Where to go now?

First question – have you had vision checked?  It’s always an important part of the process!  Beyond that, I find that daily practice is good, but I keep it short, no more than 5-10 minutes.

I see the options as practice reading,  revisit parts of  the last reading program,  or start another one.

We are using Abecedarian, abcdrp.com.  I think I would start with practice for a bit, and then add parts of a program later.

Have you screened for dyslexia? One marker of dyslexia is skipping the “little words” like a, an, the.

Another marker is reading words incorrectly that look like other words: play, plan.  Or house, horse.

Is her spelling bad? 8yo or 9yo is about when a dyslexic can no longer “mask” her trouble with reading and spelling  (not that she is purposefully doing that – young dyslexics have no idea that their brains are organized differently than anyone else’s.)

Lots of info at Barton Reading and Spelling and at Susan Barton’s other site, Bright Solutions for Dyslexia.

Even if you don’t think your dd is dyslexic, read the info. There is so much good, encouraging information on those two sites.

With my kids, I didn’t find it uncommon for them to skip the articles or prepositions in their daily readings.  I think their mind just skips to the next “hard” word.

In my experience, there is no substitute for daily practice.  I still have my 10YO read aloud to me for 5-10 minutes each day, and the progress he has made since last year at this time is amazing.  My 7YO and 6YO practice with me daily, as well.

In fact, I regret that I didn’t have my 14YO, who has always been a strong reader, read aloud to me more often in the earlier years.  Once he was fluent I let him go on his own.  Now I don’t have a handle on what he struggles with or what he may still need help with.

My daughter has dyslexia and does the same things you mentioned. So, I would not rule that out. You don’t need to have some expensive test done. If she shows those symptoms, then read up on it and look for a program that is geared for kids with dyslexia. From experience, I personally don’t feel you need an expensive program like Barton. We used it for a while and it helped, but when it just got into a bunch of spelling rules, it didn’t work anymore. Because of exceptions to rules, it was too confusing for my daughter. Just having to remember all the rules was frustrating her. We used Phonics Pathways for a while, but when her reading improved to where I could have her practice in books like Abeka Readers or easy chapter books, I stopped PP. My daughter has good phonemic awareness, which is unusual for dyslexics, so she can decode  pretty well, and that made a big difference. Many use All About Spelling for their dyslexic children. My daughter is in 6th grade and I still have her practice reading to me. But, she is doing some fun reading independently. I had her to a neuro-psychologist a few months ago for testing, not simply for dyslexia, but she has some other language issues and difficulties in math. But, I did mention to him that she will say ‘a’ for ‘the’ and ‘the’ for ‘a’ quite often. He said to let them go. Getting too picky about little words like that will just cause frustrations. I was stopping her for every little word. But, saying ‘play’ for ‘plan’, I would stop my daughter and have her take time to look at all the letters. Then she would get it right. Dyslexics will read by shape or by context. They see the first letter or two and then guess at the word. I agree that a lot of reading practice is needed, but if there is dyslexia, you may need a program like AAS until she is able to decode well. Just my opinion.

My daughter struggles with reading in Sunday School as well. The teacher has each of the kids read some verses. She would prefer not doing it, but I told her just to do her best. I know she does not read as well as the others, but trying to push her to read like the others would just make things worse. I used to worry about her not being on the same level academically as her peers, but as one poster said on another thread, this is where she is. You just work with the child where he/she is and let them progress at their own speed and not worry about anyone else. As long as the other children in Sunday School are sensitive and not making fun, I wouldn’t worry about it.

“R” is a very tricky sound. My ODS has been in apeech therapy for 18 months (so close to graduating) for “s” “th” “l” and “r” and according to his speech path. “R” is one of the toughest sounds to learn because that one letter makes so many different sounds depending on what letters it is paired with. My son has improved so much! If you are concerned you might want to seek outside help. Talking to his speech therapists “r” is a sound that is not “grown out of” some kids do but since it takes a bit (or a lot) of “retraining the brain” on how to form the sound it is tricky. My ODS ‘s speech therapist had trouble with “r” when she was young too.

Oh and speech struggles can also effect reading and spelling because they are hearing the word incorrectly so spelling or reading it can be difficult. If my son heard the word red but when he said it, it sounded like “wed” he would spell it that way.

It is very fascinating how things are all tied together. We also found my ODS had low muscle tone in his jaw which not only effected speech but also eating, why he was such a difficult eater. I fealt like a lot of “light bulb” moments over the past 18 months 🙂

Sorry that got so long *blush* just things I wish I had been told or even mentioned years prior