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Learning to write...without comprehending what the letters are?


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Please help my poor little brain comprehend something...I know I am overthinking and all, but this was not covered in all my teaching courses. :D
 
Normal instruction, at least from what I remember from my short stints teaching K and 1st, have you talking about the letters and sounds and teaching the child to write that letter. But, what do you do when the child doesn't retain the letter information?

I guess my thought last night was "If I can't read Chinese, why would I care to know how to write symbols? I wouldn't be able to use them appropriately." So, how is that different from teaching my daughter to write before she understands what the letters do/say?

Do you just keep truckin' along so that there is some muscle memory? Do you do something else?

Please knock me out of this thought process and tell me what to do and why!! I know I'm overthinking this.

 

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I don't think it makes sense to move forward until the child can make the connection between symbol and sound. THat's just how our system works.

 

If it makes you feel better, my kids did not have that click until much closer to 6. They are in the top percentiles now. (The one who didn't really read until 7.5 is now reading at a grade 12 level in 5th.)  I didn't push it. Just read, read, read, read. And lots of outdoor time for their eyes.

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I don't think it makes sense to move forward until the child can make the connection between symbol and sound. THat's just how our system works.

 

If it makes you feel better, my kids did not have that click until much closer to 6. They are in the top percentiles now. (The one who didn't really read until 7.5 is now reading at a grade 12 level in 5th.)  I didn't push it. Just read, read, read, read. And lots of outdoor time for their eyes.

So I'm not crazy. That's good. 

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My son did have letter activities (with therapy and pre-school) before he made that connection. 

 

For him it was some legitimate activities, the sole purpose wasn't pre-reading. 

 

If the sole purpose was pre-reading, I don't think it would be the right time.

 

If you were happening to want to do some activities where you could include some letter exposure, and letter formation, but having dual goals to have exposure to the letters plus Something Else Good ----- then I think that is different. 

 

To give an example -- for a while my son did activities with Handwriting Without Tears wooden pieces.  He would copy shapes with wooden pieces.  Well ----- this was a legitimate kind of goal for him, in an OT way, to copy and practice copying in a certain order.  He could have worked on this kind of goal in a variety of ways.  The way he worked on it happened to do double-duty with also being exposure to letter shapes and letter formation. 

 

I think that kind of thing is good. 

 

If you think she would pick up the writing and the formation part decently *if she was making the letter/sound connection* then I don't think it is necessarily that worthwhile. 

 

However I think some kids can "tie" the letter sound to a symbol, because they are visual, and that is how they do things, they learn a visual symbol first, and then "tie" the verbal/auditory information to the visual symbol.  And it could turn out that is a strength for your daughter, it definitely is for some kids.  So I think that could be a reason to give it a try some, but not go overboard or do anything frustrating or demoralizing. 

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I think if you have a sense that it would be frustrating, pointless, a waste of time, demoralizing, etc., then listen to your gut instinct!!!!!!!!!!!!! 

 

But if it's thinking "well that is too hard, she couldn't possibly learn that right now" then I think maybe try a tiny bit and see how it goes, because maybe she would do better than you think.  But if it seemed to be counter-productive then you can stop and try again later!  And I also think you are not obligated if you have clearer, more pressing goals, and this is just something that is a "should I do this because it's a usual activity" kind of thing when you know that there are things that are really, really fruitful and productive for her to work on right now that don't happen to be usual activities for her age. 

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Is she able to figure out the sound words begins with? Say the word and then that beginning sound? If so, I wonder if letter writing could somehow help her connect the look of the letter to a word beginning with that sound, and then to the sound itself? So, for example, she could draw a B, and then turn it into a bear, saying the beginning sound as she draws...(I realize I may be underestimating how difficult it is for a child with APD to break apart sounds.)

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So I'm not crazy. That's good. 

 

No. You are not. The public schools keep trucking because they have to achieve a minimum number of kids achieving a skill, so they can't stop for the students who are not there yet. That's not an educational strategy though. It is a funding strategy put in place by people who are looking for excuses to punish and deprive, rather than nurture and grow, our kids.

 

In our school, they have pull-out for the children who aren't getting it. The teachers identify those children and they do other related hands-on activities, like play-doh letters, lots of spoken language, read-alouds, and other proven methods to help strengthen reading skills for those children.

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Is she able to figure out the sound words begins with? Say the word and then that beginning sound? If so, I wonder if letter writing could somehow help her connect the look of the letter to a word beginning with that sound, and then to the sound itself? So, for example, she could draw a B, and then turn it into a bear, saying the beginning sound as she draws...(I realize I may be underestimating how difficult it is for a child with APD to break apart sounds.)

Nope. She currently has no concept of sounds. Well...actually...kind of. Sometimes she does.

Like, we worked on B for 3 weeks (adding in some other letters, but she only had 4 letters in all) We did a review with the sound and wrote it. She said "Hey! B-b-b...BUTTERFLY! and then turned the capital B into butterfly wings and made a butterfly. It was so cute. 

