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arliemaria
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My son is 2E (Gifted/Dyslexic). He is not a non-reader and is reading beginner readers pretty well. I just became aware of a free tutoring program at a local church. Basically we would show up and they do homework and work with the student on their needed areas. I am thinking of participating. I am not sure if there is a curriculum that would work well to once a week sessions of about an hour in length. Any advice? I thought about getting a Memoria Press Literature Student Guide and book. Our first session would be next Wednesday so something that I could download and put in a binder would work best.

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He is 8 (born 5/09). He was born with a congenital diaphragmatic hernia. Major delays (no eating until 2, delayed speech) and were in Missouri First Steps for therapies for a long time.  He does not qualify for speech or any of those related services.

 

Goal would just be to have more assistance. I, of course, want the best for him.  He has come a long long way in the past 6 months or so with reading. He can read level 3 readers well on his own now.  I don't know how to jump to the next step though into more chapter book length books.  He has Wild Robot out from the library and we have been partner reading that.  Also I am a homeschool mom with two other little children (5 year old and 2 year old). Perhaps this could just be another time in our day/lives that he is reading. We read occasionally to a therapy dog on Tuesday at the library.  We recently got a puppy but he is not always calm enough when we try to do this at home. He reads to me daily, his sister daily, to himself daily. We listen to audiobooks/podcasts almost daily. He reads some of our evening prayers every night. Does lessons with his father 4-5 evenings a week. But if I am completely honest I don't get a lot of reading/phonics instruction with him every day. He is reading now so we will stop and discuss words. Yesterday in his Beast Academy we broke down equilateral.  This could just be another time every week where he has reading time. If he did both sessions the 4 and 5 session one could be reading and the second more competition/challenging problem solving type math.

 

Learning at home we do most of the reading aloud from his books or alongside him. We are using Ambleside Online Year 2 as our primary course work.  He does a lot of prodigy math and he will have the computer read him the questions, but more and more he doesn't need it. 

 

Hopefully that helps with some more insight into our lives.

 

 

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I was just going through our bookshelves and think perhaps he could read with some help The Matchlock Gun. That plus some discussion questions (maybe I could find some Bloom's Taxonomy questions online) and copywork could be good. Then for math maybe Singapore Math Challenging Word Problems or Kangeroo Math contest questions. I want to do those with him, but we frequently run out of time.

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It's quite possible this will be supervised homework completion vs. actual tutoring. In my very limited experience with these programs, it's really a chance for the child to have an adult sit with them and help them overcome procrastination, answer common sense questions about what the assignment means, and then if the child is struggling with, say, math, help with math facts and that sort of thing. It has not been 1:1 or instruction-oriented when I've seen it. If this is actually geared toward special needs or something, it might be different. 

 

I think it's possible that your son could do the tasks you mentioned at this program (anything in a workbook would be good), but I wanted you to know what I've seen in case that helps you anticipate. 

 

Good luck! It sounds like it would be a real help to have an extra hand. 

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I offer free tutoring at my church. It is homework help. It is not one-on-one help. I would certainly not be able to help a child with such significant needs in the tutoring session that I run.  Of course this might be completely different, but I would want you to ask the tutor first, if she/he is comfortable and is able to take this on at that time. 

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I was just going through our bookshelves and think perhaps he could read with some help The Matchlock Gun. That plus some discussion questions (maybe I could find some Bloom's Taxonomy questions online) and copywork could be good. Then for math maybe Singapore Math Challenging Word Problems or Kangeroo Math contest questions. I want to do those with him, but we frequently run out of time.

 

I just read this book and I think I'd rather read this alongside Robby instead of with someone I am not too familiar with. Some sensitive subjects.  Any recommendations?

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I would strongly discourage you from having anyone not qualified or trained to work with learning disabilities working with your ds in his areas of disability. They won't be prepared to have it go well. You've already said this his areas of disability are challenging enough that he struggles to remain calm, enjoys the presence of a therapy dog, etc.

