What am I seeing here....

[sweet2ndchance]

Can someone explain my quirky child to me please? lol

Background - he's been to a developmental ophthalmologist. Diagnosed with an eye teaming issue. Got him glasses but still waiting on insurance to approve further testing. Fingers crossed they approve it before his rescheduled appointment next week. (there is no reason they shouldn't but you know how insurance can be)

While he has been enjoying the break for the last couple of weeks from real phonics work while we wait on testing, I'm getting anxious. I don't want him to forget what he does know before they test him and skew the tests, ya know? So I came across my copy of Sequential Spelling from when ds21 was little and thought to myself "Ds7 loves patterns. I wonder if he would tolerate working on words if they were in patterns he could see..."

So, we started SS this week. He is doing fantastic with it. I wouldn't say he loves it, but he does work with it much more willingly than he has with other programs we've tried (LOE, SWR, WRTR, ETC, OPGTR,...) Today was the first list that added endings other than just s. I explained the rule one time and he correctly applied it to the rest of the words in the lesson without help! He was proud of the words he was spelling and even showed his dad his words and, without prompting at all, explained the ending rule and why the words were spelled that way! 

This is a kid who still stumbles over reading CVC words at times. But he confidently spelled pinned, sinned, begin... And he excitedly announces that the words have patterns, what they are and at least once so far was able to expand the pattern to words that are not on the list. It feels strange and awkward to be asking him to spell these words when if I wrote it on the board and asked him to read it, without spelling it himself, he would wither in the chair into a puddle of whines about how hard it is.

I've never taught a child to read with word families. SWR was my go to when my big kids were little and learning to read. It worked fine with all of them eventually. Some caught on faster than others but they all got it eventually. This little guy however is turning everything I thought I knew about teaching reading on its head. He still says SWR is too hard but he almost seems to like SS. (Don't tell him I said that, I don't want to jinx it, lol)

We are going to keep going with SS for a while, just to keep his phonics skills fresh if nothing else. He feels successful and proud even if he's not begging for more words. Do you think he could learn to read this way? If there a word family/word patterns reading program I should look at? Do I need to just stop questioning and go with it? lol

 

[PeterPan]

It's fine to continue the sequential spelling, yes. It's probably both that it;s very orderly AND that he ha a little more time to mature. 

It's rare for an eye doc to run even a CTOPP so I don't thin what your doing affects the eye eval either way; it's fine to continue. Untreated eye teaming issues affect visual memory, so over the long run they need to be treated. Glad you'reprobably able to amke that happen. 

[kbutton]

I wouldn't worry about why it's working for now. Do the VT and see how that changes things. Something about SS is working, and that's totally fine!

[sweet2ndchance]

Yup, just waiting on stupid insurance to approve everything so they can further test and get a treatment plan for vision therapy. It's just red tape, it shouldn't be a problem getting it covered. Just a lot of hurry up and wait.

I don't have the paper right in front of me but I don't remember CTOPP being on their list of tests. They are doing at least one dyslexia test or screener (I can't remember which it is, a test or just a screener). That's what I was worried about with him not being fresh on his phonics skills.

[prairiewindmomma]

Type a word he should know but sometimes stumbles over in 48 point font and print it on a single sheet of white (or preferably yellow) paper and ask him what it says. If his eye teaming issues are severe, you might simply be dealing with vision issues.

My kid who I thought might have a reading disability had a functional vision issue. It can be that severe. He was seeing everything double, and the lines of the letters were moving around. 
 

If this is the case, I would work on a lot of stuff orally...clapping out phenomes, sequencing sounds orally, and continuing with what is working.