But...10 minutes later, we were going over the sounds for A and B and she had to really think about the difference; she forgot what sound it makes. 

 

I feel like she's getting better at it, but it's taking quite a bit of time. 

 

She's slowly beginning to recognize simple rhymes. They're currently working on being able to count words in a sentence in speech, then they'll move on to syllables. I assume that after that, and after we get an official auditory processing disorder on record, they'll begin working on sounds. (Until then, it's considered academic and insurance won't pay.  :rolleyes: ) 

 

 

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My son did have letter activities (with therapy and pre-school) before he made that connection. 

 

For him it was some legitimate activities, the sole purpose wasn't pre-reading. 

 

If the sole purpose was pre-reading, I don't think it would be the right time.

 

If you were happening to want to do some activities where you could include some letter exposure, and letter formation, but having dual goals to have exposure to the letters plus Something Else Good ----- then I think that is different. 

 

To give an example -- for a while my son did activities with Handwriting Without Tears wooden pieces.  He would copy shapes with wooden pieces.  Well ----- this was a legitimate kind of goal for him, in an OT way, to copy and practice copying in a certain order.  He could have worked on this kind of goal in a variety of ways.  The way he worked on it happened to do double-duty with also being exposure to letter shapes and letter formation. 

 

I think that kind of thing is good. 

 

If you think she would pick up the writing and the formation part decently *if she was making the letter/sound connection* then I don't think it is necessarily that worthwhile. 

 

However I think some kids can "tie" the letter sound to a symbol, because they are visual, and that is how they do things, they learn a visual symbol first, and then "tie" the verbal/auditory information to the visual symbol.  And it could turn out that is a strength for your daughter, it definitely is for some kids.  So I think that could be a reason to give it a try some, but not go overboard or do anything frustrating or demoralizing. 

I think if you have a sense that it would be frustrating, pointless, a waste of time, demoralizing, etc., then listen to your gut instinct!!!!!!!!!!!!! 

 

But if it's thinking "well that is too hard, she couldn't possibly learn that right now" then I think maybe try a tiny bit and see how it goes, because maybe she would do better than you think.  But if it seemed to be counter-productive then you can stop and try again later!  And I also think you are not obligated if you have clearer, more pressing goals, and this is just something that is a "should I do this because it's a usual activity" kind of thing when you know that there are things that are really, really fruitful and productive for her to work on right now that don't happen to be usual activities for her age. 

I think this all started when I was looking at handwriting curriculum. We practice writing when it's related to the letter we are learning, but I was looking at what we might need to do when we did LiPS or Foundations in Sounds. *shrug* I stopped myself and thought "What's the point of writing something if you have no idea what it says?" Then, I started wondering if I need to wait until she knows the sounds to practice writing or if I should still do it anyway and then I went down this Yea/Nay spiral. lol 

 

We're working on fine motor things for OT and writing her name is one of them. I feel like she does a decent job writing as it is (except for the AWFUL habits that were allowed when writing her name in preschool), so I don't think it'll be hard to get her writing later. In fact, she saw some cursive a few months ago and did a pretty bang-up job just copying it onto another paper. 

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She is making progress, she is doing good things.

 

I think it does just take a long time and readiness.

 

For a book suggestion if you are interested, I thought PhonicsA-Z by Wiley Blevins had some good ideas.

 

But I think when youĂ¢â‚¬â„¢re just getting started with FIS or LIPS then it may just take a while! FYI in that book he has a page or two talking about Ă¢â‚¬Å“ADD auditory something in depthĂ¢â‚¬ itĂ¢â‚¬â„¢s the old name for LIPS.

 

ItĂ¢â‚¬â„¢s one of the only books I ever found that seemed like it had *anything* practical to say, but itĂ¢â‚¬â„¢s not that it would be earth-shattering. But he had some suggestions for what kind of words make good key words.

 

I liked it bc at the time my son did alpha-phonics (a nice program but not a good fit) and learned snake as a key word for s.... he couldnĂ¢â‚¬â„¢t segment and so he couldnĂ¢â‚¬â„¢t go from Ă¢â‚¬Å“snakeĂ¢â‚¬ to Ă¢â‚¬Å“sĂ¢â‚¬ but he could make the wriggly snake motion. It was so, so frustrating.

 

But over time and with speech therapy/working on it he did learn his letter sounds!!!!!! Just not on a fast time table or at a pre-school age.

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Honestly, I wouldn't bother at this point.  It seems irrelevant to her.  Spend that time on giving her the foundation with language and sounds that she now has the resources to appreciate.  She's got a lot of years of listening to catch up on.  If you want to spend time on fine motor stuff, there's lots of crafts and practical life stuff that would be more appropriate.  But no, it doesn't seem like a developmentally appropriate activity to spend time on writing letters when she's not making a connection.  Don't waste her or your time. 

