I have a student who can not remember how to differentiate the letters b and d. He will write them wrong 8/10 times. I have tried many different ways to help him remember the differnences of b and d when writing. Do you have a technique you can share? Thanks in advance.
Re: need a technique for remembering (b and d)
Just one suggestion, you might have him visualize and draw a bat before the ball for the b and a doughnut before the stir for the d and have him orally reinforce that he is drawing the “bat before the ball” or the “doughnut before the stir” as he is drawing it. When looking at a word that starts with a b or d you could help reinforce his recognition of these letters by by asking him to state whether the first letter is a “bat before the ball— b” or a “doughnut before the stir — d”.
[Modified by: dhfl143 on December 07, 2011 09:08 PM]
Re: need a technique for remembering (b and d)
I’ve worked with struggling readers for over a decade and ran into many who initially confused b and d both when reading them and writing them. I always took about two minutes to explain a simple method to them that would work both ways, reading and writing, and after a short while, they rarely had a problem anymore.
I cover the method, which I borrowed from Romalda Spalding’s [i]Writing Road to Reading[/i], on my website on the page [url=http://ontrackreading.com/phonics-program/telling-b-from-d]Telling b from d[/url]
If you try it a few times, you’ll forget about using all the other methods, most of which interfere with comprehension because they throw a bed, and animal, or some other object, into the middle of the storyline. This method is completely tactile, and is adopted very quickly with minimal reinforcement.
Rod Everson
[url=http://ontrackreading.com]OnTrack Reading[/url]
Re: need a technique for remembering (b and d)
First, you’re a great teacher for asking this. My child, it took a couple of years, resolved the reversal issue. She was diagnosed with dyslexia by a neuro psyche in middle school and is now applying for colleges. Dyslexia has a lot of associate issues such as executive functioning, etc. It all depends on the child. So, it isn’t about the reversals as much as how the brain process information. If you try to remediate the reversals by understanding more about executive functioning and word retrieval—you may help the student improve. Puberty helped my child on a lotas well as great teachers like you. Something came together in her brain and her reading took off. The IEE helped to guide the teachers.
Re: Re: need a technique for remembering (b and d)
I have tried many different ways to help him remember the differnences of b and d when writing. Do you have a technique you can share?
thanks
robert
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[Modified by: dhfl143 on June 03, 2012 10:42 PM]
Try using a performance task-relating an activity to real life tasks. Example: Seeing a dog or looking at a banana. There are plenty performance task and hands on activities that may allow the student to create less errors with B & D.
Good luck