LD Expert Podcast with Jill Stowell
In Sync: The Hidden Role of Timing in Learning
Jill Stowell
Jill Stowell: What do reading, handwriting, attention, conversation, catching a ball, and making friends all have in common?
They all depend on timing.
Not just practice.
Not just intelligence.
Not just effort.
Timing.
And when timing isn't working efficiently, learning can become much harder than it needs to be.
Today, we're going to explore why rhythm and timing may be one of the most overlooked foundations of learning, attention, regulation, and even social success.
We'll also briefly introduce a wonderful rhythm-based brain training program called the Ronnie Gardiner Method, or RGM, which we'll explore in greater depth in our next episode.
Welcome to the LD Expert Podcast, your place for answers and solutions for dyslexia, learning, and attention challenges.
I’m your host, Jill Stowell, founder and executive director of Stowell Learning Centers and author of Take the Stone Out of the Shoe.
If you've listened to this podcast before, you've probably heard me talk about the importance of looking underneath a learning challenge.
Reading is not just reading.
Attention is not just attention.
Behavior is not just the behavior that we see on the surface.
There are underlying skills that make those things possible.
And one of those underlying themes that shows up over and over again is timing.
Most of us think about timing in music or dance, or sports.
Can you keep the beat?
Can you clap in rhythm?
Can you hit a baseball?
But actually, timing shows up everywhere.
Think about a conversation.
Two people are talking. One person speaks. The other listens. There's a natural back-and-forth rhythm. We take turns. We pause. We know when to jump in and when to wait.
When that timing is off, conversations feel awkward.
The same thing happens in the classroom.
A teacher asks a question.
Most students hear it, process it, think about it, and respond quickly enough to stay with the discussion.
But some students are still processing the question when the class has gone on.
I've worked with students who looked inattentive, but attention really wasn't the problem at all.
I had a student - a 6th grade boy who was constantly answering the wrong question. I remember him so well because he was really eager to participate, but when he would say something the other students would laugh and the teacher would be frustrated that he wasn’t paying attention - again.
What was actually happening was that his auditory processing was so slow that by the time he had figured out an answer, the class had already moved on to the next question.
He WAS paying attention, but his timing was off.
Timing affects reading too.
When people think about dyslexia, they - often - think about letters being reversed or words being mixed up. But timing can be part of the picture as well.
So let's start with the auditory side of reading.
We have a phonetic-based language. Before a child can use phonics effectively, their brain has to be able to accurately process the sounds inside of words.
Spoken language moves incredibly fast. Many consonant sounds occur in just fractions of a second, and the brain has to notice what those sounds are, how many there are, and the order they're in.
It’s pretty common, when people think about dyslexia, to think about mixing up bs and ds because the letters look so much the same. And that’s true, that happens a lot. But… the sounds /b/ and /d/ can also be confusing.
We have some family friends whose son, when he was three, would always call his dad’s VW bus, a “dus.” He would say, “Go in the DUS! Go in the DUS!”
He wasn’t reading - he wasn’t looking at the letters b and d. That was an auditory discrimination issue.
The difference between those sounds, /b/ and /d/ occurs very quickly. For some struggling readers, the challenge isn't hearing the sounds with their ears—it's processing those rapid sound changes quickly enough for the sounds to be clear and meaningful.
Researchers have spent decades now studying rapid auditory processing and language development. Dr. Paula Tallal’s work suggests that when the brain struggles to process very brief, rapidly changing sounds in speech, language and reading development can become more difficult.
That's one reason why rhythm and timing are so interesting. Long before a child reads a word on a page, the brain is already processing patterns, sequences, timing, and rhythm in spoken language.
Reading is highly auditory, but there's a visual timing component as well.
For reading to feel comfortable, the brain must quickly and accurately process where letters and words are on the page and keep them stable while the eyes move across lines of print. Some struggling readers describe words that seem to move, or blur, or shift, or pulsate, or run together on the page. Others lose their place repeatedly and find reading physically tiring.
Dr. Terri Lawton has proposed in her research that timing differences between visual processing pathways may contribute to this type of visual instability in some individuals with dyslexia.
When auditory timing and visual timing are working together efficiently, reading becomes smoother and more automatic. The reader can recognize words, process meaning, and move through text with appropriate pacing and phrasing and expression.
That's what we call fluency.
Fluent reading isn't just reading fast. It's accurate, effortless reading with natural rhythm and intonation—much like speaking. And once again, timing is at the center of it.
