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How great are Garret and Janel? Our son started 2nd grade with a reading DRA level 12 by the time he finished 2nd grade he was reading DRA level 28 thanks to Janel and Garret’s support! Our son has been able to raise his previous sub standard reading comprehension levels up to where he should be for his grade level and is now on par with his peers.
We decided to take our 7 year old son to Clear Pathways Learning Services because he was struggling in school, and our school was proactive enough to have a town hall type meeting and invited Janel to come and speak about the types of learning challenges children are having. And for our son, his inability to stay focused was really hindering his ability to learn. He also desperately needed help with his listening skills, along with test-taking skills and comprehension.
His teacher and my husband and I started noticing that it was taking a bit longer for him to clearly understand what the teachers are instructing him to do. This of course affected his confidence and self esteem. So, as is often the case, he started to compensate by assigning himself to be the class clown and being disruptive to his classmates.
Our son was enrolled in Janel’s program for about 7 months and almost immediately started to show improvement in all the areas he was struggling with. He was able to retain what was being taught in class, and reading became more enjoyable. He is now able to finish quizzes in timely manner, excels at math, and doesn’t have to be embarrassed about being pulled outside of class in order to focus. His teacher was impressed with his new ability to able to sit still in class and pay attention.
Before Clear Pathways, this kind of accomplishment would have been out of the question for him. With the proper type of instructions and guidance, he has gained the tools he needed to be successful in life and school.
He continues to show great progress in and outside of the classroom, and more important is the continued change in my son’s confidence and work habits. From battling with doing homework, to having him do it all on his own, is another example of the relief that is to us. Clear Pathways was an eye opener for us as we now understand with the tools that Janel and
Garret gave us, to better help us help our son in a positive way.
I would easily recommend Clear Pathways to any kind of student. Both Janel and Garret teach with creativity and in a deep and personal way that their students respond to. Our son thoroughly enjoyed his sessions with both Janel and Garret and looked forward to his time with them. He enjoyed his time that he often didn't want to go home when it was time to leave. They are not only terrific educators but they also really understand kids. They really connect and go the extra mile with the kids and parents. Clear Pathways paved the way for our son to be successful both at home and at school now and into the future.

Words cannot adequately express our great joy over what Clear Pathways Learning Services accomplished with our daughter who was 14 when she received services four years ago. The results were nothing short of miraculous.
Our daughter always seemed disconnected, and in spite of her work ethic, academics and basic life skills never came easy to her. When we brought her to Janel at age 13 (almost 14) she was still reading at a second grade level. She had made very little progress over the last two years despite private tutoring and special education services through our school district. She was diagnosed with a reading disability and mild ADD. At home and at school efforts were stepped up but there was still very little progress. Our daughter could not seem to retain what she learned week to week. I sought the advice of many professionals including doctors, teachers, tutors, literary specialists and psychologists, but none of them were able to help my daughter – until I came to Clear Pathways.
After several months of treatment my daughter made gains in many different areas at Clear Pathways. At the conclusion of treatment she was reading chapter books at the 4th grade level and enjoying them! Prior to treatment she was distant, forgot instructions, didn’t like sports, was socially isolated and had difficulty with any mental/academic tasks. After treatment she made friends, participated in and enjoyed sports, spoke more fluently, was engaged in the world around her, completed multi-level tasks, responded much faster mentally, and improved significantly in regard to her school work. Her countenance completely changed. She socialized with everyone – adults, teens and small children. She conversed easily – even with strangers. Friends and family noticed she became much more outgoing, and she finally believed she was smart. And best of all ... she began smiling!
Currently my daughter is 18 and continues to do very well. She has plans for college and for starting her own business. I don’t know where she would be without the help she received from Clear Pathways, and I don’t even like to think about it! We are so grateful for the services we received and happy to have the opportunity to recommend them. Our experience was truly life changing!

