dyslexia or something else? (what do I do?)

[sbgrace]

My son is a young six.
I'm sorry this is long. I just don't know what I should think or do at this point.

He has very little phenomic awareness. I noticed this long ago (couldn't and still can't really rhyme consistently). I did phenomic tests from this site: http://www.brightsolutions.us/ and he had no clue on all but two questions. By no clue I mean when I said "if you change the /h/ in hot to /p/ what word would you have?" and he said "pat, right?" "no sweetie, not quite hhhhhot and take away the /h/ and add a /p/." "pud?" He did tell me when words shared similar beginnings (he seems to get beginning sounds yet has no awareness of ending or middle sounds) and told me cat take away the /k/ is at.

Here is what is confusing me.
He had no significant speech delay and no weird articulation or pronunciation issues at all. He repeated dyslexia as dyswexia but he’s six. His ambulance sounds like his brother’s (L issue which I believe is typical at a young early six year old level). I never noticed stuttering.
I don't know of any dyslexia in the family (my sister does have dyscalcula and I see signs of possible dyslexia in her early years at least and I know she's still a horrible speller but she's a special ed teacher and can read aloud and etc.) Neither my husband nor myself are dyslexic. I'm sure of that.

He has severe ADD I believe. He's right handed.

He isn’t at all solid on left/right but does know things like over/under.

He was late with hand dominance but he's better now at six. I do still have to tell him to use his right hand in writing but not all the time.

He knew letter names very early (well before 18 months, self taught). He easily learned letter sounds. He can say his alphabet in order though he can’t tell me what letters come after other letters. He struggles with memorizing days of the week in order and stuff like that but I don’t know how much is attention and interest. I noticed when he was learning to print he formed his letters with extremely illogical ways (cross of H before lines type stuff) with weird starting/ending points but that seemed to mostly resolve as we worked on it with Handwriting without Tears. He has a tight pencil grip and really struggled to form a non-fist grip but his thumb now isn’t crossed (it does sit closer to the top of the pencil).

He’s extremely creative, imaginative, and intuitive. I think he’s right brained (not at all sequential and an “aha” learner/global thinker). However, his visual spatial skills (things like puzzles) are not his interest or strength so I’m not sure. He does have an uncanny ability to remember locations he's only visited once long ago and things like that. He had vision therapy for convergence, tracking, and related issues.

Mostly I’m confused as he doesn’t seem to have the major warning signs (such as oral language things and strong family history) but the phenomic awareness is so poor that I think I have reason to worry about that alone? He's doing fine with our phonics program (Headsprout) but it's repetitive and he's memorizing I believe as he immediately knows headsprout words (no sounding out at all and he remembers them quickly) yet he struggles to sound out any words he hasn't encountered in Headsprout--even simple three letter blends.

I'm sorry this is so long and I would greatly appreciate any input at all about what I should do for him? I particularly need help with the phenomic awareness issues I think?

[Terabith]

The substitution phonemic awareness activities (changing hot to pot) are the hardest. My oldest is reading on a 4th grade level and still struggles with those.

Rhyming, however, would concern me. ABeCeDarian does a lot of great work on segmenting and blending, which really are what is important in reading. I think it would be good for you guys.

[burleygirl]

Hi, I understand your concern. I have a child who has dyslexia. She's 11 and we found out when she was 10. The first thing I want to tell you is to not take those lists, early warning signs, etc literally. My daughter spoke early and coherently at 18 - 24 months, walked at 10 months, knew her letter sounds at 4 and could read some. Dyslexia is very different for each and every child. There is no typical dyslexic child. My child read fluently in the 1st grade; however, I am pretty sure it was due to her memory. She did fine in 2nd grade as well. We pulled her from the public school after 2nd grade for various reasons (one being she hit a brick wall because the school switched to a new math curriculum). We noticed in 3rd grade her reading started to stagnate and by 4th grade it was not improving at all.

As she got older, school became much more difficult- spending > 3 hours on homework with our help. Needless to say she has trouble sometimes hearing middle and ending sounds as well. She has mild ADD as well.

Continue to work on the phonemic awareness with a good phonics program. My daughter had PACE (Processing and Cognitive Enhancement) training which worked on those middle and ending sounds and that was a great help to my daughter. If he is still struggling and you want a diagnosis, get him tested. We did only at the urging of my sister as I was in denial at first. However, after reading several books on dyslexia I was pretty sure that was the culprit.

She now attends a school for dyslexics and has made great strides. The use the Orton-Gillingham approach to teach reading and have done an excellent job with her.

Hang in her and have a lot of patience as he will need it.

