD. The closest comparison would be the Dyslexia Association of Singapore (which has been doing great work for students with dyslexia too).
That said, our curriculum is also closely aligned with that of the Ministry of Education’s. Using over 120 frameworks, concepts, and techniques, we cover nearly every aspect of the mainstream English Language syllabus, including essay writing and reading comprehension. 99% of our teaching materials are created in-house and vetted by NIE/OG-trained educators. We don’t believe in assessment books, for good reason.
Finally, we are the first educational therapy programme to integrate games into its curriculum. When games are conducted at S&S, you can expect them to be tied in with a reading comprehension or writing activity, and vice versa.
For more information, read our article: “Swords & Stationery: Is It a Tuition Service?“
Educational therapy is a remediation process to help students with specific learning difficulties improve academically, socially and emotionally. A therapy session is typically planned out and executed based on the strengths and weaknesses of the learner, taking into consideration his or her needs. There is at least one learning objective behind every therapy session; oftentimes this includes helping the learner to make progress towards overcoming a particular learning challenge.
For more information on educational therapy as a practice versus traditional tutoring, take a look at this online brochure by the Association of Educational Therapists.
A therapy session is prepped days, even weeks, in advance. Students may learn new concepts, review previously taught ones, or both. Lessons may cover any of the following areas: literacy, academics, social skills, and emotional and behavioural management. Lessons are always tailored to our students’ needs and profiles.
Thus, a regular 2-hour lesson may include the following activities:
- Learn to cut words with ‘Bossy R’ syllables (20 minutes)
- Review past concepts through reading and spelling activities (40 minutes)
- Watch a short film (30 minutes)
- Critically analyse the previous week’s role-playing game session and discuss how the short film we just watched ties in with the game’s theme (30 minutes)
Most of our students have benefitted from the programme in some way. It may be academically, social-behaviourally, or even in their ability to regulate their emotions. Nevertheless, there have been fringe cases where we felt the programme was not right for the child. We will inform you as soon as possible if we determine this to be the case, so that you may seek another professional or programme that’s more suited to your child’s needs.
There’s no “cure” to dyslexia in that traditional sense. It’s not a disease, and no two dyslexics are built the same way. Nevertheless, there are ways to overcome its challenges. This usually involves a good therapist who can “read” the student to know where his or her difficulties stem from. Then, it’s just a matter of identifying a possible solution and incorporating it into the lesson.