 

No, I would not give him speed drills either. Those are things that require motivators and reinforcement to go well. If he's slow at his math facts, it's very likely due to low processing speed or some other disability, which again makes it inappropriate to hand off to someone not prepared to deal with that.

 

My ds is gifted with significant disabilities. (all the SLDs, autism, apraxia) We've done work with paid, low level workers, college students who were maybe $15 an hour who could answer questions but were maybe not really prepared to do actual intervention. What I found best with them, and I'm just being blunt, is idiot-proof. We started low, with things we KNEW he could succeed at, and we had the materials so straightforward that a direct entry worker like that, someone with minimal training but some compassion and enthusiasm, could come alongside and make happen. Things that worked well in that?

 

-Doodling books from Timberdoodle--They're AWESOME, they're fine, they're fine motor, they're language, they're a tidbit of reading. You'll love 'em and they're worth doing. And the lovely thing is, the doodling there translated into enthusiasm for notebooking, so now he will notebook for our state study! So it's not a distraction. This is actually something seriously worth doing.

-puzzles--Can your ds stay calm and complete puzzles? Any sort of self-checking, self-correcting materials will do. File folder games, Versa-tiles (I think Timberdoodle sells something like this by a different name, same idea). But really, puzzles are fab. Can he do a 30 piece or 50 piece puzzle? Maybe you need to start lower even.

-worksheets from Teacher Created, Evan Moor, Scholastic, Carson Dellosa--It takes some work to pick really carefully. Think about the balance here, how you can have some things that are more motivating (doodling books, etc.) and some things that maybe are going to need that person right there to help with. So he's working the whole time, but he only needs the especially one-on-one help during these pages. And they have all kinds. It's sneaky reading. Like instead of sitting down with a whole book, it's just a few sentences on a page, kwim? You can get simple math workbooks, cut and paste science workbooks, sequencing workbooks, you name it. I use TONS of this stuff with my ds. So, so, so worthwhile for just this scenario. I have my ds going through the Spotlight on Reading series right now. I think it's from Carson Dellosa. We're doing the Success in Writing, Success in Grammar workbooks from Scholastic. These are GREAT, really adorable, really on-target with good skills, and they're stuff anyone can supervise and help make happen. Fwiw, I have my ds doing the *1st grade* books in those Scholastic Success books. My goal is success, kwim? I want momentum and confidence. It's WORK for him to read what is on the page and answer. And some of these workbooks are nice, because they'll have multiple choice options for answering. The success books I either scribe or let him color or draw lines. So, depending on your ds' mix of disabilities, you may need to give instructions like that.

-dot to dots--These are just walmart, dollar tree, whatever, but there are better ones you can find sometimes that are skip counting, the alphabet, etc. And if he nails small d2d, you can get the long ones that go up into the hundreds! Timberdoodle sells them. Photocopy them so you have them on single pages, then you can print his pages for the day and paperclip into a packet. I'm not saying plagiarize. I'm saying for my purpose all in a book isn't useful. I need to be able to give my ds one page at a time, and that works better in your situation too.

-mazes

-word searches--I hit jackpot atWord Searches Activity Book Grade K-1 | Carson-Dellosa Publishing  They have a series under the Frank Schaffer label that says Homework Helpers that goes through a bunch of levels (k5, advanced k5, 1st, 2nd). LOVE these, super fabulous.

-Fountas & Pinnell readers--I get these and many other goodies through the curriculum library at our local university branch. F&P are kind of standard gig for ps reading instruction. They're total bunk for phonics, honestly, but they've been REALLY HELPFUL to my ds in breaking down that *anxiety* over reading. They have levels (A, B, etc.) and they build from just a word or two on each page (I kid you not) to full sentences and multiple sentences. And every page has pictures, which has really been fabulous for helping my ds' comprehension. You can just see his expectation increasing that he should understand what he's reading. And it gives me a way to get in *more reading* while still keeping the level simple. And they're simple enough that you could send a little pile of 3 or 4 with him as part of his work and he could bang through them with the helper, no problem. And you wouldn't be crying that they didn't do a good job. 

