Do you have a struggling reader, or do you suspect your child has dyslexia? That’s me! We will just say that he doesn’t fit the mold. He doesn’t learn like other kids do and guess what that’s okay. This is one of the reasons we homeschool. Also, I think that how technology is used today also plays a role in how kids learn. Let me tell you why, remember this is my opinion and my thoughts on the matter, if you don’t agree that’s fine. I am just trying to reach out to those who are at a standstill and are looking for ways to modify their current curriculum to fit the needs of their child. Throughout all my kid’s school careers, I have seen how different it was and still is from my own. I can hear the teacher telling us that we won’t always have a calculator, that is why we need to memorize multiplication facts, well guess what, we always have a calculator now. So, what does that mean for this generation and future generations? It means that the way we teach our kids must be updated just as technology gets updated. The days of memorizing math facts are done, the way spelling used to be taught is done. With today’s advances in technology, we should be teaching kids how to utilize this technology to aid in their learning. Let’s use spelling as an example. Anyone who has a child with dyslexia knows that spelling is a struggle. There is a lot of frustration and tears. My question is why, why are we putting our kids through the old way of learning to spell when there is a smarter way, a more calming way? Technology has taken the need to know how to spell every single word away. Do I think that a child should know the basics of spelling, like knowing letter sounds and connecting those sounds with making words, yes absolutely, but the days of spelling words that are difficult are over, you know, the many words that don’t follow the rules we learned in phonics. Nowadays we can start typing in a word on our phones or computers the way we think it is spelled based on its sounds and technology corrects it. Do you see where I am going with this? My son struggled so much with a spelling word list that no matter what I did he couldn’t spell the words on paper. So, I put my thinking cap on and decided to modify his already dyslexia-based spelling curriculum to fit his needs. We of course still spell the words using letter tiles, but instead of me just sitting there waiting for him to figure it out when he is struggling, I would help by saying the sounds for him. Sometimes, he gets confused because the sounds in the words get jumbled in his brain and he misses letters in the word or puts them in the wrong place. So, saying the sounds out loud to him helps his brain to concentrate on that sound and he would figure out how to spell the word. My biggest thought and what got me thinking about how technology is used today, was the test. The test at the end of the week where he would pull out his notebook and I would tell him a word and he was supposed to spell it on lined paper. My thought is why are we doing spelling tests like this? As I mentioned before, we can just start typing in a word into a text message on our phones and the correct word is going to show itself, so just as long as we recognize the word that we are trying to spell we will use that correct spelling without really knowing how to spell that word. The same with word processing programs, they will show the misspelled word by putting lines under it, you right-click on the word, and a list of words show up and if you can recognize the word you are trying to spell you will click on that it. So, with all of that said, I decided to make spelling tests multiple-choice. I found a website that creates spelling worksheets, you can check it out here if interested: Common Core Worksheets I also use the other worksheets they offer on the website as well. After we go through the instruction and practice spelling the words using letter tiles, I give him a worksheet that requires him to write the word into a crossword, fill in the missing letters, or fill in the blanks with the help of a word box. Then on the fourth day, I give him a multiple-choice test, three are misspelled and one is the correct spelling. I say the word, and he chooses the answer. This method is working out well. So, if you are in the same boat as I am and need to modify the curriculum to suit the needs of your child, just do it, don’t worry about what other people are doing or what society says is the “correct” way of doing things, because the old way of teaching and learning doesn’t work anymore. Technology is making life easier and adjusting the way you teach will help your child to learn by using this technology and still be a successful adult. As a parent and a homeschooler this question crosses my mind all of the time. Having a struggling reader is new to me and knowing the proper way of addressing this is not easy. I have come to terms with that there is no black and white answer. Each child is different, with different struggles and one size fits all solution does not work. So my question is, "What should my struggling reader read?" The Struggle Is Real! As you can tell by now I have a struggling reader. He just couldn't get it, there were so many issues. If you would like to learn more about my son's struggles check out my blog post, how to help a struggling reader. As he has gotten older he is a better reader. Is he reading Shakespeare? No, but who wants to read that, I know I don't! I did notice that looking for books for struggling readers is not the same as looking for books for non struggling readers. You can't just search for books for kids age 14 or for grade 9 because when my son opens those books he just shuts down. Why? Well he sees all of those words and his brain says, "Nope, not today!" Of course my mind goes to its only my kid no one else's kid is like this, I must not be doing my job as a parent. Well