I want support for my child’s learning
Explore support shaped around your child’s interests, strengths, and goals for reading, spelling, writing, and learning.
Explore support for your family →Reading, writing & learning support · Maui, Hawaiʻi · Online
Individualized support for reading, spelling, writing, and comprehension
Learning support begins with your interests, questions, and goals. Lokahi Connect offers personalized online support for reading, spelling, writing, comprehension, and learning strategies for children, teens, and adults, including people with dyslexia. With roots in Maui, Hawaiʻi, and Bainbridge Island, Washington, we welcome learners from these communities and beyond. Start with a free 30-minute online consultation.
31%
In 2024, 31% of U.S. fourth-graders performed at or above NAEP Proficient in reading. NAEP notes that this is not the same as grade-level proficiency.
Source: NAEP 2024 reading results ↗28%
In the 2023 PIAAC assessment, 28% of U.S. adults ages 16–65 performed at Level 1 or below in literacy. This population estimate is not a diagnosis or a measure of any individual.
Source: NCES PIAAC 2023 ↗Flexible
Lokahi Connect develops student learning resources, educator learning, and open online tools. Program formats and availability vary.
Start here
For families
For adults
For educators
For communities
Start with what brought you here
Choose the pathway that best fits your question. Each one leads to practical information without asking you to know the right terminology first.
I want support for my own reading or writing
Explore individualized online instruction shaped around your goals, experience, and ways of participating.
Explore adult literacy support →I want to strengthen literacy instruction
Explore professional learning, practical teaching ideas, and ways to investigate language with your students.
Explore educator learning →I want to support learners in my community
Find carefully selected national, Washington, Hawaiʻi, and Maui resources, plus ways to share local needs.
Explore community resources →Work with Stephanie Steinshouer, an educational therapist who holds CERI’s Certified Structured Literacy Dyslexia Interventionist (C-SLDI) certification and IDA’s separate Structured Literacy Educator (SLE) Certificate. Read her qualifications and verification links →
Making connections
Discover how words work together
Reading and writing bring together spelling, pronunciation, meaning, and context. We help learners explore those connections and use what they discover in everyday reading and writing.
Explore a question
A question about a word, a sentence, or an idea can open an investigation. We connect explicit teaching and practice with what the learner wants to understand.
Notice connections
Compare related words, notice how their spelling and pronunciation connect, and explore what they mean in different contexts.
Use what you learn
Try an idea with another word, a new text, or a message you want to write. Together, we notice what is useful and what needs more support.
The Lokahi WORD Project
Questions that help language make sense
The Lokahi WORD Project connects meaning, word parts, spelling, pronunciation, grammar, and word history. These four questions help us explore the connections. We begin with the learner’s question and revisit ideas as the investigation develops.
Meaning
What does this word mean here?
Structure
What base, prefixes, or suffixes build this word?
Related words
Which related words help us understand it?
Letters and spelling
How do the letters work in this word, including how they represent pronunciation?
Foundations of our practice
How Lokahi Connect Teaches
Structured Word Inquiry (SWI)
We investigate how words are built and used, compare evidence, and connect discoveries to reading and writing. Questions can lead from a word to a sentence or a whole text.
Peter N. Bowers is the intellectual source of SWI and the Four Questions. Bowers and Kirby (2010) introduced the term Structured Word Inquiry in a Grade 4/5 morphological vocabulary intervention.
Support for different ways of learning
Our approach to learning design uses visible choices, manageable tasks, and flexible pacing. We adapt the support while keeping ideas accurate and meaningful.
Mediated learning in practice
The educator and learner explore together. We invite questions, explain ideas, notice useful strategies, and consider where else they might help.
What we measure
See Programs & Impact →
Notice progress together
We review work, listen to the learner’s perspective, and look at how ideas are used in new situations. Assessments may also help guide instruction. Together, we use this information to adjust goals and support.
Student learning
Individualized online educational therapy and literacy support. Explore sessions, fees, and current availability on our Services page.
Educator learning
Training and coaching that help educators guide questions, explain language, and respond to learners.
Open tools
A free, web-based Student Lab with read-aloud support, adjustable speech controls, and scaffolded activities.
Launch Student Lab ↗
Language should make sense
Help more people access learning support
Access to learning support should not depend only on what a person or family can afford. Your gift strengthens financial access, educator learning, and practical tools communities can use.
$75
Matches the published price of one 30-minute online student-learning session.
$120
Matches the published price of one 50-minute online student-learning session.
$425
Matches the published price of a comprehensive profile and written service plan when appropriate.