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You're good to wait till she wants it. However I would go ahead and form the letters in a sand tray and use sandpaper letters. I bought some on amazon and they aren't very expensive. They'll give you multi-sensory input to go with your LIPS/FIS work. You can also do whole body, gross motor letter formation, like in the air, on each other's backs, on a large circle chart, with water and paintbrush on the sidewalk, etc. But I would keep it at the phonogram and word level with multi-sensory until she seems to crave more. For my ds, that is just happening, now, at 9. Just roll with it. He was ready to read long before he was ready to spell.

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Didax Educational Resources Sandpapers Letters Boxed Set  These are what I used and I'm CRAZY for them. I may have just had the lowercase, but both would be good. They have numbers too. 

 

This heavy multi-sensory work is a super short stage, but it's really nice to have the right tools, good tools. We also used a jellyroll pan with salt in it. Sugar would have worked. Nuts, use easter colors of sanding sugar. That would be fun! 

 

I will tell you, the OT we're using right now, who super kicks butt on handwriting, only wants us to DRAW. She said drawing is the bees' knees for handwriting. She wants ds to be doing gross motor with her, saying the gross motor develops before fine motor, and she just wants us to draw each day. 

 

And to me, if you try that drawing, and it's slow to come, that's just another sign that spelling, handwriting, some things are going to have to take their time. Like we worked for a year with the doodling books from Timberdoodle (love, LOVE), and still she's like wow you should put your time there. Not handwriting, just doodling and drawing, stepped drawings, doodles, whatever. She wasn't really picky.

 

If she's 10 and things aren't clicking, we'd be having another discussion. But at 5, 6, 8, we are still really in the developmental progression. Don't let little voices freak you out about being behind if you're building foundations. Foundations, real progress, that's where it's at.

 

 

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There are two parts.

 

One, ways to practice letter formation without needing the fine motor to control a pencil. It can build a memory for how the letter is formed even without using a writing utensil.

 

Two, adding in more sensory/movement can help kids to remember more easily.

 

It can be necessary for kids who are having a hard time. But I think itĂ¢â‚¬â„¢s optional for a lot of kids, and then it is something they might like or might not like. Some kids would rather color or something. It depends on the kid.

 

This is a fun article about sand trays.

 

https://blog.allaboutlearningpress.com/salt-trays/

 

Same type of thing. ItĂ¢â‚¬â„¢s good stuff but if sheĂ¢â‚¬â„¢s got good pencil control and is able to copy, probably not necessary.

 

If she has a hard time learning letter formations and not just linking sounds and letters, itĂ¢â‚¬â„¢s very worthwhile.

 

My daughter would have been old to do this stuff when she was 5. My younger son somewhat would have been old to do it. My older son went Ă¢â‚¬Å“backĂ¢â‚¬ and did this kind of thing with OT when he was 7 and 8 and having trouble with letter formation. It was a good time for him to benefit from it, it was very suited to him then.

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ez Write 8 Beginning Strokes - YouTube  This is the handwriting I used with my ds. I'm not saying it's so way better than anything else, but it's helpful to watch a video. 

 

You're wanting to make lots of pathways, so you want them to say the sound while they trace it on sandpaper, say it while they write the letters from memory in sand, tell you the sound while you draw it on her back, etc. Sound to written, written to sound, done lots of ways. Multi-sensory. 

 

You can google multi-sensory instruction, but that's the gist. What LIPS adds is the ability to go multi-sensory with her mouth, with the visual. So see it in the mirror, see it in the LIPS faces, etc. Given her APD, she may have been doing some lip reading or using visual cues. So now you can harness that with a cognitive process to help her finish making connections on sounds.

 

I was watching a video tonight on apraxia (for a totally unrelated reason) and the professor was saying that many kids with apraxia have phonological delays, that not having the sounds glitches the practicing that helps them develop their phonological awareness. My assumption/guess is that the severe APD could do something similar. We've always known my ds' diagnosed dyslexia was very atypical. He now reads well enough that the psych is like hey, toss that label. But that phonological processing, it was super crunchy.

 

So I think you could support it all the way and see how far you get. I'm just throwing out that little bit of wishfulness there, that it could happen you're going to come in with some serious phonological processing cannons, get those things firing, and it's all gonna come together. 

 

I'm not promising that, just saying it could happen. 

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Perhaps she doesn't understand what letters are?

Which are no more than symbols, that we use to represent sounds.

Each symbol also has a name.

 

What could be helpful, is to help her understand how we use symbols to represent things.

While some symbols, look slightly like what they represent.

What can be confusing, are symbols that look nothing like what they represent?

This is precisely the situation with letters, that don't look like any sounds?

 

So that it could be helpful, to help her understand the concept of Symbols.

With letters as one type of symbols, to represent sounds.

 

Also make the distinction between, the name of a letter and the sound it represents.

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You can work on the fine motor skills needed for writhing without working on letters.

