Our mission at Porter Academy is to educate children with atypical learning styles who have not been successful in a traditional classroom setting. We serve children as young as 4 ½ who have difficulties with attention, sensory processing disorder, language processing, auditory discrimination, dyslexia, fine and gross motor skills, visual processing, social interactions and self-esteem. In addition to Porter Academy’s language-rich curriculum, the school is now offering Integrated Listening Systems (iLs) programs effectively “retrain” parts of the brain involved in learning, communicating and moving. The iLs program combines an auditory training with balance and visual activities. It strengthens neurological pathways and improves our ability to learn and to process information. The three main systems for organizing sensory input — visual, auditory, and balance (vestibular) — are highly interrelated. The iLs program directly affects our sensory systems, thereby influencing a broad spectrum of our day-to-day functions. The iLs program  uses receptive and expressive programs to integrate one’s visual, auditory, and vestibular systems in order to build a foundation for auditory processing, reading, phonetic awareness, attention, sensory processing, motor coordination, visual-motor integration, and more.

To date, university research and third party data show that with iLs there were significant improvements in the areas of reading, auditory processing and attention. Reading data showed students’ reading ability improved by an average of  two years after a three-month iLs program. Auditory processing-improvement occurs across the entire range of auditory processing skills, especially in the areas of auditory figure ground, auditory memory, dichotic listening and binaural summation. Also, school data consistently reports significant improvement in attention as well as behavior.

Porter Academy is the only school in the United States that is integrating this program throughout the school day with a large portion of the student body.  It helps provide a strong foundation, enhancing neural capabilities upon which Porter Academy’s program builds. Porter Academy’s program is structured, multi-sensory, and flexible to accommodate the different learning styles of our students. Children are exposed all day to an environment rich in both receptive and expressive language experiences, sensory diet activities, visual processing, fine and gross motor skills, social skill development, as well as typical core curriculum. The children participate in PE each day and also participate in OT, art therapy and music therapy. At Porter Academy, we help students appreciate and realize their strengths to build self-confidence.

Our goal at Porter Academy is to help each child develop the skills and confidence that serve as a foundation for lifelong success. For more information please visit our website: www.porteracademy.org or call and speak to our principal, Barbara Ramer, at 770-594-1313 ext.222.