Hettie P. Johnson M.A., CCC-SLP

Speech-language pathologist

Strategies for more success with less stress



Hettie received her B.S. Magna Cum Laude from Auburn University in 1970 and her M.A. from the University of Montevallo in 1972, both in speech-language pathology. She was a trainee at Duke University and at the Birmingham, AL Veteran's Administration Hospital during her training and scored in the top one percent nationally on the speech-language pathology certification exam.  She has been on the Speech-Language Pathology faculty of the University of Montevallo, University of Alabama-Gadsden, and University of South Alabama as well as in private and public school settings, hospitals, nursing homes and home health care; she has primarily been in private practice since 1980.

She has been on staff at the Alabama Scottish Rite Learning Centers, providing dyslexia evaluations and intervention planning. She specializes in dyslexia and has special interests in teaching learning strategies that apply across the curriculum and across the lifespan, considering the whole child, improving unintelligible speech, and improving social skills. She has earned numerous Awards for Continuing Education (ACE) from the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association for outstanding continuing education achievement. 

She was part of the Dyslexia Friends group that wrote the Dyslexia Amendments to the Alabama Administrative Code which were unanimously accepted by the AL State Board of Education October 8, 2015 and also helped write the Dyslexia Resource Guide which is on the Alabama State Department of Education website https://www.alsde.edu/sec/ari/Pages/dyslexia-all.aspx?navtext=Dyslexia.

She published “Teaching Chaining to Unintelligible Children” in Language, Speech and Hearing Services in Schools, describing an original approach for intelligibility and language disorders. She developed the Amygdala SPA strategies in 2012 to reduce brain shut-down which she has presented at national and international conferences; she has presented at annual conferences of the British Dyslexia Association, Academy of Orton-Gillingham Practitioners and Educators, the International Dyslexia Association (IDA), the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association, the Speech and Hearing Association of Alabama, the Georgia and Alabama Branches of the IDA and the South-East Regional IDA conference, the 2015 AL State Department of Education MEGA Conference, the Alabama Association of School Psychologists, the Christian Homeschool Education Fellowship (CHEF), Refresh Homeschool Retreats, as well as at numerous regional and local association meetings and inservice training programs. You can see Hettie on her YouTube channel, sharing strategies to improve school and life success.

She served three terms as Secretary of the Speech and Hearing Association of Alabama, two terms as Vice-President of the Alabama Branch of the International Dyslexia Association (ALIDA), and has been President of the Mobile Area Speech and Hearing organization. She co-founded the Dyslexia Education Group of Central Alabama. She is a previous board member of Alabama Game Changers.

Hettie serves on the Board of Spring Valley School and is happy to serve with the Hettie Johnson Institute of Spring Valley School.

hettiej@gmail.com


Board Member Spring Valley School


Board member Hettie Johnson Institute


The Alabama Literacy Act became law May 31, 2019 “to implement steps to improve the reading proficiency of public school kindergarten to third grade students and ensure that those students are able to read at or above grade level by the end of the third grade....” Also, on October 15, 2015, the Alabama State Board of Education adopted the Dyslexia Amendments to the Alabama Administrative Code at which time the AL Dyslexia Resource Guide was created on the AL State Department of Education website:  https://www.alsde.edu/sec/ari/Dyslexia/Dyslexia%20Resource%20Guide%20Draft%2011-1-15_AppendK%20explan-vers.pdf.


SPA Strategies for More Success with Less Stress IDA-AL 2018 Conference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0xDtjLzdfiM



https://tinyurl.com/happyamygdalahandout




https://go.learningally.org/specialist-spotlight-hettie-johnson/?utm_source=Certifer+Master+List&utm_campaign=afa73dbdd4-Specialist_Connection_12_2015&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_09217cf359-afa73dbdd4-170942433


http://harbert.auburn.edu/news/put-a-little-swag-in-your-studies.php


Watch this wonderful interview with Maryanne Wolf of Tufts University:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NyxRIVfrxJs


http://www.supersummary.com/dyslexia-guide/



Mark Seidenberg published an excellent review and commentary regarding the University of Rennes dyslexia study: October 27, 2017 @ 12:53 am · Filed by Mark Seidenberg under Biology of languagePsycholinguisticsReading     Powerful article:  http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=35144


Google Alabama Dyslexia Resource Guide for helpful and encouraging links and information. There are also many helpful videos in the Appendix. https://www.alsde.edu/sec/ari/Dyslexia/Dyslexia%20Resource%20Guide.pdf