 

Does she recognize her name when she sees it? Many kids start with learning to write their name long before the can write other letters or words. If you, or someone else, is wanting to work on writing, the focus could be on writing her name. Many years ago when I taught pre-kinder the kids were expected to be able to write their name by the end of the year, but that was as far as the writing expectation went.

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You can work on the fine motor skills needed for writhing without working on letters.

 

Does she recognize her name when she sees it? Many kids start with learning to write their name long before the can write other letters or words. If you, or someone else, is wanting to work on writing, the focus could be on writing her name. Many years ago when I taught pre-kinder the kids were expected to be able to write their name by the end of the year, but that was as far as the writing expectation went.

 

Yes, she knows her name and she can see a letter and say "Hey! That's the letter than my friend Avery starts with", etc. 

She developed some bad writing habits with her name when she was in pre-K, so we're addressing that at home and in OT. 

 

(Just a side note on her name - it's strange to watch her write it. She writes almost all of the letters from the bottom up or forms the letters from right to left. It's very strange.)

 

Perhaps she doesn't understand what letters are?

Which are no more than symbols, that we use to represent sounds.

Each symbol also has a name.

 

What could be helpful, is to help her understand how we use symbols to represent things.

While some symbols, look slightly like what they represent.

What can be confusing, are symbols that look nothing like what they represent?

This is precisely the situation with letters, that don't look like any sounds?

 

So that it could be helpful, to help her understand the concept of Symbols.

With letters as one type of symbols, to represent sounds.

 

Also make the distinction between, the name of a letter and the sound it represents.

I think she has a general understanding, because she understands that people have letters in their names, that letters have sounds, etc. She just can't always recall the sounds or gets them confused with other sounds. 

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I guess I'm not sure what you mean by "learning to write".  I find that most kids do best with an instructional plan where they're learning to read and write in tandem, with each skill reinforcing the other.

 

I think that most young children learn best through physical exploration, and for kids who are struggling with letters, physical exploration can be a great way for them to really understand the differences between them and connect them with names.  So, things like writing them with shaving cream, or sidewalk chalk, or a paint brush with water on the side of the house, or a tiny nub of crayon on the bottom of a table while you lie on the floor like you're painting the Sistine Chapel; or building them with playdough or the HWT wooden pieces;  or stamping all over them with a bingo marker . . . , all the while talking about the names and/or sounds of the letters is a great way for kids to learn letters.  I would consider those to be handwriting activities, so I'd say that handwriting instruction is great for kids who don't have their letter names or sound/symbol.

 

I also think that kids learn to make sense of things through imitation and successive approximations.  So, I'd be doing a lot of things like having a kid watch while I write a birthday card for Grandma, or a grocery list, or a sign for the garage sale, and then ask them to think of something to add, and celebrating what they could do even if it was early in the progression of scribble, to letter like forms in random order, to letter like forms left to right . . .  I'd also be incorporating writing into imaginative play, whether that's making signs for block buildings, or pretending to be a police officer and writing tickets. I'd consider those things "composition" in that the child is learning how writing works, and is practicing organizing thoughts and representing them on paper.  

 

And finally, I believe in encouraging kids to use letters to read/spell as soon as they have a few.  So, if my kid knew 3 letters, then I'd be helping them rearrange them on letter tiles to spell words, or exploring them on an app like "Word Wizard".  I'd also be doing shared writing where my kid wrote the letters they knew, and I wrote the rest.

 

So, I guess what I'm saying is that I do believe that kids can benefit from practicing handwriting, and composition, and spelling even when they recognize very few letters, or maybe even none.  On the other hand, if you're asking about copy work or handwriting worksheets or formal adult directed handwriting instruction, then I'd say no,  I don't think they have a place for a kid at the level you describe.  But I'm also not sure I believe in them for any child.

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Yes, she knows her name and she can see a letter and say "Hey! That's the letter than my friend Avery starts with", etc. 

She developed some bad writing habits with her name when she was in pre-K, so we're addressing that at home and in OT. 

 

(Just a side note on her name - it's strange to watch her write it. She writes almost all of the letters from the bottom up or forms the letters from right to left. It's very strange.)

 

I think she has a general understanding, because she understands that people have letters in their names, that letters have sounds, etc. She just can't always recall the sounds or gets them confused with other sounds. 

 

Yes, this is why you need to use something like EZ Write or HWT, that has very clear instruction on formation. And you're working on retained reflexes, midline issues, OT stuff, right? How is she on L/R stuff? There's a theory in the development of this stuff that some kids stay longer at this land of confusion. My ds is pretty strongly VSL, and for him directions were all kerflewy for a long, long time, like several years. We did a lot of lego kits together, which helped. We were right about that age, 5/6. You build up to something complicated that she can't figure out without using the directions, and you work through them together. It gives her a physical way to work out in her brain the pathways of ok this is up, this is down, this is left, this is right. Like my ds could build through a bunch of steps and then realize he had just built them all MIRROR, like flipped the wrong way. It just wasn't really tight in his head. So she needs opportunities to use her hands and build things and get that feedback of oh yeah it ended up in the right spot.