 

If your goal is for him to work independently part of the time, then the work has to be work he can already do independently, not at instructional level. And work he does with an aide worker is something that is also below instructional level, something he's been instructed in and sorta gets but maybe still needs a little help to do independently.

 

So the more you back off, bring down the level, bring it into reach and make it EASY, the more you're able to get a successful, positive momentum going. THEN you can start to bring up the level.

 

I would consider sending a tablet and having him do immersion reading or having reward time be time on educational apps for spelling or math. That probably means you'll need to send a dedicated device. Or you could see if they have a computer there and you could specify what his reward activity is. We ALWAYS finish with reward activities. This sounds like it will be a good stretch for him. :)

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I would strongly discourage you from having anyone not qualified or trained to work with learning disabilities working with your ds in his areas of disability. They won't be prepared to have it go well. You've already said this his areas of disability are challenging enough that he struggles to remain calm, enjoys the presence of a therapy dog, etc.

 

No, I would not give him speed drills either. Those are things that require motivators and reinforcement to go well. If he's slow at his math facts, it's very likely due to low processing speed or some other disability, which again makes it inappropriate to hand off to someone not prepared to deal with that.

 

My ds is gifted with significant disabilities. (all the SLDs, autism, apraxia) We've done work with paid, low level workers, college students who were maybe $15 an hour who could answer questions but were maybe not really prepared to do actual intervention. What I found best with them, and I'm just being blunt, is idiot-proof. We started low, with things we KNEW he could succeed at, and we had the materials so straightforward that a direct entry worker like that, someone with minimal training but some compassion and enthusiasm, could come alongside and make happen. Things that worked well in that?

 

-Doodling books from Timberdoodle--They're AWESOME, they're fine, they're fine motor, they're language, they're a tidbit of reading. You'll love 'em and they're worth doing. And the lovely thing is, the doodling there translated into enthusiasm for notebooking, so now he will notebook for our state study! So it's not a distraction. This is actually something seriously worth doing.

-puzzles--Can your ds stay calm and complete puzzles? Any sort of self-checking, self-correcting materials will do. File folder games, Versa-tiles (I think Timberdoodle sells something like this by a different name, same idea). But really, puzzles are fab. Can he do a 30 piece or 50 piece puzzle? Maybe you need to start lower even.

-worksheets from Teacher Created, Evan Moor, Scholastic, Carson Dellosa--It takes some work to pick really carefully. Think about the balance here, how you can have some things that are more motivating (doodling books, etc.) and some things that maybe are going to need that person right there to help with. So he's working the whole time, but he only needs the especially one-on-one help during these pages. And they have all kinds. It's sneaky reading. Like instead of sitting down with a whole book, it's just a few sentences on a page, kwim? You can get simple math workbooks, cut and paste science workbooks, sequencing workbooks, you name it. I use TONS of this stuff with my ds. So, so, so worthwhile for just this scenario. I have my ds going through the Spotlight on Reading series right now. I think it's from Carson Dellosa. We're doing the Success in Writing, Success in Grammar workbooks from Scholastic. These are GREAT, really adorable, really on-target with good skills, and they're stuff anyone can supervise and help make happen. Fwiw, I have my ds doing the *1st grade* books in those Scholastic Success books. My goal is success, kwim? I want momentum and confidence. It's WORK for him to read what is on the page and answer. And some of these workbooks are nice, because they'll have multiple choice options for answering. The success books I either scribe or let him color or draw lines. So, depending on your ds' mix of disabilities, you may need to give instructions like that.

-dot to dots--These are just walmart, dollar tree, whatever, but there are better ones you can find sometimes that are skip counting, the alphabet, etc. And if he nails small d2d, you can get the long ones that go up into the hundreds! Timberdoodle sells them. Photocopy them so you have them on single pages, then you can print his pages for the day and paperclip into a packet. I'm not saying plagiarize. I'm saying for my purpose all in a book isn't useful. I need to be able to give my ds one page at a time, and that works better in your situation too.