[Shay]

I tutor a little boy who sounds a bit like yours. He is 6 1/2, but was a young six when I started with him. He had no speech issues. ( I use the I See Sam readers when tutoring.) He struggled a great deal at first. I became concerned that he was not hearing the differences in sounds because his teacher told me he performs poorly on spelling tests. I began to dictate words to him and sure enough, he had a hard time with similar sounds. So, I gave him the Barton screening, which he failed.

So, I decided to go with the notion that his phonemic awareness just may develop along with learning to read. This idea is dominant in the synthetic phonics teaching in the UK. In other words, perhaps teaching him to read will make the sounds explicit. The National Reading Panel found that phonemic awareness instruction is more effective when used with letters and that only doing a couple of types of phonemic awareness exercises is recommeneded (more may be confusing).

He has made great, great strides and is taking off. His spelling has improved greatly as well. So, this is one kid and my experience, but the question begs to be answered, "does/can phonemic awareness develop with learning how to read phonetically?"

I"ve only heard positive things about Headsprout. ABCdearian (sp?) is another good program that is highly recommeded (and folks use the Sam readers alongside it).

My own ds struggled to learn to read (but unlike yours, mine *did* have the speech delay). He also could not do the phonemic exercise you mentioned with changing out phonemes (hot to pot). But, after some Reading Reflex and then starting the I See Sam readers, he started to be able to read. It was a slow go at first and then he took off. I then tested him on those same phonemic manipulations and he aced it.

Does Headsprout employ the method of reading the phonemes in a continuous fashion....mmmmaaaat with no pause? Perhaps your son needs that "moveable" alphabet feature to make manipulating phonemes explicit? Reading Reflex is a cheap, fast way to do that.

[Ottakee]

Shay has some good experiences to share.

I just wanted to add that the I See Sam books would be a very good thing to try with him. http://www.teacherweb.com/CA/PomeloDriveElementary/Mrssakamoto/printap2.stm Here you can get the 1st 2 sets to print out. www.3rsplus.com has all 8 sets to purchase as well as lots of helpful information. Look around the resources for the cursor/notched card. This is a 3x5 card that you cut a notch out of. You use it to move along the word as the child sounds it out. It can really help with eye tracking, sounding out, etc.

As to the phonemic awareness, I would not overly worry about that. Kids CAN and DO learn to read without that. My daughter has some pretty severe special needs but can read at about a 3rd grade level now (learned to read using the I See Sam books) but I doubt she could rhyme or do most phonics worksheets but she can APPLY the phonics to words when reading and that is where it really counts.

As to the ADD. I would strongly suggest that you focus on treating that---be it looking at allergies (food and environmental), sleep issues (sleep apnea can be a part of ADD behavior), checking blood tests for anemia, blood sugars, thyroid, etc, using supplements or using medication if indicated.

My youngest daughter was so ADHD that she could not learn to read as she just couldn't focus long enough to get through sounding out a word. We did the allergy stuff, changing environment, diet, supplements, etc. and some of those things helped some but we went to medication and in 6 months she gained 2 years of academic skills. Medication might not be the first thing to try but for some kids, it can be very life changing.

[sbgrace]

Thank you! This is really helpful.
I'm going to get those I See Sam books for sure and also look into ABeCeDarian. I may finish Headsprout and see where we are before the ABeCeDarian but it sounds like the I See Sam might help now. My hesitation is I'm afraid he'll do something like ABeCeDarian and feel like he's unsuccessful and give up/lose confidence. Right now he feels good about himself re: reading because he can do Headsprout.

Shay, that's really encouraging to read! I talked to my sister tonight who is a special ed. teacher who was in charge of her elementary reading program and she said very similar things to me. Headsprout does teach blending without pauses/continuously. You mentioned addressing phonemics with just two
phonemic awareness exercises. Is there somewhere I can find phonemic awareness exercises to work on it directly or would you continue w/Headsprout (or ABeCeDarian if Headsprout doesn't seem to be getting it) along with the readers and see where we get?

Ottakee, it is reassuring to know kids can read w/out things like rhyming. My sister said similar stuff about treating the ADD more aggressively. She has ADD herself and told me what a difference it made for her academically to finally be treated. I have tried diet stuff, supplements, etc. w/out changes. He had a sleep study two years ago and it had reduced deep stage sleep but few apnea episodes. I hesitate to medicate him at this age though I assume we'll need to as he ages. I guess I may have to faster than I wanted though.

burleygirl, what age did you do PACE? I figured a child could talk on time and still be dyslexic. Do you know if they can be dyslexic with essentially no family history (to my knowledge the only person with dyslexia in the family is a cousin of mine)?

[Shay]

I'd agree with Terabith that phoneme segementing and blending are the two exercises that really, when it gets down to it, are important in reading. I've never used ABeCeDarian, but I gather it addresses those things. I used Reading Reflex for the phonographix aspect, and ABCD is based on the same premise, but is a full program with a yahoo support group and people on here use it, too. I've just got a hunch that your ds needs to manipulate letter tiles (paper or other). For some reason, it makes a difference with some kids (it did mine). You don't have to do this forever once the concept is down.

