Having a dyslexic child.

I am entering my fourth year as an Orton Gillingham tutor and originally got into it, as so many others do, because of personal experience.  When my son was in kindergarten and the first grade, he seemed very bright and it didn't make sense that he wasn't learning his letters in the same way that the other children were.  Other children with similar curiosities and intellect were picking things up quickly.  Even into the first grade things were slow.  People kept telling me to "give him time" and "he'll get it eventually" because he was so curious and seemed bright in so many other ways.  One very well meaning person even thought all he needed was a colored overlay to put over the print and that would help him read better.  She also suggested that we work with someone who did eye tracking exercises thinking that would help, since he already wore glasses.

This experience is very common for people with dyslexic children.  The reality is that most teachers, unless they have taken the initiative to learn more about dyslexia and what it looks like in children, have no idea what it looks like and how to help these children.  And, the reality is that unless these children get the help they need as soon as possible, they will continue to fall behind their peers and might never catch up.  This is called The Matthew Effect.  Basically it says that the good readers get better while the poor readers continue to fall behind.

 I knew to have him tested in the second grade only because I'm a teacher and I firmly believe in getting an educational assessment for a variety of reason.  But, the biggest reason is so that as parents we would know what was going on with him and be able to make a plan of action to help him learn to read and learn to read better.  As the old saying goes, "Knowing is half the battle."

Armed with test results, I went to the private school he attended and brought all of my recommendations with me.  Some were instituted, some not, and he continued to work with the "reading specialist" provided by our local public school system, and at the same time I found someone Orton Gillingham certified  to work with him.  She started working with him at the end of his 2nd grade year, worked with him over the summer and throughout 3rd grade, and made a world of difference for him.   She will always have a special place in my heart.  Of course, we had to pay for her services out of pocket, but I would do it again in a heartbeat.  She was wonderful.

Therein lies one of the biggest problems.  "Reading Specialists" are NOT required to know anything about dyslexia, its symptoms or its remediation.   Even in my current work at a local university, getting a Reading Endorsement on my teaching license, no one has even touched on dyslexia, what it is, or what to do about it.  Most of these children fall through the cracks.

My son is now in the 5th grade and doing much better.  He has an intervention specialist (who just happens to be a friend of mine) who comes in and works with him twice a week at school.  Last year they worked a lot on his language arts and reading assignments together.  She would help him organize his work and in the 4th grade they worked a lot on prefixes, suffixes, bases in words, etc.  He was fascinated, and his spelling has improved greatly because of it.    He's definitely not typical in terms of remediation for a dyslexic child, but he's been successful so far.  And I am very grateful.

Do you have a dyslexic child?  Do you have children in your classroom who, despite your best efforts just don't seem to get it?  Please let me know.

Vocabulary enrichment that's fun!

Vocabulary development in children is a real issue sometimes.  Even for us as adults, we're able to comprehend much more vocabulary than we use in our daily lives.   It's even truer for children.    


One website I've come across is Freerice.com, and their mission is to fight hunger worldwide by donating 10 grains of rice for every right answer given on their site.  It's neat too, in that children can see exactly how much rice they've been able to donate via their right answers.    It's probably most appropriate for 3rd grades on up, but even adults will have fun with this site while doing something worthwile. 

Marcia Henry

As I began  my journey into learning about dyslexia and Orton Gillingham tutoring, one name that kept coming up over and over again was Marcia Henry.  Part of my requirements for training was to read her book, Unlocking Literacy, Effective Decoding and Spelling Instruction.  It's been one of the most useful books I have in my professional library and the one that has lots of dog-eared pages and a worn cover.

Marcia Henry is another reading researcher who has based all of her information on research and in turn has created some best practices.   Her forte is morphology, or the study of the changing words in the English Language.  Anytime you have a chance to listen to her speak or to even attend a conference that talks about the morphology of the English Language, I highly recommend it.

Whenever I get into morphology with my dyslexic kids, their spelling takes off.  It suddenly makes so much sense, and they are able to look at words in a different way.  I think it's because it appeals to their intellect and that's how these children learn best.

Here's a link to a blog post on Vocabulogic written by Marcia Henry.

Marcia Henry on Vocabulogic

Once you start reading her information, I hope you discover how wonderful her work is and how much sense it makes in literacy instruction .  Enjoy!

More Resources

 Anyone who knows me knows that I am a huge proponent of research based practices.  We as teachers can look at what other teachers are doing and copy what they do, but unless it's backed by research as being proven to increase reading skills, we'll just be doing what's always been done.  I know we learn a lot from each others as teachers, but when you ask Sue down the hall how she increases her students fluency, you have no idea whether it's been proven by research to increase fluency, or it's just something that she's always done.  Doesn't mean it isn't a good activity, but it's not based in research.

I came across a website today that not only has information, but also links to papers this man has written, all based on reaserch he's conducted.   His name is Dr. Richard Allington, and his website is:

Teachersread.net

You can find the link to his papers and articles here.

I know we're all busy and barely have time to plan our lessons and keep up with life, much less do research on best practices.  But if you ever do have time and find that you're looking for a different way, take a look.  You just might be surprised. :)

Podcasts for Adults

I know I haven't touched much on my experience in working with Dyslexic children.  I will get into dyslexia more as the year progresses and tutoring starts back up again for the year.  I did come across a list of podcasts that have to do with dyslexia and related information.  You might find it helpful.

Go here and click on "Podcasts" at the top of the page.

I hope you enjoy them as much as I do!

Podcasts

As I was thinking more about audio books, I realized there are a plethora of podcasts developed for children, many of which are free.   One of my, my son's, and children with whom I've worked favorites is Story Nory.  The podcasts are available for free on Itunes.

I believe Story Nory podcasts originate in the UK, and the stories are mostly read by people with British accents, which makes them very lovely to listen to.  When my son was younger, we would download many stories for trips and he'd listen to them quite a lot.  His favorite story was Tick Tock Turkey and The Disappearing Sandwich because it deals with time travel, one of his interests.

I've used Story Nory stories for listening at school at the end of a long day with my 3-6 year olds, where the children lay on the floor in the dark, relaxing, and I've used them in a Reading Practicum I did this past summer with 4th graders.  They've all loved them.  I think you will took.

There are other podcasts of stories out there for children, and some of them are free.  These are the ones out of which I've gotten the most mileage.  Hopefully you will too.

If you know of others that have been successes for you, please leave a comment and let us know!  Thanks!

Audio Books

I recently came across this article on audio books and their benefit for young children.  Audio books for young children  are also known as books on tape, and some traditional classrooms call them "listening centers".  I've had books on tape and cd in the classroom for years and absolutely agree that they're wonderful for young children.

Sometimes when we're having a meeting at school I'll use a book on tape/cd for the meeting instead of reading the book aloud.  It's a completely different experience for the children.  They're mesmerized, taken to a completely different place in the world of the story.  It doesn't matter if it's the youngest child or the oldest child in the space, they get completely drawn in.

Quoted from the article,

"Hearing a book read on tape helps her see how the words on the page can come alive in a fluid, expressive way. It helps her focus on the sounds of words read without interruption and provides a model of fluent reading. Audio books also give her an important introduction to listening — a skill that she must master in order to learn to read. "

So true, so very very true.

Audio books for young children are available at the local library if you don't have access to any, and I have had much success in ordering them inexpensively through Scholastic Books.

Scholastic Audio Books

Happy Listening!