8 year old struggling reader

[lovinmyboys]

What do you suggest I do this year to get him reading and spelling better?

 

To be honest, some of the reason he is behind is because I have not been as consistent as I should have been with him. Another part is that he does struggle to learn to read. Since it was so hard for him, I took that as a sign that he wasn't ready and didn't really push.

 

I took him to get tested and the results were that his iq was normal and he has a pattern in his results (where his weaknesses are) in areas that are consistent with reading disability but not enough to make a diagnosis.

 

So, last night he read Owl at Home by Arnold Lobel which is an AR book level 2.7 (second grade seventh month) and he was able to read it fine. I don't think he is way, way behind, but he is somewhat behind. He turned 8 in April so he is starting 3rd grade Tuesday and is still not a fluent reader.

 

So, suggestions of what to do with him. He actually did pretty well on the tests when he had to just read words, but he struggled a lot reading paragraphs. He also did pretty well (average) on the phonics tests. He is reading some, so I don't think he needs to start at the beginning. He is very weak in spelling

 

I have hooked on phonics, opgtr, ETC. I am willing to purchase something. I *think* Barton would be overkill. What about dancing bears? Should I just start somewhere in the middle of OPGTR and just have him read more to increase fluency?

Edited September 1, 2016 by lovinmyboys

[Ellie]

What do you suggest I do this year to get him reading and spelling better?

 

To be honest, some of the reason he is behind is because I have not been as consistent as I should have been with him. Another part is that he does struggle to learn to read. Since it was so hard for him, I took that as a sign that he wasn't ready and didn't really push.

 

I took him to get tested and the results were that his iq was normal and he has a pattern in his results (where his weaknesses are) in areas that are consistent with reading disability but not enough to make a diagnosis.

 

So, last night he read Owl at Home by Arnold Lobel which is an AR book level 2.7 (second grade seventh month) and he was able to read it fine. I don't think he is way, way behind, but he is somewhat behind. He turned 8 in April so he is starting 3rd grade Tuesday and is still not a fluent reader.

 

So, suggestions of what to do with him. He actually did pretty well on the tests when he had to just read words, but he struggled a lot reading paragraphs. He also did pretty well (average) on the phonics tests. He is reading some, so I don't think he needs to start at the beginning. He is very weak in spelling

 

I have hooked on phonics, opgtr, ETC. I am willing to purchase something. I *think* Barton would be overkill. What about dancing bears? Should I just start somewhere in the middle of OPGTR and just have him read more to increase fluency?

 

Spalding. Spalding teaches children to read by teaching them to spell--a two-fer--while simultaneously teaching penmanship, capitalization and punctuation, and simple writing. It is particularly helpful for children who might have some learning challenges because of its specific instruction on directionality and the way it uses all learning modalities (auditory, visual, kinesthetic). All you need is a one-time purchase of the manual (Writing Road to Reading) and a set of phonogram cards, and an annual purchase of a composition book for the child.

 

[mathmarm]

If I understand you correctly, he is an 8yo boy who struggles a little with reading, and who has NOT received consistent instruction and consistent practice time. He was tested and performs between average and well on the reading skills expected for a boy of his age and grade. (He hasn't done 3rd grade yet, it makes since for a child who completed 2nd grade to perform on a 2nd grade level, yes?). Having lower scores in the areas that you know are his weaknesses makes sense.

 

What I would suggest, is working with him consistently for about 4-6months, and continuing to work on more advanced phonics in a seperate session. Doing 2 short reading sessions a day, for 4-6 months should bring his reading up.I think he'll improve a lot if you are able to be consistent wit him. If, after 4-6 months of consistent practice and lessons he is not making progress or still struggling, then reconsider.

Edited September 1, 2016 by mathmarm

[mathmarm]

ETA: Since you have a lot of phonics resources, I will suggest that you look into getting a book of "decodable readers" from a school publisher like Open Court, McGraw Hill, Houghton-Mifflin etc... You'll get like 40 booklets for a reasonable price. We have found them to be SUPER helpful because it makes reading practice easy!

You can get them in full color, or you can get them in black and white. I'd get a set of 2nd and 3rd grade. Here is a post I made in another thread asking about favorite readers.
 

We are having luck with a lot of freebies from around the internet.
Progressive Phonics | I See Sam | Hubbards Cupboard | Free Phonetic Readers | Readers by Teachers

I find that graded readers are working very, very well around here. We supplement with books from the library but the regular reading practice comes from a series of graded, decodable readers from Open Court Publishing and Reading A-Z (which has a bunch of printable books)

If you really don't want to print then you can buy a book of Decodables in black/white or in full color from publishers such as Harcourt or Open Court. We have Open Court Readings Full Color Decodables for K and 1st grade. By the end of 1st grade all of the main phonics have been introduced and practiced so that kids are comfortably reading multi-word sentences full of words like "afraid" "innkeeper" "silly" "thought" "caramel" "island", "window" etc--most of these words can be decoded by the child--especially if the decodables are used as practice/reinforcement to a thorough treatment of phonics. Because of that, we probably won't buy the 2nd and 3rd grade Decodables--which seem to contain faster, more sophisticated reviews of Phonics.

We got the the Open Court Reading 2000 edition offline for really cheap but you can still buy new books from both 2002 and 2005 editions direct from the publisher--about 15-20 dollars per set of 30-50 stories so its a good deal and you don't have to print out anything--just cut out, fold and staple the books. Buying new directly from the publisher you don't run the risk of getting books with pages missing or damaged.