 

Timberdoodle has cute games that would be good for that. Day and Night would be good. I think it's by Thinkfun. They used to sell it if they don't now. That idea of things to keep letting her brain turning things and figuring out directions. She's super young. Don't go to TEACHING now. You really, really, really want to stick with lots of hands-on play. Does she like clay? You could get playdough and get some cute guides for things to build and build them together. Play with playdough every day. If her hands are strong, jump up to Sculpey. Origami would be good. Hobby Lobby sells books of easy origami. 

 

You want to do lots of physical things, fun things, that help her develop the pathways and brain connections. THEN she can use those to pull it together and write words. That's a huge leap, and really only some kids are ready for that at this age. 

 

Don't think of it like ok I got the filter, now I need to TEACH her and catch up. What you need to do is make lots of brain pathways, so when she's ready to do those things she can. 

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Do you have an easel to stand and paint? Ikea has them for $14. You could get one and paint several days a week. Seriously. And make big charts with the EZ-Write foundational strokes. Gross motor proceeds fine motor, so anything you thought you wanted to do fine motor, be doing gross motor.

 

She's also young enough to enjoy fine motor games, btw. They have books of them you can get at teachers supply stores. I had one. You know, things like games with pinchers and moving cotton balls, that kind of thing.

 

Btw, you didn't ask, but you might like to buy cute easter eggs to use for spelling, phonograms, matching upper and lower case, etc. It's really quite endless what you can do with them and kids love 'em. I have some white ones where I physically wrote the upper and lower case on the halves to let him match them. I just bought some camo eggs to step up the challenge, hehe. I think we'll use them for language stuff, like building sentences. If the eggs are big enough, you could put letter tiles in and let her unscramble words, haha. Sometimes I just use one egg as the reward at the end of the day. Find it and inside is a treat. 

Edited by PeterPan
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I guess I'm not sure what you mean by "learning to write".  I find that most kids do best with an instructional plan where they're learning to read and write in tandem, with each skill reinforcing the other.

I mentioned it above, but it probably got buried. :) 

 

Basically, we're dealing with auditory processing disorder, mixed expressive receptive language disorder, ADHD, SPD, and I wouldn't be surprised if dyslexia is in the mix. I know that the reading aspect is going to be slow because of how much we've been working and how little progress we've made. In my mind, though, I still need to teach her how to write the letters, but after thinking about it, I was wondering if that even made sense since, as you said, those things are usually taught in tandem. 

She learns to write the letters as we introduce them (she can write b, m, f, k, t and a) and as we continue to introduce them, she'll learn. But, I was looking at difference writing programs and they were all with words and such and to me, it wasn't logical to continue to reinforce the writing aspect, learning/practicing cursive or print, if the words were gibberish to her. 

 

That's what I was wondering - if I was right in thinking that reinforcement of writing when it's gibberish was pointless, much like me learning to write Chinese characters without knowing what they meant or how they went together. 

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Are you beginning speech therapy for the MERLD? Now that you have your filter, it would be good. Personally, I would work on language more than reading. I got my ds reading and he couldn't UNDERSTAND what he was reading. No joke. You want to be working on language every day with speech therapy materials. Go through Super Duper and see what they sell for express/recept language, APD, etc. Talk with your SLP. Synergize, energize, go at it. My ds began spontaneously reading environmental print when we got his language up. 

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DeGaetano has great stuff for APD, expressive/receptive, etc. Have you seen her book Attention Good Listeners? We did it while we were doing LIPS, but it was at least as valuable, maybe MORE valuable. Highly, highly, highly recommend. Cheap, easy to implement, and you can use it a bunch of ways. (rapid naming, working memory, minimal difference pairs, etc.)

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Don't think of it like ok I got the filter, now I need to TEACH her and catch up. What you need to do is make lots of brain pathways, so when she's ready to do those things she can. 

Very good point. I feel like if we don't get onto a reading program now, then she'll be even further behind and we'll never "catch up". I have to stop and breathe and remember that some places don't even begin formal education until 7. So, even now, we're doing just fine. 

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Are you beginning speech therapy for the MERLD? Now that you have your filter, it would be good. Personally, I would work on language more than reading. I got my ds reading and he couldn't UNDERSTAND what he was reading. No joke. You want to be working on language every day with speech therapy materials. Go through Super Duper and see what they sell for express/recept language, APD, etc. Talk with your SLP. Synergize, energize, go at it. My ds began spontaneously reading environmental print when we got his language up. 

That was the initial reason for speech therapy. They're now including auditory skills, but a big part is MERLD. 

 

I'll get on there and look. 