I learned real fast that most struggling readers are like this. I have heard from several parents that providing reading material that the child is interested in is key. Of course when I thought about this, I thought well I am a good reader but when I am reading something that I am not interested in, I kind of struggle through it. It may not be reading the actual words, but comprehending what I am reading is not happening. So why should this be any different for our young readers? So I did an experiment. My son does not like to see pages with only words. Wait, I know what you are thinking, when he is out in the "real world" he will most likely encounter reading material that is all words and no pictures. Yes you are right, but.. By showing him books where the paragraphs are divided by pictures seems to help him. He doesn't see it as an overwhelming task. Sometimes in the books that he is reading, there will be a page where there are only words and how I deal with this is I tell him to focus on the words he is reading and not the number of words on the page. Then I tried a book that did have mostly words, but the font was bigger, so that meant less words were on the page. This worked as well. But what does this mean, well books where the fonts are bigger are not 9th grade reading level books. So now you see the struggle with finding books for him to read. So, it looks like I have a dilemma on my hands. I don't want to get him "baby books" as he calls it, but he gets overly frustrated with books that are deemed for his age. Reading Material Comic books, graphic novels, audio books, poems, ect. Yep you read that right, there are a bunch of material that a struggling reader can practice reading while building confidence to be able to comfortably read those "real world" reading materials. My son loves Batman. So I found him a Batman graphic novel. I do have to remind him to read for at least 20 minutes a day, but overall he doesn't give me any problems about it. These types of books I let him read on his own. I have him read me a poem everyday for school, so I make sure he is progressing in his reading. But you may be wondering how I know that he is reading the Batman story and not just looking at the pictures. Well, he is constantly asking me questions about the things he is reading. He will ask me if certain things that happened in the book happened in the movie. So right there tells me he is actually reading the words. We don't use audio books but I do read to him and have him follow along in his book as I read. I do this by scanning the pages of the book and put them on my computer. I personally think the key to audio books are to have the child read along with it. This way they can make the connection in their brain on what those pesky words are that you can't apply the phonics rules to. As I mentioned above poems are great too. I have him read a poem at the beginning of school day. Oh and any time he asks me what something says, I say you can read, figure it out. He just needs a little push, 9 times out of 10 he reads it, if he struggles, we work it out together. Graphic novels are new to me in a sense that I always thought they were just manga, which my son does not like. But more and more companies are producing graphic novels and one of those companies are The Tuttle Twins! I love the Tuttle Twins and I know you will too! Is your child interested in entrepreneurship, does he or she love corn dogs? Well this graphic novel is going to be perfect. While you are there check out there other great graphic novels! Disclaimer: I am an affiliate of The Tuttle Twins, I will earn a small commission when you make a purchase using the links in the blog post. One of the most important things you can do for a struggling reader is to keep him or her reading. It doesn’t have to be a novel or something fancy, just have them read something. As you hear your child read you will pick up on strengths and weaknesses and then create a strategy that will help your child move to the next level. Over the years I have seen what troubles my son has, and I have created a few strategies and found some that work and some that don’t. Reading Weaknesses Every child is different. Each child is going to have his or her own challenges when it comes to reading. My son struggles with decoding words and slowing his brain down. It amazes me how he can read big words that I wouldn’t think he would know and struggles with words that I feel would be easy for him. By easy I mean sounding them out. We all know that the English language is tricky, and some words don’t follow the phonics rules. That is one thing my son struggled with and still struggles with to a degree. He still has trouble with sounding some words out, he will say that “y” says “w” and for some reason he switches “on” and “in”. He also struggles with sounding out parts of the words and putting them together. If I sound them out for him he gets it but when he tries to do it himself he either adds sounds that are not there are just starts guessing. Strategies I have come up with so many different strategies to help him be a better reader. A lot of those failed. Some of them were boring or they were too repetitive, and he was just getting frustrated. Then I finally found a few that work. The first one is reading the story to him first. We are about to be finished with All About Reading Level 4 and we are just reading the stories. I will read him the story first and I will make him follow along as I read. This helps him see the words as I am saying them. After he gets a day to process what I read to him (I noticed giving him a day for his brain to process the information helps a lot), he will read me the same story the next day. Any words he misses, I create a fun board game to help him get familiar with the words. Next strategy I use is to have him put his finger under the words as he is reading. I