lilacii Posted July 11, 2011 Share Posted July 11, 2011 I am tutoring a junior-high student who has dysgraphia. Does anyone have experience concerning this? Any help would be appreciated. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Geo Posted July 11, 2011 Share Posted July 11, 2011 (edited) Ds9.5 probably has dysgraphia. This is what it looks like in him:Writes slooowww. Writing hand trembles.Still needs a therapeutic pencil grip.Tires easily when writing.Spacing is poor, letters and words too close and/or too far apart.No automaticity regardless of practice.OT said he probably won't learn cursive. We're struggling through, I'm no expert.Here's a linkhttp://www.ldonline.org/article/12770?gclid=CJPYroaW-KkCFQ7MKgodKBzuZA Sorry about the format...it won't post correctly. Edited July 11, 2011 by Geo Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pantone Posted July 11, 2011 Share Posted July 11, 2011 I am tutoring a junior-high student who has dysgraphia. Does anyone have experience concerning this? Yup, my DS9 has it; 30-point differential at his last testing. What it is you'd like to know? If you can eliminate pencils from this student's life, you will attain some kind of deity status. :) Our pediatric Neuropsych told us that learning touch typing would be far more useful for DS than to keep hammering on the handwriting. Teach him either print or cursive, but not both. Keep writing assignments small, like fill-in-the-blank. Essays should be typed instead. Anything you ask the kid to write is at least four times more difficult than for the average student. So your reasonable request for a 1-page report is instantly a 4-page report to him. And this has a multiplier effect through the classes he takes. So an average night of homework turns into: "Don't forget, you have 80 math problems due on my desk by 8 a.m., and make it look nice, people, I don't want to go blind! You were all assigned a four-page essay for our reading this morning. Remember that we're taking a field trip next week for our Life Sciences, so it's imperative that you complete the 50 questions at the ends of both chapters 5 AND 6. Please write out the question AND your answer. And we'll be finishing up our unit on Napoleon, so make sure you have that 12-page paper complete as well. You've had two days, that's more than enough time." And then the most horrifying aspect is that everyone else in the class can do it and you can't. Is it any wonder that kid may have self-esteem issues? Those 80 math problems? It would be SO much better if he didn't have to copy them from the book! If they were already written out ahead of time, that would be WONDERFUL! And the Language Arts essay? Is he old enough to use some voice-recognition software? Cause that would shave off a TON of time!!! Otherwise, can he use a scribe to help him get his thoughts out? And those 100 questions for Science...wow, he could answer those rapid-fire if they were just oral questions. He KNOWS the material, it's making it come out the end of a pencil that causes so much heartache. And the History paper...he needs someone to help him spew out all the stuff he knows about Napoleon and then arrange it in some form. One of the better ways to do that is to type out all his responses, cut each sentence out of the page, and tack those sentences up on a bulletin board. Then you can have some switch places or find the areas where there are "holes" of information. Then rearrange the essay in the word-processing program, print and cut again, and do a final edit. Add dyslexia to this mix, and now you have numbers switching position, two or three readings worth of material, four to six chapters to read, etc. I keep thinking that the LiveScribe Pen ( http://www.livescribe.com/en-us/ ) would be helpful, but when the kid doesn't like making marks on the paper, that almost negates the usefulness of it. ??? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Love_to_Read Posted July 11, 2011 Share Posted July 11, 2011 What are you hired to tutor? Everything, specific subjects like math, just writing composition, the dysgraphia issues in general? My response as a tutor varies depending on what you're responsible for and how often you'll work with him. Also, any specifics as to what type of issues he has, since dysgraphia is a blanket term...some strategies work better for some kids than others. Proud of you--I think there are a LOT of undx'ed students with dysgraphia, and I'm always glad to see their needs being addressed. Tutoring can be a huge help. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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