* Are you "missing" pieces of conversation, but your hearing has been tested and there is nothing wrong?
*  Do you have to ask people to repeat phone numbers or other information when you are talking on the phone; frequently 
transpose the phone numbers, can't remember the info long enough to write it down?  
You've tested negative for dyslexia but this is still happening?
This is what we were facing with my husband David.  We couldn't find answers to what he was experiencing.  It was affecting his job performance and our lives.
What could we do?  We went to doctors, a psychiatrist, nobody had any definitive answers.  We could find pieces of information, but not enough to put it all together ourselves.
We finally went to a naturopathic doctor who tested my husband and found he had a brain chemistry imbalance that was affecting the memory.  There were vitamins and amino acids to take for that.  But that didn't help us with the rest of what he was experiencing.  The doctor gave us a business card and told us to go see Janel at Clear Pathways Learning Services. She told us Janel was a master at assessments for symptoms just like my husband's.  The best part  for us was, she worked with adults.  Remediation for learning for children we could find, but not adults.  We had even tried a local reading clinic, thinking maybe David has missed something in the early learning years.  We went through a complete assessment with them and an entire 6-8 week program which was very costly.   We walked away with a good overview of English grammar and some reading exercises, but no closer to figuring out what was really wrong and how to fix it.  We were becoming frustrated and desperate.
Our doctor said they found out about Janel because the parents of children in their clinic kept coming to them and raving about Janel and the results they had with their kids.  Our doctor couldn't ignore those results.  They were highly recommending her.
 We do as well!  Janel gave my husband an assessment.  This was so helpful.  She was able to inform us in exactly what areas David had issues and where we could expect results.  She was so honest, which I really appreciated.  She said sometimes with older learners, the results could vary.  She said depending upon how many "categories" of learning are affected, it may or may not be worth the cost to go forward with the remediation.  She explained that she informs her clients of that and lets them make the decision.  I really appreciated that.  In David's case, she said there were so many categories affected, she was certain any improvement would be vastly noticeable.  We were eager to get started and see results, now that we had definitive information and a game plan; which we had not been able to find anywhere else.   We were worried about cost.  Janel was great.  She laid everything out and helped us find payments we were comfortable with.  She was willing to be flexible and adjust if we hit bumps in the road.  My husband and I have an unpredictable income as he gets paid by the job, so this was a huge relief!  There were no barriers for us!
 David began going through a process to help his left and right sides of the brain work together.  Janel said this was the essence of the problem, and his inability to hear pieces of the conversation was not due to hearing loss.  She said his brain was not hearing the messages coming from  the ear, because both sides of the brain do different functions.  If they are not working together, you have problems.  She did say, there were a number of potential reasons for that.  David had not had any traumatic injury.  She asked questions about his early childhood learning experiences.  From his background she deduced he probably did have early learning gaps.  I was impressed with her ability to ask questions and draw out the right information to come to conclusions.  This is a skill that not everyone has, and you definitely need it when you are seeking the kind of help we needed. 
Janel began a series of what I would call phonetic exercises to help him fill in those early learning gaps.  Janel's husband Garrett was also great.  David also really likes working with him as he is so personable he enjoys the "guy time" too when he is going through the balance and coordination exercises that also help that left and right brain connectivity.  
David has been going through this remediation process for about 15 months.  He has about 5 sessions left, and those will be devoted to the visualization when he is reading.  Janel will give some exercises to do on his own to continue to improve in this process.  She said once the process has become habitual, he won't even need to think about it anymore.  She said the writing piece will all come together after that, because she will give him some tips on taking what he is visualizing, and learning how to make that into a simple outline he can use as he is writing.  This will work for any kind of writing, fictional or factual. 
15 months may seem like a long time to you, but we don't think it is.  Yes, it's a time investment, but time passes anyway and we are getting changes in his life and consequently, in mine;  that we never would have gotten on our own.  
My husband is 62 years old.  Here is what I see now.  His pronunciation and spelling are vastly improved.  He is now beginning to visualize what he reads.  Janel determined that through her assessment and questioning!  This was amazing to us.  We had no idea, because who knows what happens in the brain?  David had no idea.  He thought everybody read the way he did.  Janel said that instead of visualizing, his brain did a work around and simply "decoded" the meaning of words rather than seeing a picture of what he was reading.  Janel has had physiological training that helps her understand how all this works.  It's amazing.
David is also more creative, witty, spontaneous, and the fun loving person I remember when we first married is back.  There can also be physiological and medical reasons attributed to some improvements.  I am not advocating you skip seeing your medical providers by any means.  You need the whole picture.  But, the left/right brain connectivity is certainly a huge part of these changes.
David is also so much more articulate verbally.  He relates to people better because he now asks questions instead of giving 1 to 2 words answers, because his brain can hear the entire conversation.  He relates to me so much better on an emotional level.  He asks how I am doing, he is engaged.  He expresses his own emotions, without being an emotional flat line.  You might ask, how can this remediation be responsible for all of that?
Here's the thing.  The right side of the brain as I understand it, is the one that helps with language, creativity, and processing emotion.  Because David's right side was not connecting, those areas were suffering.  When you can't express your emotions, it's like you don't have any.  When your brain can't hear entire conversations, your self esteem suffers.  You lack confidence. You retreat.  You live inside yourself and don't want to engage with others.  You start to suffer socially because you give 1 to 2 word answers, and you don't know how to relate to people because you're afraid to.  We were living a life we didn't want to live, and David had a lot of fear.  Fear that he was not a success.  Fear that he might not be able to change.  
With Janel and Garrett