truly believe this helps his brain slow down and focus on his finger which helps him focus on the words. I have seen him read page after page without missing a word using this method. As soon as he stops doing that, he is missing words left and right. I say to him, “See how well you are reading when you put your finger under the words.” He responded that he doesn’t like doing that because people will know he struggles to read. That broke my heart. But I put my feelings aside and told him that there are adults who use this strategy to this day when they are reading. I also told him that there is no shame in doing that because that is what works for his brain and everyone’s brain is different. Then I added in so humor saying that people don’t make movies about the normal kid (I saw a meme that said that). He just laughed. He is still struggling with decoding the words. I say look at the word, find words you know within the word, or I say, just sound each letter out slow and then say it together fast. It’s a process. Conclusion There is no perfect solution. There is no one education fits all. It is the journey that makes a difference. It is trial and error and when you find a strategy that works, it will be like a light bulb went off. This will not only be an accomplishment for you as the parent, but also be a great accomplishment for your child. An accomplishment that will make him and her want to keep going, want to be the best reader they can be. I never thought after having two girls that turned out to be good readers that my third child would be a struggling reader. My third child is my only son and I thought I failed as a mother because my child couldn’t read at the age of 9. But as I did more research, I realized that it wasn’t me, it was his brain, after many years of struggling we are seeing a light at the end of the tunnel. I do have to give credit to All About Reading. Their system is what made reading make sense for my child. Early Struggles My son was about to turn 5, so that meant it was time to start school, well that didn’t happen. At 5 years old he was not able to pass the kindergarten entry test, so we waited a year. That didn’t do any good either, he was still in the same place. The problem was he couldn’t retain the information, no matter how hard he tried he couldn’t remember things that were taught to him 30 minutes before. At this time, he was in a public school, so he moved on to the first grade and then second and he still couldn’t read. So, the school had him tested. They declared that he was border line dyslexic and that he would need to be on an IEP. To make a long story short, the school was not accommodating and was going to push him on to the third grade knowing that he would never be able to take the third-grade reading test that is required by my state. So, I did what I thought was best for my son and pulled him out of public school and decided to traditionally homeschool him. Homeschool Troubles Believe me when I say that our troubles were not gone because we decided to homeschool. No, things were not changing. We tried so many different curriculums and we even tried game schooling, nothing was working. I especially noticed that he would be able to get big words but struggled with little words like in and on, he would say one for the other. I also noticed that he was prone to guessing words instead of trying to sound them out. It was frustrating, but, I understood that his brain was not going to process the information if it was not ready, so I tried one more curriculum, mind you my son was 11 and still struggling at this time. We tried All About Reading! It changed his life and mine. All About Reading All About Reading was founded by Marie Rippel. She developed this curriculum based on the Orton-Gillingham Approach. It is hands on, and it can work with any type of learner. They also have a spelling program using the same approach as the reading program. There are 4 levels. The levels are not grade levels. I recommend starting with level one no matter what age your child is. There is a teacher book, student pages, letter tiles, word cards, letter cards and readers. Once you buy the letter tiles you don’t have to buy them again when you purchase the other levels and you can use them for the spelling program too. To learn more about Marie Rippel and the company click here. Why Did it Work for Us? This program changed our lives. I finally realized that he needed the hands-on approach. He needed to be able to see and touch the letters in words. This helped with sounding out the words, which to this day is his biggest hang-up. He needed to see the flash cards and be able to touch each letter on the flash card to learn the words. The fun worksheets and games were just the right amount of fun to keep him focused and not bored. All of this with the huge brain growth worked for my child. I also realized that if he puts his finger underneath the words as he reads, he is a better reader. Don’t get me wrong he still struggles, he would not be at grade level according to public school standards, but he is making progress and that what matters. He also needs to be reminded a lot about when to sound out words or remind him that he can read if he tries. Click here to learn more about the reading levels and the spelling program. Conclusion I highly encourage parents with struggling readers, homeschooled or not, to check out this program. You will see improvement with your child’s reading faster than any other programs, in my opinion anyways. One thing to remember is that it is important for your child to keep reading, even if it is a paragraph a day, just keep reading. Once the brain grows enough to retain information, the more they read the better they will get. |
Hi! I'm Robin. I am a sister in Christ, a wife second, and a homeschooling mom third.
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