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Maybe try to get two hours a week of speech therapy. See what your insurance will pay for. You've got a lot going on and language is the key that is going to hold back and unlock EVERYTHING. Language is where I put the majority of my mental effort with ds. It is going to glitch up EVERYTHING. With ds, he had high vocabulary and people thought he was fine. I kept saying no it's not. CELF scores were funky, so I intervened and thought ok, now we're fine. No, now we have narrative language, expressive language, interoception (advocating for how you feel, putting it into words). It's just on and on. And think about all the school subjects that get glitched up. 

 

The language issues mean that he functions multiple grades behind for school work. He progresses relative to himself and probably is not going to just catch up somehow. We're having to build everything. There is not going to be "too much" with speech therapy. You could get two people or do two sessions a week. Have her give you homework. Have her show you how to play games to work on your goals. Most speech therapy involves games, and this is a great age to hit goals with play. So have your SLP give you goals and how you how to work on them (expressive language, receptive language) using intentional, planned play time every day. Call that school. Some intentional play and planned therapy time, every single day, that would be my advice/

 

I've been buying more toys lately. Now I'm buying things trying to work on narrative language ,because we just have so far to go. We never accomplish all my goals. How is it supposed to come out on paper/screen as 3rd grade writing when he can't do the narrative even with expressive language? It can't. So far to go.

 

Does she have some kind of dolls or Polly Pocket or that kind of thing she likes? Something she doesn't have. Get it, slowly add to it, something with lots of details and things to fidget with. Use that to work on your language. I just bought a set of lego mini figs, just knockoffs on amazon. We can build narratives with them. Any language goals your SLP is working on, you can work on with the toys. Prepositions, sentence structures, using joining words, classification, conversation/dialogue, anything. 

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Take a look at I See Sam books from www.iseesam.com or www.3rsplus.com

 

They teach reading starting with only 3 words and 5 sounds/letters so the child doesn't have as much to remember. It moves very slowly with adding new letters/sounds. Very effective for those with dyslexia and language delays.

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There is a really nice new app called Ă¢â‚¬Å“initial codeĂ¢â‚¬ by sounds write, it teaches a few basic sounds and how to write them, that might work, but I would not randomly teach letters that she has not learned or is not learning. The app is very incremental and forgiving and well designed. It is British, so there is a British accent, but it is not that different from a general New England accent.

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There is a really nice new app called Ă¢â‚¬Å“initial codeĂ¢â‚¬ by sounds write, it teaches a few basic sounds and how to write them, that might work, but I would not randomly teach letters that she has not learned or is not learning. The app is very incremental and forgiving and well designed. It is British, so there is a British accent, but it is not that different from a general New England accent.

Fabulous! I'm going to check that out. 

 

*DARN! It's only iPad. We have a tablet and iphones, but no iPad. :( 

Edited by Southern Ivy
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Is the AAS app available for android or only ipad?

 

Total aside, but for my ds the british accent was a mess. We tried Nessy and they had that. Ditched it right away. Super cute, just not appropriate for him because he already has issues, lol. That was a couple years ago. Maybe now he could sort it out? Dunno.

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Because she is still working heavily in phonics perhaps its time to work on fine motor techniques. For my son it was visual tracking of the hand. Even with vision therapy we did many many mazes, dot to dot, color and paint by numbers. Perler beads, legos and I actually used the arrowsmith technique and  had my son trace mayan, latin and other symbols to work on motor control. The arrosmith model tries to remove the phological aspect and work exclusively on motor control. 

 

 

Arrowsmith is a school in Canada I learned about it in a book called "the woman who changed her brain" It has some interesting elements and I stole a bunch of ideas from their techniques. They call it  Motor Symbol Sequencing Program (MSS Program)

 

Here is an interesting article The relationship between handwriting, reading, fine motor and visual-motor skills in kindergarteners

I just developed my own symbol tracing techniques based on pictures I saw of arrowsmith and had my son trace and trace them to build his visual motor control. Then after Vision Therapy when we started Getty and Dubay he took off. I attribute that to cementing his visual motor complex. 

 

 

I posted this in another thread Its worth a read it might give you some ideas of how to work with your daughter to get that visual motor connection independent of letters while you are working on phonics and reading. 

 

 

For connecting the fine motor to the brain:
Since you are into way out there ideas. Have you heard of the Arrowsmith model? they have a school in Canada. I read and watched every article I could about that school. I actually made my own version of symbols and had my son work on reproducing them and writing them to help him build fine motor skills and tracking skills. Here are some links if you feel like reading sometime. I learned about it through the Norman Doidge . The brain that changes itself. I don't know if it totally was as cool as the article said. I did do tons of clocks and tons of symbol tracing. My son really just had a visual hand challenge. I feel like I blasted through rock but the symbol tracing did help and got him control. I also got a light board and had him trace on that. 

http://www.arrowsmit...ve_capacity.pdf
http://www.arrowsmit...ire-a-Brain.pdf
 

 

Seperately. 

