Oh... a controversial question ? I’ve been reading a lot about “retrieval practice.” I signed up for an email list ages ago, and now I get research updates about it. Anywho, I am intrigued by the idea that just TRYING to retrieve a piece of information (e.g. math fact) helps you learn it, even if you’re unable to actually retrieve it at the moment. Repeated trying, in the correct way, aids memory. One article I read made the point that most people try to retrieve the wrong way - with flash cards, for example, people read the front of the card, and then flip it over without actually trying to retrieve the fact. Done this way, flash cards are useless. BUT, if you actually make yourself try to think of the fact - like read it aloud, think for a few seconds, and THEN flip - that actually helps you memorize. The other important thing to do, when doing flash cards this way, is to keep known facts in the pile for longer than you would think - they suggest getting a fact correct 3 times before removing it from the pile, and then periodically reviewing after that. You could make a pencil mark on the back of a card each time your son gets it right, and then move the “mastered” cards to a different pile that you review weekly. To answer your actual question, I would try this retrieval method AND give him a chart/calculator. Practice facts for 5 minutes, twice a day, and then let him use his tools for actual schoolwork. (Retrieving for short periods multiple times a day is shown to work better than marathon sessions once a day.)

Gluten-free, dairy-free, and meat-free, on an elimination diet, is tough! Eczema around the mouth sounds very uncomfortable, too! My first thought was to go on an anti-inflammation elimination diet, but most of the time when people do that, they eat meat. Hmm. You also need to get protein and fat somehow. I think your rice + potatoes idea is good, since it’s probably a fruit or veggie that’s causing your issues. Can you keep avocado? For sure, I would cut out eggs and nightshades (tomatoes, peppers, certain spices), and cutting out most fruits/veggies would give you information the fastest - and if that STILL doesn’t work, you could modify the plan. I wonder why someone told you it’s crazy that it would be food. Food would be my first thought! What else would cause it, other than some immune thing? There’s got to be some root cause.

Ah... I’m jealous about your SLP degree. I’m in special ed, which I love, but SLP is so interesting ?

I was really, really anxious about going to college. I remember learning about college for the first time when I was maybe.. 8 years old? And I vividly remember thinking, Oh good, I still have 10 years before I have to leave home. The next year... Oh good, I still have 9 years left... and so on. I never wanted to leave home. I survived college though! If I could do it again, I would either have went to college nearer to my home, or had a single room. I loathed having a roommate, and I never had any alone time. I would definitely pay extra to have a single room. As for jobs... she’s so young! I don’t think I knew about very many jobs when I was 16. Thinking about her and languages, though, what about speech language pathology? I heard on the radio that there are 6 jobs in that field for every speech pathologist. Most programs have a 100% job placement rate. I’m a special ed teacher, and I kinda wish I had gone into speech path. It’s a really neat field, and you get to learn all kinds of cool things like phonetics and language acquisition. Your DD has probably never heard of that before, but who knows, she might find it interesting. I’m also an introvert who thought I could NEVER teach because I was too shy. Turns out my shyness somehow goes away when teaching! I’m also a completely different person than when I was 16.

Are you in the US or in Germany? My students really love the Scholastic Branches books, which you can find at the library. I had to do inter library loan to get all of them. http://www.scholastic.com/branches/ These books range from beginning 2nd grade to late 2nd grade level. Your daughter might really like the Dragon Masters series. There are also ones that look geared towards girls, but I didn’t read them since I was always teaching boys ?