My child is a different person now! Janel has found a way to combine the best practices she knows to create an optimal learning experience for each client. Before we started my child had problems with loud environments, was reluctant to read, and had the most creative spelling I had seen. It seemed he was choosing random letters to spell a word. Guess what! He couldn't hear the difference between some sounds. Each week Janel works with him on how sounds feel when forming them, how to determine which sounds change between words, how to identify common spelling "rules", how to visualize while reading...all while the client is wearing headphones (from the iLs system) to facilitate deeper learning. Janel identified that my son's auditory sensory issues would benefit from using the headphone system multiple times a week, so we purchased a home unit. In the past six months we have seen our child's reading and spelling skills improve by leaps and bounds. More importantly, his self confidence has soared. I would not hesitate to recommend Clear Pathways to anyone! If you think there could be an issue, let them help you figure that out.

Update - one year after finishing services:

The first time Janel from Clear Pathways asked my son to think of a cat he said, ?I?m allergic to cats.? He couldn?t picture anything!  Janel explained how the brain understands and remembers what is heard and read by visualizing. Now he tries to explain to me how he sees pictures in the clouds. At school they did a practice Iowa Basics test, and his reading comprehension was at an EIGHTH GRADE level. He is currently in elementary school. Wow! He obviously learned to picture very well! The way Clear Pathways works with kids really works!!

I am so grateful for Clear Pathways and what they do.  I am so happy we found them and my son had the chance to broaden his view/hearing of the world.

Janel has changed our son's life. Her methods of learning through visualization techniques combined with integrated listening has helped him with focus and attention. Another benefit of the process has been his greater self-regulation and overall better grounding. Academically, he has had real improvement, as seen in his school report cards. Every part of our interaction with Clear Pathways has been a positive experience. We are so happy with all the ways they have been instrumental in helping our son.

Let me begin by saying none of the other professionals, both private and through my daughter's school district,  were able to teach my daughter to read.  I am happy to report our experience with Janel at Clear Pathways Learning Services was far different.  
Janel was the first to identify the cause of my daughter's difficulties and used therapies specifically targeting those issues.  Janel was so observant that she was actually the first to suspect my daughter might also have a  visual impairment that was negatively impacting her ability to read.  She was correct. 
Janel is knowledgeable in so many different areas.  She also genuinely cares about every client, and somehow seems to be able to "place herself in her client's shoes," no matter their age.  Her encouraging words  really motivated my daughter.  She teaches so much more than academics.  Our entire family continues to benefit from the many tools and techniques she taught my daughter.  
The end result of our time with Janel is my daughter actually enjoys reading now and as a bonus her self esteem has greatly improved.  The gains my daughter experienced over such a short period of time were priceless!  Therapy with Janel has made all the difference in the world!