Yvonna Graham

Yvonna Graham

Yvonna Graham, MEd, started her career in education in the 1980s at an alternative high school in Las Cruces, New Mexico, where she quickly realized the transformative power of literacy in breaking cycles of failure. Her passion for literacy deepened when her daughter struggled with severe dyslexia. Determined to help, Yvonna pursued a master’s degree with a focus on research-based reading instruction and homeschooled her daughter. These methods were so impactful that her daughter defied expectations, progressing from a teacher’s grim predictions of her future to earning four college degrees, including a doctorate in music composition and a master’s in computer science.

Now, Yvonna continually educates others about neurodiversity in education. She is passionate about literacy and enjoys reading research papers. Fueled by her success and love for helping other students with dyslexia, Yvonna founded Mumbling Marmot Tutoring in Durango, Colorado, where demand for her expertise in dyslexia intervention grew rapidly. She eventually expanded her work by hiring and training tutors to support students from kindergarten through college—and her interest in sharing her methods more widely resulted in her first book, Dyslexia Tool Kit: What to Do When Phonics Isn’t Enough, Expanded Edition (self-published, 2021).

Yvonna’s work has earned her the privilege of being interviewed by literacy pioneers such as Marion Blank (Reading Kingdom), Fernette Eide (The Dyslexic Advantage), and Sam Bommarito (featured speaker at LitCon 2022). (These interviews are all available on YouTube.)

Yvonna received a bachelor’s in psychology from Evangel University in Springfield, Missouri, and a master’s degree in special education with a focus on neurodiversity from the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque. She actively blogs about dyslexia at www.dyslexiakit.net and leads workshops for teachers and parent groups. She also offers private consulting to support parents of students with dyslexia.