[fralala]

I'm like you and would want to make sure I understand exactly what's going on before beginning-- if he actually has the code down, you don't need to waste time with phonics instruction but instead know that you just need more practice. Sometimes spelling problems can be a sign of not understanding the code, but not always.

 

So I would just give one more test myself-- a code knowledge test, if he hasn't taken one yet-- and then base my instruction on what I learn from that. You could just mark off the OPGTR lessons you need to teach or review (or the relevant parts of the things you already own). And, of course, keep reading together and see if he improves this year with reading paragraphs.

[forty-two]

ETA: Since you have a lot of phonics resources, I will suggest that you look into getting a book of "decodable readers" from a school publisher like Open Court, McGraw Hill, Houghton-Mifflin etc...

 

 

I second this.  I have a new 2nd grader who is a struggling reader and definitely does better with individual words than with paragraphs.  I was having problems finding readers at the library, because of huge mismatch between our phonics program and the balanced literacy beginning readers - the ones that didn't have too many words she couldn't decode had too few words per page period.  And I have a set of decodable reader booklets from Harcourt Mifflin (mom picked them up at a yard sale), but they didn't have enough practice - too few words per page at the lower decoding levels and too sharp an increase in the decoding load at the same time as they increased the words per page - and dd7.5 hit a wall.  But this summer I ran across a list of school publisher readers that used the same basic progression as our phonics program and pieced  together three of the series used.  Best reading investment I've made since our phonics program itself :thumbup:.  Dd7.5 started from the beginning, way below both her decoding level and below her words-on-the-page fluency level (for some easy, confidence-building practice), but by the second books in each series, she's still way below her decoding level, but is being stretched by the number of words on the page.  It's been a wonderful fluency builder.

 

The two series I like and we are using are the Merrill Linguistic Readers (set of 8 readers, A-H) and the SRA Basic Reading Series (set of 7 readers, A-F (level A is split into 2 books, part 1 and part 2); scope and sequence and list of titles is on pgs 7-8 of the linked pdf).  They suffer some from educational pricing new ;), but I was able to get them used online for around $5-$10 a reader.  I'm glad we have both - dd7.5 can use all the practice she can get - but my favorite is the SRA Basic Reading Series.  The stories and the illustrations are quite humorous (as readers go) - dd7.5 reads them on her own.

 

Also, I just got the Short Vowel Phonics readers from the library last night, and they look to have a similar combination of easy decoding combined with a lot of words on the page. 

Edited September 1, 2016 by forty-two

[MistyMountain]

Spalding. Spalding teaches children to read by teaching them to spell--a two-fer--while simultaneously teaching penmanship, capitalization and punctuation, and simple writing. It is particularly helpful for children who might have some learning challenges because of its specific instruction on directionality and the way it uses all learning modalities (auditory, visual, kinesthetic). All you need is a one-time purchase of the manual (Writing Road to Reading) and a set of phonogram cards, and an annual purchase of a composition book for the child.

 

I have a similar kid who did not do well with Spalding at all for spelling or reading and I had to use other things to see improvement.

[MistyMountain]

If he already is decoding something like Owl at Home you could try Webster's or ElizabethB's videos to work more on the multi syllable words. They have it online or you can get it in workbook form put together by Don Potter on Amazon. It helped my child but I wish it had a little bit of instruction with it. I like it for reading more for spelling though.

Edited September 1, 2016 by MistyMountain

[Gabrielsyme2]

All About Spelling can go a long way toward helping kids who struggle a bit with reading to make progress without feeling like they're just doing MORE reading practice.

[MerryAtHope]

This article on Signs of a Reading Problem has lots of links to helpful resources.

[Rod Everson]

So I would just give one more test myself-- a code knowledge test, if he hasn't taken one yet-- and then base my instruction on what I learn from that. 

 

Thanks for linking to the code knowledge test on my website. Like a lot of other resources there, it's free.

 

I just want to point out that there are also blending, segmenting, and auditory processing tests as part of the same test battery that can also be easily administered. Buried elsewhere on the site is a free exercise for practicing auditory processing titled Oral Auditory Processing that you'll find useful if your child does poorly on that test. 

 

Also, the entire multisyllable curriculum that I include in the advanced code workbook mentioned on the site is available free. It's very effective. I used it with nearly 200 kids in one-on-one tutoring and they really responded well to it, as I describe on the site. Frankly, most of the strategies for teaching multisyllable decoding don't make much sense to young kids. This one does because it's very simple and straightforward. It's covered on several pages starting with the Multisyllable Method Overview.

 

Next, if your child has trouble with code knowledge, there's a free phonogram card set that's completely consistent with the code knowledge test, the multisyllable method (and the workbook program too, for that matter.) You need to go to lulu.com to download it and then print out the cards per the instructions. You can read about it on the Free Phonogram Flash Cards page. 

 

And finally, if your child continues to have trouble with longer passages, take a look at the vision information on my site. As many in this forum will attest, a visit to a developmental optometrist has often proven to be the most effective way to get a child reading comfortably. 

 

I hope you find some of the above resources useful.

 

Rod Everson

OnTrack Reading

[lovinmyboys]

Thanks everyone. Lots of good suggestions and some resources I hadn't considered. I'm going to spend the weekend looking through this and making a plan.