-mazes

-word searches--I hit jackpot atWord Searches Activity Book Grade K-1 | Carson-Dellosa Publishing  They have a series under the Frank Schaffer label that says Homework Helpers that goes through a bunch of levels (k5, advanced k5, 1st, 2nd). LOVE these, super fabulous.

-Fountas & Pinnell readers--I get these and many other goodies through the curriculum library at our local university branch. F&P are kind of standard gig for ps reading instruction. They're total bunk for phonics, honestly, but they've been REALLY HELPFUL to my ds in breaking down that *anxiety* over reading. They have levels (A, B, etc.) and they build from just a word or two on each page (I kid you not) to full sentences and multiple sentences. And every page has pictures, which has really been fabulous for helping my ds' comprehension. You can just see his expectation increasing that he should understand what he's reading. And it gives me a way to get in *more reading* while still keeping the level simple. And they're simple enough that you could send a little pile of 3 or 4 with him as part of his work and he could bang through them with the helper, no problem. And you wouldn't be crying that they didn't do a good job. 

 

If your goal is for him to work independently part of the time, then the work has to be work he can already do independently, not at instructional level. And work he does with an aide worker is something that is also below instructional level, something he's been instructed in and sorta gets but maybe still needs a little help to do independently.

 

So the more you back off, bring down the level, bring it into reach and make it EASY, the more you're able to get a successful, positive momentum going. THEN you can start to bring up the level.

 

I would consider sending a tablet and having him do immersion reading or having reward time be time on educational apps for spelling or math. That probably means you'll need to send a dedicated device. Or you could see if they have a computer there and you could specify what his reward activity is. We ALWAYS finish with reward activities. This sounds like it will be a good stretch for him. :)

 

Thank you for your response. I've always enjoyed reading your comments. Robby doesn't have a problem remaining calm. I am sorry I must not have written clearly enough. We go to the library so he can read to the therapy dog just as another outlet for reading aloud practice.  Because he enjoyed this so much we got a family dog recently. He is now a five month old Great Pyrenees puppy. He is fantastic, but we haven't been able to do much reading aloud with our dog, Hugo, like they do at the library because Hugo gets excited and thinks it is play time when we try to do this with him. Robby has done many classes outside of the home. This summer he went to our local community college for two classes.  He took another full day class at a local library presented by another community college. He has presented science fair projects and won since he was 5 years old. I just want to continue to have him read for as much as we can daily.  

 

Robby is very unique like all children. I could share with you if you'd like his WISC-V scores, but his processing speeds were at the top of the average range, but because everything else was soo soo high this is noticeably low.  Before he did his testing I remember commenting to the psychologist how I worried about his speed with them addition/subtraction fact speeds.  After he scored so high on the mathematical portions she said she would not worry about him memorizing these facts.  I haven't forced it, but I know he could benefit from more practice here.  An example, two public school brothers from our local parish were quizzing him a few Sundays ago. They asked him 7x4. After a minute Robby said 21. They laughed. I know Robby can answer this and much more. He has different ways of thinking sometimes. Instead of just rote memorization he does things like: 4X8 is 4X4 is 16 times 2 (to double 4) is 32. 

 

After thinking on this last night and this morning, I think I might have him work on his keeping--his Charlotte Mason style poetry and nature notebooks during this time.  Those are tasks that he needs quiet focus and not have his little sisters interrupting him. I want him to work on these everyweek, but we don't always get to them.It could be a dedicated time for him to work on these.  Copywork, scientific illustrations, art. Also I could send along a book that if they have time he could read aloud to one of the tutors.  I could send along the 'assignment' and materials. Perhaps something like draw the lifecycle of the monarch as shown on page 45. Or continue work on copying Walter De La Mare's poem Some One.  The thing with copywork is he could not do this for an entire hour. So if his first hour is to work on language arts I could include copywork in his poetry notebook.  I just need to figure out how he could use this first hour to focus on literacy/language arts. Copying his poetry he could probably work on for 15 minutes or so before his work starts to get sloppy.  The second hour could be his nature notebook or something similar.