 

For linking phonics with letter meaning I like the phonetic magnets from lakeshore learning. You could have her just write the letters in sugar and all the cool tricks you learned in school. some kids do not learn as well with paper and pencil. They need tactile and intense hands on to get those connections forming. 

 

Edited by exercise_guru
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I have read a lot about it but do not know anyone who has moved and placed their child in the program. They now have the symbol program remotely through the toronto school but for our purposes we spent a lot of time doing repetitive motor symbol tracing. Not as much as arrowsmith but as much as I could bribe my son to do. I also did a lot of clock work with analog clocks with my son but he seemed to take to them quickly so after a month I decided that wasn't where the glitch was and moved where he needed the help. As he got older I bought a digital tracing light up board and had him trace a lot of shapes and figures. i still wish I had time to do this as we did it all summer. Now with school I am hoping we cemented the handwriting enough that automaticity will take over. 

 

I think with dysgraphia and with handwriting there is too much focus on the shapes of the letters.  With my son the glitch was way before that in tying the hand motion with the brain and so we had to back up and work on that for hours and hours. I did this the entire summer between 2nd and 3rd grade and then I did Getty and Dubay through  the summer between 3rd and 4th grade. Next summer I hope the handwriting is all cemented and we can just work on bravewriter. Its certainly been a long process. 

 

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Thanks all. :) 

Yes, we do a lot of fine motor at home and that's a big focus at OT, which we just started back up (we changed insurance and had to change therapists. I love this new one. He's newly graduated and on it, plus I just have a better vibe with him.) 
Anyway, lots of fine motor skills - tracing, putty, learning to write her name better, coloring, etc. 

We're taking a break from any kind of literacy program right now. We will still do read-alouds. She also has an Epic! account and the Storyline Online app for more read-alouds. But, formal instruction, we're stopping for the time being. I've been talking to a lot of APD moms on FB (and I know you all have mentioned this before, but it takes me awhile to really process and own it  :001_huh: ) and the general consensus has been to step back and wait until she's 7. The majority of them tried literacy programs before to no avail, but almost all of them were saying that around 7, they noticed more retention and that grew through the coming years. 
It's hard to break free from all my education and experience, but we're just going to chill and allow her auditory nervous system to develop a bit more. 
DH is very nervous about that, but I'm pulling out articles and research about reading and kids who start later. 

Edited by Southern Ivy
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Lots of countries don't do any literacy instruction till seven, and she's got years of LANGUAGE to catch up on.  I think holding off on reading instruction and focusing on language and motor skills is a really excellent idea.  I've wondered if we would have saved angst if I had waited till seven to try to teach my younger one to read.  Developmentally, I think a lot of kids aren't really ready till close to then, and it's not like you're waiting till 12 like some of the unschoolers do, which makes it tough to remediate learning disabilities.  Good idea!

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Ivy, when is her b-day? Honestly, I don't even see how that's stepping back. She's almost more like K4 by age. 

 

Yes, because she had significantly decreased input because of the APD, she's going to have a phonological delay. A DELAY is not the same thing as a defect. It's not saying it won't come, but it's saying indeed she might need a year or two of time to use these sounds, NOW THAT SHE'S FINALLY HEARING THEM, in order for her to be ready to process them and do the complex task of reading. 

 

So yes, I agree with your online people that pushing reading per se is not the necessary thing right now. Doing things with sound, things you'd normally do in K4 or K5, like reading nursery rhymes, playing games with things that rhyme or have similar onset/final sounds, these would be totally normal to do. Get puzzles where you build pictures that you spell (cat, dog, cake, etc.). Melissa and Doug has them but they're pretty common. Walmart will sell beginning phonics games like that for back to school. Puzzles where you do alphabetical order would be good. She's going to benefit from extended time at this stage, now that she's finally HEARING these things and getting the input. 

 

You know, you might even consider AAR pre. Have you looked at it? It's the cutest thing you've ever seen. Ok, it's as much as LIPS. But I'm just saying, I agree with you. 

 

The real gig with beginning reading later is that they *don't* just magically come up to speed. The studies show that people who begin later still go through the same steps of fluency acquisition and still need the hours. So there ARE consequences. But I just think quibbling over 5 vs. 6 vs. 7 is just not productive. The main thing is to meet her right where she is right now. I think you can do high quality materials with her and help the process. It's not like you have to do NOTHING. But to focus on language, on phonological processing, filling in her holes, this is good.

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Ivy, when is her b-day? Honestly, I don't even see how that's stepping back. She's almost more like K4 by age. 

 

She will be 6 on April 26, so about 6 weeks away. BUT, with her ADHD, her executive age is more like 4. 

 

 

Yes, because she had significantly decreased input because of the APD, she's going to have a phonological delay. A DELAY is not the same thing as a defect. It's not saying it won't come, but it's saying indeed she might need a year or two of time to use these sounds, NOW THAT SHE'S FINALLY HEARING THEM, in order for her to be ready to process them and do the complex task of reading. 

