wy_kid_wrangler04 Posted November 11, 2011 Share Posted November 11, 2011 Ok, so I posted a few days ago some more concerns about his reading on the K-8 board, but today I got the detailed report from his first vision therapy app. Every concern I have is clearly within the report with the reasons and such. Now, my question is where do I go from here for phonics? Do I wait for a few months or a year until we have been at VT for a while? He LOVES E so we would continue that. We would continue AAS. I am specifically wondering about Phonics Pathways, Reading Pathways and his readers. Or should we keep going at his pace and see what happens? I plan to ask the VT her recommendation at our next app. I want thoughts from here as well though because our next app is in 2 1/2 weeks. I don't want his phonics to regress but I don't want to fatigue his eyes to much either, kwim? I will post the results in a reply to this thread- maybe that will help. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wy_kid_wrangler04 Posted November 11, 2011 Author Share Posted November 11, 2011 His VT summary: Refractive Error: Results of his refraction revealed he has a slight amount of farsightedness, for which glasses have been prescribed. Following the additional testing, glasses were prescribed to include prisms to compensate for a visual disturbances that causes a distortion in how B perceives visual information. Accommodation (focusing): B has significant accommodative problems. B did struggle some when focusing with each eye individually, but really struggled when trying to focus with both eyes together indicating eye teaming problems. Accomodative problems can cause difficulty in shifting focus from distance to near, as well as difficulty sustaining focus at near. Inadequate focusing ability can cause headaches in the forehead and temple area as well as blurred vision at near. Binocularity (eye training): B's eyes are not always properly aligned, so they do not work together efficiently as a team. When B becomes fatigued, his eyes temporarily slip out of alignment resulting in double vision. Most individuals do not recognize the double vision as such, but they do recognize that print becomes jumbled and confusing. In order to eliminate the double vision, after a few seconds the eyes either realign or the brain ignores (suppresses) the visual input from one eye. Although B sometimes experiences double vision, he tends to suppress an eye when the visual demand becomes to much for him. Oculomotor Ability (eye movements): Enclosed is a copy of the visagraph results. The numbers test was used to eliminate any unnecessary frustration with reading. The test is 9 rows of 6-8 numbers each, read from left to right at random intervals to stimulate eye movements used for reading. B exhibits difficulty with directional attack and prolonged durations. This can indicate problems with ocular motility/tracking and coordination of the two eyes. Enclosed is a copy of the Visagraph results. (NOTE: The default level for any findings below Grade 1 is also 1.0). The number of fixations (how many times he stops to look at a word or group of words), The number of regressions (backward eye movements), The average span of recognition (how much is taken in on each fixation), The average duration of fixation (how ong each fixation is held until the next eye movement), The reading rate (words per minute) (I am putting dots to keep the spacing as it is in report) ..............................NORM......................Left eye..................Right eye Fixations:............NA fix/100 wrds......141/100................134/100 Regressions:......NA reg/100wrds......31/100..................31/100 Duration: ..........NA sec.........................0.52 sec..................0.55sec Reading Rate:....80words/min..............................81numbers/min The significant findings are the differences in fixation between the left eye and right eyes. Also noted, was the differences and the length of duration of fixation for each eye. There are no norms for the Number Test based on age or Grade Level, and it is not a direct comparison of the norm for grade 1 of reading words (80 words per minute) with reading numbers (81 numbers per minute) Then the rest goes onto show us how to read the graphs of his eye movements. It also says that B's saccadic eye movements (jump eye movements required for reading), as tested with the Developmental Eye Movements test (DEM), are more than two years below age level and his pursuits (tracking eye movements), using the Groffman Visual Tracing Test, are also below age level. B required head movements to complete the test instead of using only his eye. Inadequate eye movements to complete the test instead of using only his eyes. Inadequate eye movements can cause one to lose his place when reading, experience swim or movement of words on a page, skip or reread lines and reverse letters, numbers or small words. When an individual has poor eye movements his eyes don't move nicely left to right across the pave, but instead move left to right then right to left then forward again. The reversals occur when one takes in visual information as his eyes are on a backward swing movement. Thus, letters are seen reversed such as "on" being seen as "no", whereas, if the word has been read from left to right it would have been seen corrrectly as "on". It says in the recommendations that all of these problems will greatly affect his ability to read and learn in school. This is why I am wondering if we should wait on phonics for a while (but continue with ETC and AAS as he loves those ;)) Thoughts? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jumping In Puddles Posted February 5, 2012 Share Posted February 5, 2012 It says in the recommendations that all of these problems will greatly affect his ability to read and learn in school. This is why I am wondering if we should wait on phonics for a while (but continue with ETC and AAS as he loves those ;)) Thoughts? What did you decide to do? Did you wait with phonics? What did your VT doc recommend? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rod Everson Posted February 5, 2012 Share Posted February 5, 2012 What did you decide to do? Did you wait with phonics? What did your VT doc recommend? I was confused about your question until I realized that the original post was back in November. I'd be interested in an update too. As for the phonics instruction, for nearly 10 years I worked with kids who'd already undergone vision therapy, teaching them advanced code phonics, and getting their blending and segmenting skills in place. Believe me, it was much easier working with the kids who'd gotten most of the way through VT, than with the ones that had never gone. I gradually concluded that most struggling readers probably have various vision issues and that all of them should at least see a developmental optometrist to rule out the possibility of serious binocular vision problems such as described in the above post. As for phonics programs, I started out with Reading Reflex (which was fast, but the information covered didn't always stick), then learned more about Spalding's Writing Road to Reading (which really teaches the code, but takes way too long for a remedial program) and eventually I designed something using what I saw as the strengths of both programs that ended up getting the job done in 20 to 30 hours, usually. I found that a lot of kids who got vision therapy would have had some previous phonics instruction, but because they were so visually confused during the time they were getting the instruction, they really just needed a short remedial program to organize it all and fill in some gaps so they could finally make efficient use of it. They didn't need to learn, or relearn, a bunch of phonics rules, but needed to understand how it all fit together. That's essentially the philosophy behind Reading Reflex, which avoids the use of phonics rules for decoding, but quickly shows how the English phonics code can be organized. Rod Everson OnTrack Reading Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wy_kid_wrangler04 Posted February 5, 2012 Author Share Posted February 5, 2012 His vision therapist recommended we continued with phonics instruction but at HIS pace. So that being said we are going very slowly. Still at 7 1/2 he is painfully sounding out cvc words. He likes AAS though so that helps. I implemented a prize system so he does not get bogged down with Phonics Pathways but has incentive and wants to get it done. (we are still very early in the book) I think at the moment ETC is helping his handwriting more than anything but he still loves it so we are still doing it. We are just slowly going through book 1 though, we will do book 1 1/2 after so hopefully some more will stick (instead of doing them together like people recommend) Its a slow, grueling process but we are getting there. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rod Everson Posted February 5, 2012 Share Posted February 5, 2012 First, I've worked with kids pre-vision therapy that just didn't "get" sounding out. I don't know if they just couldn't link the visual with the auditory, or if something else was going on. I'd be curious how he'd do on the three phonics tests on my site that you can find here. The first is a blending test, the second a segmenting test, and the third a sort of auditory processing test where he's asked to delete phonemes. Some kids are good at the skills, but are just messed up visually; others have very poor phonics skills, but can see fine. Some kids have problems in both areas. I would get kids after vision therapy that did quite poorly on these tests, and it would take phonics work to build their skills up. Vision therapy isn't likely to address that area. The tests take about 15 minutes to administer in total, once you've familiarized yourself with the procedures, run off the scoresheet, etc. Rod Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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