Fully agree with everything PeterPan said above! I taught a kid that sounds something like your daughter. He loved books, and would try, try, try to read them. I think that trying super hard, for long periods of time, really did help his decoding and fluency. He learned words that surprised me. Since budget is a challenge (I’m right there with ya!), I would buy the Recipe for Reading from Amazon. It’s currently $20. If you don’t already have them, I would also buy letter tiles (ideally with vowels a different color), two small whiteboards, one for each of you, and pretty colored whiteboard markers ? That’s all you really need for a reading lesson. Then - just start at the beginning of the Recipe for Reading. The lessons are quite short and easy to do. With my most struggling/resistant readers, I didn’t do everything in the lesson - whatever you can do in 15-20 minutes. Make sure she: Reads and spells words with tiles (I would make a list of maybe 10 words, and read them and spell them with tiles) Read and spell those same words on the whiteboards Read sentences (those are included in each lesson of the Recipe. It’s handy. I would either write the sentences on the whiteboard, or type them and print on paper, if you have a printer) Read connected text from SOME book. If you can find some at the library that she can read easily and still enjoy, that would be great. I found that nonfiction is pretty good for this purpose, but anything she enjoys will do. So, for $40 or so, you can have a really good start. ? And yes, I’d sit with her and read Kingdom of Wrenly, or anything she’s willing to read. For a dyslexic kid to WANT to slog through books, is amazing & something to encourage. If you could somehow find slightly easier books than Wrenly, but still exciting to her, she’ll have even more success.

Thank you so much for that explanation.

4KookieKids, does your daughter know that she has dyslexia? We have a thread going on this forum about creating a positive learning environment, and how stress inhibits learning. Your daughter is emotional about reading - understandably - and it sounds like every time you try to do “reading practice,” she puts a wall up. I’ve taught many kids like that. You somehow have to get her buy-in, which can involve negotiating time, like setting a timer for 10 minutes at first, or offering a fun activity directly after tutoring, or getting extremely fun materials, like a game that you play after the decoding/spelling practice. If she doesn’t know she has dyslexia, I would tell her. She’s obviously bright, and knowing that she has an actual *thing* that keeps her from reading right now might be a relief. It’s not a personal fault. As for overcoming the reading wall she’s putting up... it will probably take some time to detox from reading stress. For my students, what relieved the stress most is knowing that there is a certain amount of time they’re required to work, and then it’s over. They also enjoyed knowing the schedule, so I always write down what the plan is for the session, and they can check off items as we go. When she starts succeeding a bit, she should become a little more amenable to lessons.

Hopefully this is the correct link to High Noon Level 1: http://www.highnoonbooks.com/detailHNB.tpl?eqskudatarq=S8271-8 These are the decodable books that I love: http://www.highnoonbooks.com/HNB/HNB-SoundOut_Intro.tpl?cart=15321822113709192

Regarding reading programs, I don’t think there a single be-all, end-all... in my experience, it mostly depends on the teacher. For dyslexic kids, you have to be organized, prepared, and then stick to your plan. Yes, Orton-Gillingham is very important - but each OG-based program is different, uses a different sequence of teaching, etc. There are also probably “OG-based” programs that are bad. If the OP goes with High Noon, she could take as long as necessary with each lesson. The materials on the sample pages look solid. When I say stick to a plan, I’d don’t mean rush - it’s most important to practice every day to keep concepts fresh. When I had 20-30 minute reading groups in my class, time was short - but we packed it in. Our general plan of the lesson included: 1. Introduce new sound/concept OR choose to review known concepts. 2. Read words using tiles. Spell words using tiles. 3. Read words from a whiteboard. Spell words on a whiteboard. (With certain kids, we wrote sentences if they were ready) 4. Read from printed material (High Noon book, other book, paragraph I typed, etc) Using my “plan,” you don’t even really need a “program.” At my school, we used the Recipe or Reading book that ElizabethB mention. It’s super cheap on Amazon. It includes a sequence of teaching, and helpful word lists and sentences so you don’t have to think it all up on the spot. I absolutely love High Noon books. Their decodable books are genius. I have no idea how they do it, but their series of books that only contains words of 3 letters or less... they’re really good! Some of the books are downright suspenseful. I’ve never had a kid that disliked their books. In fact... most of my students grabbed the books and started reading on their own, before I could even sit with them, because they were so delighted to see books that they could definitely read. They don’t look babyish, either. Geez, I’m rambling. Sorry. The main idea is that you just need to jump in and start trying something, like 20 minute sessions of High Noon. Once you get going, you’ll notice if the student is making progress, and if they’re not, then you make adjustments. ?