Timing also shows up in attention and listening.
Imagine trying to listen to a teacher all day if what you're hearing feels like a bad cell phone connection.
You catch part of the message.
And then another part.
And then you miss a piece.
And eventually your brain starts to drift.
Not because you don't care or because you’re lazy, but because keeping up requires an exhausting amount of effort.
Movement has a huge impact on learning, attention, and mental and physical well-being at any age. And timing shows up in movement.
Think about riding a bike or catching a ball, handwriting, tying your shoes, playing the piano, or just walking through a room without bumping into people.
All of those depend on coordinating multiple systems at exactly the right moment.
When timing is working automatically, everything flows.
When it's not, life feels harder than it should be.
We do a lot of work with students on specific movements to integrate retained reflexes, build body control, improve eye hand coordination. And the exercises that we’re doing aren’t necessarily movements that students need to be able to do at school, or at home, but through those exercises, their timing improves and they become more regulated and more in sync with the world. Everything starts to work better.
Even social success is affected by timing.
Have you ever met someone whose speech seemed just a little off?
Not wrong. Just slightly out of sync.
Maybe they interrupted at unexpected moments or responded a little too late.
Sometimes, social challenges aren't just about knowing what to say.
They're about timing when to say it.
The rhythm of social interaction matters.
In fact, the more I work with struggling learners, the more I see timing connecting so many of the challenges we talk about on this podcast:
Dyslexia.
Auditory processing.
Visual processing.
Attention.
Executive function.
Regulation.
Coordination.
Social interaction.
They're all different pieces of the puzzle, but timing runs through all of them.
It's one of those underlying skills that most people never think about until it's not working well.
And here's the great thing.
Timing isn't necessarily fixed.
Like many underlying learning skills, it can be developed. Rhythm and timing can be intentionally trained.
The brain can build new, more effective pathways.
People can become more coordinated, more attentive, more regulated, and more efficient learners.
Which brings me to the last thing I want to share with you today, and that is the Ronnie Gardiner Method or RGM.
I first heard about RGM as a rhythm and movement-based brain training program. And I was interested in it because of its potential to support executive function.
But I didn't fully understand it until I experienced it.
When I attended my first RGM training, I walked into a room full of therapists and educators from different places, all different backgrounds. Most of us had never met before.
And then we started doing the exercises.
And here’s what it was like:
You're looking at a pattern of symbols on the screen that represent the rhythm and movements that you’re going to do with your hands and feet.
Every movement is paired with a word so you are moving and naming the movements in time to the music.
On the surface, it actually looks pretty simple; but it is not simple!
In fact, it's challenging enough that you have to stay mentally engaged.
You can't drift or zone out. You have to pay attention.
You have to coordinate your movements.
You have to look ahead and adapt to changes and new patterns.
You have to recover when you make a mistake.
And believe me, everybody makes mistakes.
What struck me was, these are skills that support learning and executive function at every level. AND…Within minutes, people who had never met were laughing together and encouraging each other.
The music and rhythm seemed to pull the group in sync.
The whole experience with the rhythm, movement, language, and music was simultaneously challenging attention, working memory, processing speed, coordination, flexibility, self-regulation, and social awareness.
It was touching many of the same underlying skills that we talk about all the time when discussing learning and attention challenges.
At Stowell Learning Centers, we've always looked beneath the symptom to the underlying skill.
If a student struggles with reading, we ask why - we look deeper.
If a student struggles with attention, we ask why.
If a student struggles socially, we have to ask, what is underneath that.
Because behavior, learning, academics, and performance are based on a foundation of underlying skills.
What fascinated me about RGM was that it appeared to stimulate skills across multiple levels of that foundation, with rhythm and timing being at the very core of it.
In our next episode, we're going to take a closer look at RGM, what it does, who it's helping, and share some demonstrations so you can see what it looks like and maybe even experience a little bit of it for yourself.
At Stowell Learning Centers, we help children and adults move beyond learning and attention challenges -including dyslexia- by strengthening the underlying skills that make learning easier.
When those skills get stronger, everything changes — reading, writing, focus, confidence, even the stress around school.
If you’re listening and thinking, wow that sounds like my child, you can learn more, explore free resources, or connect with one of our learning specialists at stowellcenter.com.
You can also follow us on social media. We’re @stowellcenter on all platforms.
If this episode encouraged you, please share it with another parent or educator who needs to know that real change is possible.
