An innovative, comprehensive guide--the first of its kind--to help parents understand and accept learning disabilities in their children, offering tips and strategies for successfully advocating on their behalf and helping them become their own best advocates.

In Thinking Differently, David Flink, the leader of Eye to Eye--a national mentoring program for students with learning and attention issues--enlarges our understanding of the learning process and offers powerful, innovative strategies for parenting, teaching, and supporting the 20 percent of students with learning disabilities. An outstanding fighter who has helped thousands of children adapt to their specific learning issues, Flink understands the needs and experiences of these children first hand. He, too, has dyslexia and ADHD.

Focusing on how to arm students who think and learn differently with essential skills, including meta-cognition and self-advocacy, Flink offers real, hard advice, providing the tools to address specific problems they face--from building self-esteem and reconstructing the learning environment, to getting proper diagnoses and discovering their inner gifts. With his easy, hands-on "Step-by-Step Launchpad to Empowerment," parents can take immediate steps to improve their children's lives.

Thinking Differently is a brilliant, compassionate work, packed with essential insights and real-world applications indispensable for parents, educators, and other professional involved with children with learning disabilities.

When parents are told their child has a learning disability, they need more information. Thinking Differently is just the resource to meet that need. David Flink, leader of Eye to Eye, a national mentoring program for children with learning differences, explains each learning disability in layman's terms to prepare parents to speak knowledgeably with teachers about their child's specific challenges.

Thinking Differently will not overwhelm parents with legal jargon, but it will guide them through what laws are on their side and what they can insist that schools provide for their child. With compassion and hope, Flink describes the importance of testing and diagnosis to equip parents with the tools they need to advocate authoritatively on their child's behalf and to seek the most effective accommodations--from technology to extra time and medication--to guarantee that their child succeeds in school and life.

In this eye-opening book, David Flink helps parents understand what their child is experiencing. He also emphasizes the importance of maintaining and building children's self-esteem, by helping them discover inner gifts and special talents and realize they are as smart as anyone--even if they think differently.

Flink, David

David Flink was diagnosed with dyslexia and ADHD when he was nine years old. He holds a bachelor's degree in education and psychology from Brown University and a master's degree in Dis/Ability Studies from Columbia University. He lives with his wife in New York City.