 

So yes, I agree with your online people that pushing reading per se is not the necessary thing right now. Doing things with sound, things you'd normally do in K4 or K5, like reading nursery rhymes, playing games with things that rhyme or have similar onset/final sounds, these would be totally normal to do. Get puzzles where you build pictures that you spell (cat, dog, cake, etc.). Melissa and Doug has them but they're pretty common.  ??? Spelling the words or ? Walmart will sell beginning phonics games like that for back to school. Puzzles where you do alphabetical order would be good. She's going to benefit from extended time at this stage, now that she's finally HEARING these things and getting the input. 

 

You know, you might even consider AAR pre. Have you looked at it? It's the cutest thing you've ever seen. Ok, it's as much as LIPS. WHERE are you finding LiPS for that price? I need to snatch it up! AAR pre is only $120. The full LiPS kit is $468! But I'm just saying, I agree with you. 

We have AAR pre. The first 26 lessons are JUST the capital letters, no sound integration. The sounds start once you get to the small letters. We never got past D and she never remembered the letter names, so I abandoned that quickly. We've had more progress with pre-levels of Explode the Code. 

 

The real gig with beginning reading later is that they *don't* just magically come up to speed. The studies show that people who begin later still go through the same steps of fluency acquisition and still need the hours. So there ARE consequences. But I just think quibbling over 5 vs. 6 vs. 7 is just not productive. The main thing is to meet her right where she is right now. I think you can do high quality materials with her and help the process. It's not like you have to do NOTHING. But to focus on language, on phonological processing, filling in her holes, this is good. 

 

Edited by Southern Ivy
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Gander Publishing - LiPS® Manual - Fourth Edition  New the manual is $138

 

Gander Publishing - LiPS® Mouth Picture Magnets (15)  $27 new

 

I have some of the other components (playing card deck, etc.) because they came in the set I bought, but really you can do what you need with these two things and hack the rest. You have a magnetic whiteboard or they're $8 at Walmart... I used Classroom Magnetic Letters Kit at Lakeshore Learning  with the face magnets. It gave us enough letters to build all the sounds that could go with each face. My ds has apraxia, so I really needed to make that connection between the physical and the written. I did it to organize his brain. I got the letters at a used sale for $15, so I can get where you might cry over the price. But again, hack them or get creative somehow. 

 

So you definitely don't need the full kit. Therapists will buy that in a practice and use it for lots of kids. You're trying to teach one kid.

 

If you don't want to spend money on things, make them yourself. You can make your own little puzzles like the store ones. I've seen them on pinterest with popsicle sticks. People hack stuff. This doesn't have to be $$. Amazon.com: Melissa & Doug See & Spell Wooden Educational Toy With 8 Double-Sided Spelling Boards and 50+ Letters: Melissa & Doug: Toys & Games

 

Definitely try pinterest. (381) Pinterest  You'll find all kinds of phonics games at the thrift store, etc. 

 

With where she's at, you could almost do a letter of the week.

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I think I've said this before, but DeGaetano's Attention Good Listeners, which is intended for APD and kids with phonological issues, was really, really pivotal for us. I liked LIPS, but AGL was super, super valuable, almost irreplaceable for its brilliance, and only $30. AGL unlocked my ds and let everything else click. 

 

And if you don't want to pay for AGL, you can even hack that. What you're looking for are minimal differences pairs. You can google to find lists. But AGL was quite good. It would fit with kind of a playful, phonemic awareness approach, without getting rough or pushing you into actual reading. It's going to literally just help her notice the sounds in words more. I really agree with the people who are saying to spend time there. Think K5, google K5, pinterest K5. Anything that is typically done then would probably be a really great fit for her at this stage and fun and gentle and pleasant and reinforcing.

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(381) Pinterest  Here's a link. Some of the things you find on pinterest are really good! Like the printables for using clothespins to label how many sounds, that's fun. Using plastic cups labeled with a sharpie for letters/phonograms and stacking them to change words, brilliant. I think I may do that! Making little things to sort words, sure. 

 

Ooo, I'm scrolling through the link here. Someone made a sorting tray and is sorting little toys by initial letter. There's a printable for making word puzzles with pictures. 

 

It's all good. You can work hard or you can go at it gently. I played games like this with my ds. I have various kinds of phonics dominoes. (initial sound, final sound, rhyme, etc.) Really, it wasn't one or another. We were working on things lots of ways and it all came together. Things got easier over time. But definitely I used this stuff over a range of time, probably a year and a half. Yeah it was at least that long. And now we're going to go back through it, now that he's older, because I think maybe he's ready to do it again and spell. He was doing it, but it was without meaning to him, without soul, without any realization that it was useful. Now he gets it and wants it. I think that part was developmental. You can actually push memorization with no comprehension, but why? 

 

Ooo, this paint stick beginning sounds activity looks cute! Anything you do will probably be useful for a while to her. :)

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