Has anyone been through vision therapy?

[a27mom]

We were just referred for a vision therapy eval. My 5 y/o has excellent verbal skills but strongly resists reading. She actually can read somewhat, but won't read books with multiple lines of texts, and can only get through about 3 pages of a one/two line per page book before she gets too frustrated (even though she read the words well). When her 3 y/o sister worked through 7 pages of Henry and Mudge with me w/o whining it dawned on me that something else might be going on.

 

I think Convergence insufficiency is the suspicion. (Our optometrist didn't diagnose but has referred us to another practice that specializes in vision therapy) She doesn't appear to have any LD's, no ADD etc...

 

Our appointment isn't for a month. I am trying to decide what to do for now. We have made little progress in reading in the last several months. She is not yet 6 and with the exception of some sight words she is at end of k minimum reading level (for 3 pages anyway). So she is not behind or anything. Her verbal skills are way past that though, and her little sister is almost passing her. I have no desire to push her, but she loves to learn - she just can't focus on a book.

 

Any suggestions for reading work while waiting to start therapy?

 

Any advice or info re: therapy would be appreciated as well. :)

[wapiti]

see the Learning Challenges board for lots of discussions about VT (eta, we had a positive experience with VT when dd12 was 6 y.o.)

[SKL]

My elder dd had vision therapy when she was 3.5-4yo. This was before she was reading, but she went from being unable to write a single letter to being ready to read a year later. She started reading at just 5. Even after VT, she had to work harder than many kids because her visual memory was still not very good. But she held her own. By the end of KG (age 5.5) she had memorized over 200 sight words along with the most basic phonics rules, and she had the stamina to read easy chapter books with help. I should note that this dd isn't "gifted" and has some other mild developmental issues, so reading this well was quite an accomplishment. .... Before VT starts, I suggest using your finger or an object to encourage him to practice holding her focus on a near point and following an object as it moves. Switching from looking at something far to something near (and vice versa) is another thing that might help.

[SKL]

As for suggestions on reading in the mean time, I would switch between challenging and really easy books, to give him a break without losing skills. Focus on reading comprehension skills, oral spelling, maybe even some of the better "wordless books" out there (there are some picture books with no words that still offer a good challenge in terms of understanding and verbalizing the author's intent). With my daughter, despite her relatively poor visual memory, she did much better with sight words than with phonics, so you might want to consider whether to emphasize sight words a bit more. I used a series of books by Margaret Hillert ("Just-beginning-to-read" books) to build stamina. They are interesting stories that used limited (pre-primer/primer) sight word vocabulary along with good illustrations. They are maybe about 30 pages long.

[2smartones]

My oldest did VT (twice, actually). He was really struggling when he started chapter books, which of course was partially due to his young age and lack of eye development. He was skipping lines, repeating lines, and when reading any book (not just chapter books), he'd read the long words fine, but skip the tiny words entirely as if they weren't there. We switched to large print chapter books at first, which helped a lot, and he did 8 months of VT, which also helped a lot. The only reason we quit is that VT is soooooooo expensive!! After about a year and a half, he started to decline in reading again, so we did 6 more months, and after that, he was doing GREAT!!! We saw a huge improvement after the first few weeks both times, but by the end of the second course of treatment, he was reading way better than developmentally appropriate for his visual age. (By the way... the GDC also recommends finding a therapist who understands giftedness and is willing to push a child beyond the visual norm to keep up with their higher-than-normal reading levels. This has helped my son with endurance and speed, for sure!)

[Splash]

My daughter just finished round one. She's never had any trouble with reading, taught herself at 3 but never really wanted to read either. Her comments to me though as we're going about life were what sent me there She'd say things like "are there two cars in front of you or one?" "when I'm playing tennis I have a hard time deciding which ball to hit, so I aim for the middle one" She is seeing double, each eye working by itself and left eye just shutting down when it would get tired. After the session she is doing much better unless she is sick and/or extremely tired eyes are working together and she sees the appropriate number of items. Also glasses help her with schoolwork so eyes work together successfully together instead of taking turns like they did in the past.

[prairiewindmomma]

Yes, for convergence insufficiency.