Helping Your Child with Dyslexia Learn to Read & Write at Home
One of the most common questions we get is:
How can I help my dyslexic child learn to read and write at home?
This is a fantastic question and we wanted to dive into the biggest ways you can help your child learn to read and write effectively at home. Now teaching a child with dyslexia to read and write effectively is a complex process because many neural networks support the literacy (i.e., reading and writing) process.
We often talk about the “Literacy Processing Triangle” as a way to simplify the complex neural networks necessary for reading and writing. We break this down into:
3 primary areas of processing -
1 - The sound (phonological) processor - is responsible for helping us process the individual words, syllables, and sounds in words and is necessary for “sounding words out” when we read or spell.
2 - The visual (orthographic) processor - is responsible for helping us process each of the visual symbols (letters or letter groups) in words and is necessary for differentiating between similar patterns like b/d/p/q or words like was/saw.
3 - The meaning (semantic) processor - is responsible for helping us make meaning of words, sentences, and passages
To help our children read and write effectively,
We need to ensure that they are building these neural connections effectively and efficiently. We always recommend working with a literacy specialist either at your child’s school or privately if at all possible to help build these connections. That being said, there are some simple things you can do at home to help support these connections as well.
Build sound processing skills:
You can help your child build their sound processing skills by practicing what we call phonological awareness skills. These skills help students identify sounds, syllables, differences in words, etc.
In our clinic, we use a “10-Part Phonological Awareness Drill” - this drill focuses on a specific sound pattern and asks children to rhyme, determine how many syllables and sounds they hear, etc., and can be a great quick practice to help them build foundational sound processing skills.
These skills are necessary for both reading and spelling!
Build visual processing skills:
You can help your child build their visual processing skills by practicing a quick recognition of different letters and letter combinations that will work together to make different sounds.
In our clinic, we use a “Sound Drill” - this drill focuses on using a flashcard technique that will help students begin to visually recognize letters and letter patterns more quickly so that this process can become automatic.
We also use a “Lock Word Drill” - which helps students build the necessary sight word recognition that will help them with functional reading for those frequently seen words that may or may not be easy to “sound out.”
Even after children know their letters, they need to continue to build fluency and automaticity for those patterns (and more advanced patterns) to read and spell effectively.
Build meaning processing skills:
You can help your child build their meaning-processing skills by talking about words, sentences, and passages as often as possible.
In our clinic, we use different “Graphic Organizers” to help students make connections for their reading and writing.
At the word level -
We use a “Vocabulary Definition Organizer” which helps students think about the meaning of different words. So for example, if we hear the word “bat” it might be a “thing/object” that is “used for hitting” it’s kind of like “a club” but “it’s used for baseball.”
At the sentence level -
We ask our students to identify the “who/what” and “did what” in the sentence to make sure they’re making meaning from what they are reading. We can also use this for writing to make sure students are including both the who/what (subject) and did/does/is/are what (predicate) for a complete sentence.
At the passage level -
We use both “Reading Comprehension” and “Writing Process” Frameworks. This helps kids organize their thoughts and make sure they’ve understood the meaning while reading or that they’ve helped a reader make meaning when writing.
Other Considerations -
It’s helpful to follow a scope and sequence (order) when teaching each of the concepts, we’ve put together a “Comprehensive Rules Guide” which can help if you’re just starting with these concepts and perhaps don’t know all the rules (we didn’t! when we first got started!)
Make sure that if you do decide to incorporate these skills, you try to keep it fun and light - if it starts to become a fight or create tension, see if you can come back to it later or create a game out of it to keep it as fun as possible.
You can also consider incorporating rewards (e.g., you get to choose what we make for dinner or 10 minutes to stay up late) or other motivational incentives.
There you have it - some of our favorite activities that you can incorporate at home to help your child succeed in reading and writing.
If you would like help on this journey, contact us! We’re happy to point you in the right direction.