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I don't do speed drills with my dyslexic kiddo either. It will just cause a meltdown that's not needed. We are going through Times Tales for multiplication and love it. My 7 year old even has multiplication facts memorized now too.

 

I would work on mnemonics not drills.

 

As a warm up exercise in the morning I have him recite the multiples of 3 and 4 and it is becoming more automatic, but I don't stress speed.

 

I agree an unqualified tutor would not be helpful.

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I don't do speed drills with my dyslexic kiddo either. It will just cause a meltdown that's not needed. We are going through Times Tales for multiplication and love it. My 7 year old even has multiplication facts memorized now too.

 

I would work on mnemonics not drills.

 

As a warm up exercise in the morning I have him recite the multiples of 3 and 4 and it is becoming more automatic, but I don't stress speed.

 

I agree an unqualified tutor would not be helpful.

 

Could you give an example of this with math?

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1) I suggest you contact the tutor and learn more about the set-up and what he or she can do.

 

2) There was a math workbook called perhaps Daily Math -- but would not need to be done daily that had a bit of this and a bit of that sort of problem for one page. I used it when my son had a mastery program (MUS) so as to get some other areas that a more mixed up program might have included. It could work for once per week, with someone present to ask a qn of if needed.  I like the idea of him working on things that usually would get interrupted by younger sibs--though you don't know how quiet and calm the church study hall will be.

 

slightly off topic:

 

3) Hugo may be more calm to be read to if you have him exercised to the point of puppy tiredness first--and so long as it is ok with your ds if Hugo falls asleep while  read to.  And some readings may lend toward greater calmness than others.  Hugo might do well learning that reading means calm, not play, if he is already tired and with some soothing poetry rather than an exciting adventure.  

 

Hugo and your ds might like The Buddy the dog series (Buddy is a golden retriever who is read to as a therapy dog, and also solves mysteries) as easy readers. Or somewhat harder would be the Hank the Cowdog series.  After my ds finished his sound out chapter books from High Noon, (but while still being remediated for dyslexia) The Buddy books were some of the first books he read, followed by The Magic Tree House  and the Hank the dog series.

 

4) If you are not averse to computers, my ds used Sumdog online which greatly helped his math facts and speed.

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1) I suggest you contact the tutor and learn more about the set-up and what he or she can do.

 

2) There was a math workbook called perhaps Daily Math -- but would not need to be done daily that had a bit of this and a bit of that sort of problem for one page. I used it when my son had a mastery program (MUS) so as to get some other areas that a more mixed up program might have included. It could work for once per week, with someone present to ask a qn of if needed.  I like the idea of him working on things that usually would get interrupted by younger sibs--though you don't know how quiet and calm the church study hall will be.

 

slightly off topic:

 

3) Hugo may be more calm to be read to if you have him exercised to the point of puppy tiredness first--and so long as it is ok with your ds if Hugo falls asleep while  read to.  And some readings may lend toward greater calmness than others.  Hugo might do well learning that reading means calm, not play, if he is already tired and with some soothing poetry rather than an exciting adventure.  

 

Hugo and your ds might like The Buddy the dog series (Buddy is a golden retriever who is read to as a therapy dog, and also solves mysteries) as easy readers. Or somewhat harder would be the Hank the Cowdog series.  After my ds finished his sound out chapter books from High Noon, (but while still being remediated for dyslexia) The Buddy books were some of the first books he read, followed by The Magic Tree House  and the Hank the dog series.

 

4) If you are not averse to computers, my ds used Sumdog online which greatly helped his math facts and speed.

 

1) I will contact them again. My initial contact was good, but I will try to call Monday and talk to her more about what to expect, what to bring, etc.  They began last Wednesday, but I only found out about it on Thursday, so our first session will be this coming Wednesday.  Do you think it would be wrong to bring say 4 items, that he works on for approximately 20 minutes each? 