I’m very sorry, Katie. Best wishes to your family.

The exact same thing happened to our 2005 Jetta. One day, the transmission was just caput with no warning signs. Until then it was a great, reliable car with good gas mileage. Oh, well, the A/C had also died, and the VW people tried different things to fix it (didn't work) and then said new A/C would be $1600. We didn't do that, thankfully, because then the transmission went a year later. We actually donated that car to NPR, and just learned from our mistake never to get another VW. We paid $3500 to buy it, and it lasted for 3 years before the transmission went. It's because of this that we'll never have another VW - I'd much rather have a Ford or Chevy that's not so difficult/expensive to repair.

Hey, thanks! That's a great suggestion!

Thanks, Lanny! I'm interested to know how the job goes for you, if you get it.

Yes, I think so. ?

Yay thanks!

You guys are great. I wish I'd been making a master list of resources, based on this forum, when I joined 5 years ago!

Hi Ggg, I worked at Lindamood-Bell for a short time. I don't remember the particular evaluations that they did, but they were your typical decoding, reading fluency, etc. I believe they offer free screenings if you're interested in the programs, which is cool. Personally, I get a bit annoyed with Lindamood-Bell because they seem... secretive about their methods. A regular person can't get "certified" as a Lindamod-Bell practitioner and then tutor on their own using the method, like you can with other OG programs.I also felt that Lindamood-Bell keeps tutoring kids even if it's clear that the tutoring isn't working very well. It's extremely expensive ($90/hour where I was, about 6 years ago), and I always got the feeling that they were in it for the money. The tutors had 2 weeks of training, and then they were tutoring... which is not a great value for $90/hour, in my opinion. On the other hand, I'm a huge superfan of LiPS, and have seen it make a dramatic difference for kids with phonemic awareness issues.

Your friend is extremely nice to tutor your daughter for free ? The Morse code, tangrams, etc. sound fun, but I'm not sure what that has to do with reading. Unfortunately, I can't find much information about the Blue Book Method. I'd never heard of it before. When I try to Google, I'm not able to see much about it, and I really don't think it's Orton-Gillingham based. Since you wouldn't want to offend your friend, could you just say something like, "Yeah, maybe she's too young after all - I might try to do some stuff with her at home," and then exit the tutoring gracefully? The good news is that since your daughter is only 7, she'd probably be open to working on reading with you. Any OG-based program will do, and you're going to focus on building phonemic awareness, associating sounds to letters, and blending sounds together to make words. If you could do two 15-minute practice sessions a day, that would be pretty awesome at age 7 ?

I think so, too. I’ve seen it be an incredible strength and also a weakness. Just need to keep it controlled ?

I love the idea of teaching collaboration as well. I always think it’s madness to toss kids into a cooperative situation and expect that they can all thrive. DH is leaving academia. Yeah! Let’s hope it goes well ?

Yes, I completely agree with you. Maybe there’s something out there that has moderate interest and moderate stress ?

I think it’s as good as here in PA. I haven’t heard of internet being knocked out by storms except in very rare occasions. That would be terrible!

Didn’t find the lottery ticket, but I’m sure it’ll turn up somewhere. Hardware sounds difficult. DH doesn’t know anything about that. Data mining is another search term I didn’t know - thanks! We’re learning how to use LinkedIn... looks like a useful site. I read that 80% of jobs come from a personal connection, and are not advertised online.

Yeah, I see what you mean here. Although possibly helpful, it's like a band-aid on deeper issues that probably aren't fixable by a classroom teacher. I see perfectionism as my DH's biggest challenge. He thinks that having a PhD is not that special, that plenty of people have one, and that he probably doesn't know as much as most other people. Sometimes I wonder if he'd have been better off never getting into academia, because it only increased his self-criticism. He has friends that work at Google-like companies making big bucks, and he compares himself to them.