Question for a friend

[SunshineMom]

A friend of mine just began homeschooling her dd7 a few months ago. Her dd7 had been in a bilingual school and was struggling. She is in first grade. My friend has some concerns for her daughter is not reading. She knows her basic letter sounds, can blend some words in isolation from long sentences and is familiar with some basic phonics. She is unable to read sentences for any length of time, mom is getting frustrated and dd7 is disinterested in reading. They are using a phonics program- SWR and easy readers from the library. She does have some reversals however they seem like common type errors. Some of this sounds common or am I wrong? I did suggest she get her daughter's eyes checked. I am thinking that due to her just being pulled from ps which was bilingual and her age that it all (slow to read) sounds reasonable considering the situation. This is my friend's first year homeschooling and she is feeling really worried and frustrated at her daughter's lack of motivation to read. I remember with my dd9 (w/LDs) that is just took a lot of practice and patience before she really fluently read which was around 8yrs. Am I off base to think this is normal stuff my friend is experiencing? My dd7 basically taught herself to read and is an accelerated reader so my experiences are drawn from dd9. Any thoughts?

[RamonaQ]

I would say if the mom senses there is a problem, there is a problem. For me, there are enough red flags here that I would want to seek evaluation by a professional, not just for vision.

[PeterPan]

This is totally off the wall, but did this child have any speech issues when she was younger? I have read about a scenario like you're describing happening with a dc who had apraxia *and* dyslexia and was in a bilingual school. I can't recall exactly, but I think they counseled them to go down to one language and focus on success with that. Remember a dyslexic isn't processing language in a normal fashion anyway. The two languages may be overloading.

 

SWR *can* work well for learning to read. It's not phonics. (You're the 2nd person to say that around here in two days, lol.) Instead of sounding out to read, which many dyslexics don't do well anyway, you think through the spelling of the words, write them, and then read back the words you have spelled. It's totally different. The key that worked for us, and what she might want to make sure she's doing, is to put those words onto FLASHCARDS. I know, anathema, eh? But it is what worked for us, and it's what Sanseri says to do. It's in the reinforcements section of one of the early lists in the Wise Guide. So do it. Put all those words onto flashcards. I had a whole little index card box filled with dividers labeled for the lists, and I would tell her to go read through her A words or B words or whatever 2-3 times a day. I also put those words into little booklets where she could read the sentence and illustrate. Such nice memories!

 

Unless she had the dc's eyes evaluated by a developmental optometrist, I wouldn't drop that thread. Like Ramona, I'd be getting some evaluations. There's just no reason to wait. I'd start with the developmental optometrist and see where that gets her. If that shows nothing, then ask them for the name of a good neuropsych or ed psych.

[Murmer]

Also have mom do lots of reading to her...coming from school where reading is another task for teachers to check off I would make sure that the home had a lot of reading out loud happening. Might help her get interested just by seeing the awesome books mom is reading...cause honestly the readers can sometimes be rather dry and not so interesting.