 

-Read Aloud (if someone is willing to listen to/help him)

-Poetry copywork

-Singapore Math IP workbook

-Nature Notebook

 

2) I just got Singapore Math Intensive Problems 3A. I was thinking of him working on just a few pages out of it, mostly as review. I will need to go over the double/triple digit multiplication with him before he gets to those questions, however.

 

3) Good ideas and suggestions to use with Hugo. I will request that Buddy book from the library.

 

4) Just tried to sign up for Sumdog, but tried as a teacher, but probably needed to do so as a Parent.

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1) yes. 

 

4) can't recall if I signed up as teacher or parent. I never used the ability to check on what he was learning part, but might have been teacher because I recall we made up a name for our homeschool to enter where it wanted a school name.  I think it might have been tricky at first, but once done it stayed done, and was better than going on as just a "guest" because it remembered progress and gave correct next types of problems. My ds only used free games.

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Had more time to think on this today.  Here are the items/assignments I'm currently planning on sending:

 

1) Christian Liberty Nature Reader #1 (We've read some of it, but because we are reading other things this has been something on the sidelines for a long time.)

2) Copywork on Hiawatha's Childhood. (Even if he only completes a stanza every week that would be great progress if it is done with his best effort.)

3) Sinapore Math Intensive Problems 3A 

4) His nature notebook. (I will give him a different thing to work on each week based on something we've observed or read about.)

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What is your goal for copywork?

 

Asking because I did not find it an especially productive thing with my dyslexic ds --though it sounds like my ds has worse dyslexia than yours, as well as dysgraphia.  

We are Charlotte Mason homeschoolers and copywork is something that is supposed to happen daily.  We haven't done much copywork or actually writing of words for awhile. I was doing dictation with Dictation day by day, but we honestly lost the binder. I don't know if someone threw it away or it was truly just misplaced.  Maybe it was a year and a half now (we moved a year ago and we haven't done much of it since we've been in our new house.) Robby would do copywork of fun things from books we've read either Kipling or Stevenson from Ambleside Online Year 1. We are still working through year 2, but we've already done many of the books in year 3. Goals would be to work on habit of attention, strengthen his hand, and continue to improve his handwriting.  

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Your ds's dyslexia or dysgraphia are mild enough, I guess, that he is getting benefits from the copywork?  

 

For my ds, copywork turned out to be merely a busy work exercise. He did not connect what he was doing with his hand into language centers in his brain. It may as well have been drawing random squiggles.  Granted, that could still help hand strength and attention.

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Tonight was the night. They did a quick reading assessment based on a graded word list.  I cannot remember what it was called specifically. I think the volunteer was going to text me the link, but she said he was 3rd grade 6th month reading level.  Perhaps that is correct, but while we use Word Mastery at home, he still has trouble reading quickly/fluently the short vowel/long vowel page like: tap tape, pin pine, etc. They read the next short section in the Christian Liberty Nature Reader #1. Afterwards she helped him with blends which is something he has trouble with.  Then they did some work in a phonics workbook they had on site.  Because he wasn't signed up for the second session they didn't do much work the second hour.  Next week he will have his permanent volunteer.  She has been researching dyslexia to try to better help Robby.  I appreciate this concern from someone I've not yet met.  Most importantly Robby had a GREAT time this evening.  They sent me home with a simple phonics chart from the Kindergarten My Father's World program.  I will probably just tape it up somewhere near the LeapFrog Letter Frog Magnetic Letters are on the dishwasher.  I might take in our Word Mastery notebook next week and show them where we've been working.   

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Tonight I let Robby take the Sequential Spelling placement test online. I thought I'd share his answers.  I know they are WILDLY incorrect, but it actually made me smile, because I know he was trying.

 

beginning     bgining

shouted        shawtid

plans             plans

splitting         spliting

battery          batree

 

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