In the Put Reading First booklet, there is a lot of good info on phonemic awareness and what type instruction has been proven to help with reading acquisition. This booklet is very readable, not too technical. The first 10 pages deal with phonemic awareness.

http://www.nichd.nih.gov/publications/pubs/upload/PRFbooklet.pdf


The book Reading Reflex has activities in there to work on phonemic awareness (although I don't recall it calling it as such).

There is no history of reading or speech problems that I know of in my family either, so it was just a surprise when my 4th child had trouble.

With the students I tutor, I do encourage some of them to blend continuously, as that does seem to help the "lower" ones.

Some of the character's names in the Sam books are sort of like nonsense words, so that helps (Nan, Mit, Nell, Sid....at least the kids I work with have never heard of these names).

I think I'd stay with Headsprout, though, as it seems to have a great track record. Angie W on this group had success with her dd with HS and the Sam books.

Does your sister (sped teacher) have experience with any of the Direct Instruction programs (Reading Mastery, Corrective Reading)? I would be willing to bet she is familiar with them. The Sam readers follow a similar systematic sound sequencing.

I know this is a disjointed note....sorry! Keep us informed with what you do, please.

[sbatty]

You have already received some great suggestions... just wanted to add one more. He sounds a lot like my son... who is five (although my son did have speech delays). Have you ever checked to see if he has a sensory processing disorder. My son has auditory and tactile processing disorders (along with other sensory processing disorders).

The auditory disorder makes it hard for him to differentiate between like sounds... this makes rhyming very difficult for him. His tactile disorder makes it hard for him to hold a crayons and pencils correctly.

We have been working with an occupational therapist and have also been using The Out of Sync Child Has Fun... which is full of fantastic ideas for all children, but especially those with processing disorders.

Some things that have worked really well for our son include:
Auditory: The Listening Program... which stimulates the brain through classical music that has been specially modulated.

Tactile: Using crayons that are broken in half... this forces them to have to hold them in the pincher grasp. Picking up small items with tweezers or tongs. Threading string through noodles or cereal.

Good Luck!

[Ottakee]

I would continue with the Headsprout then as well. The 2nd level though does move MUCH faster than the first level--just a warning.

You might want to print out the first 2 sets of I See Sam books. They are likely to be very easy for him but will get him blending and give him even more success. Then move on to the next set. Make sure to read the directions on the www.3rsplus.com website-=--esp. about using the cursor and NOT over helping the child. That is one of the hardest things for a parent, we tend to help the kids too much.

You can also join a free and very helpful yahoo group called Beginning Reading Instruction (Shay and I are there along with other homeschoolers, reading specialists, etc). It is a wealth of free information and support.

The blending and segmenting is important and the I See Sam books, esp. used with the cursor and spelling suggestions would really work on this in a fun, easy way.

As to the ADD, it might be time to look at medication if he is really struggling. We waited until age 8 and I really wish that we had started 1-2 years earlier to help my daughter get a better start. It took us a few tries to get the correct medication but it is very helpful.

[sbgrace]

Thank you all so much!
This is my current plan. I'll join the group. I will do the I See Sam readers. I am going to make letter tiles for him as well. I'll go ahead with Headsprout as long as he's feeling successful and enjoying it but I think he's completely memorizing at this point. Unless something clicks I think I may need to do another (dyslexia) program.

I have a question and I'm not sure how to explain it but I read a free lesson on ABeCeDarian and it had kids pointing at each tile and saying the individual sound. The adult could do "turtle talk" to slowly run the sounds together if the child struggled but the child was pointing and saying individual sounds before blending.

So man for example, if I'm understanding the approach correctly:
point to m say /m/, point to a say /a/ point to n and say /n/ then run under them all and say /man/. If he struggles I do turtle talk and /mmmmaaaannn/. Then he tries again. Is there a reason he can't do it (still pointing as he moves to next sound) /mmmmaaaaaannnnnn/ /man/ if I can teach him to do it that way?

Sbatty, that's interesting. He does have sensory integration stuff going on (though proprioceptive) and that may be responsible for the grip/pressure stuff with writing. I don't know that he has auditory stuff going on? How would I know? I did a screening that involved comparing sounds (so he had to remember sh f ch and repeat them twice knowing they were three different sounds and f ch ch and know that there was one different and two same sounds) and he passed. Would that indicate to you it's not an auditory processing issue? I'd sure like another explanation for what I'm seeing honestly!

[Terabith]

I would definitely finish Headsprout! Especially if he is making progress.

I See Sam books are great. But after you complete Headsprout, I would take the ABeCeDarian placement test and start there.