Scottish Rite Program for Dyslexia....

Submitted by an LD OnLine user on

I’m looking for information about this program. Does anyone here have experience with or opinions about this program? My daughter’s school district uses this program starting in the 3rd grade. We will have to make the decision to fight the school district to provide it to her in the 1st grade OR we do have the resources to send her to a highly respected private LD school.

I’m really leaning toward the private school because of its reputation. The only drawback with the private school is that it is about a 1 hour drive away from where I live and the commute would be tough day in and day out. I think I would be looking at taking her for 1 to 3 years with the goal for her to return to her regular school.

Maybe I’m not giving the Scottish Rite program a chance to work here. I just don’t want to make a mistake and regret it down the line. So far, I’ve had one parent who has been there tell me not to put her through our school district. She regrets not placing her children in the private school when they were first diagnosed. Help! What do I do?

Thanks,

Suzanne

Submitted by Anonymous on Thu, 05/08/2003 - 5:37 AM

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I haven’t seen it myself, but Scottish Rite gets good reviews consistently. Look for old posts here and on Teaching Reading and Teaching LD using the search option. Also you can look on the IDA bulletin boards. I believe that SR uses a version of Orton-Gillingham. Unfortunately they also push the totally unproven system of coloured plastic sheets, but you can ignore that.

However, Grade 3 is three years too late to start. This is the out-of-date and totally discredited approach of waiting and praying for a miracle while the child gets three years practice in failure. More resent research consistently backs up starting intervention immediately.

Submitted by Anonymous on Thu, 05/08/2003 - 11:07 AM

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If your child hasn’t “suffered” too much in the public school setting, try some intensive private remediation while he/she attends the public school. We were lucky, having caughter it end of 1st,beginning of 2nd grade. She missed afternoon class 2x wkly, (missed art, music, pe, etc., usually) and now is at and above grade level. She continued for 2 years and we are doing follow up OG tutoring this Summer.

It was the “best of both worlds” for us. Not for everyone. My daughter had/has strong social skills and she did fine in school despite the educational needs. Plus she was young enough that the kids didn’t realize she couldn’t read. Only trouble we’ve had in public school is the kids teased her in 2nd grade b/c of her handwriting. I told her to tell them she was practicing to be an MD :-).

Re: Scottish Rites, I’ve heard good and bad. You don’t have a lot of time to waste. PLUS, you want to make SURE the private school you are considering will meet his/her needs as well. Big decisions, big costs. Do your homework and go with your gut.

Submitted by Anonymous on Thu, 05/08/2003 - 6:24 PM

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I’d do a summer intensive program in either Phono-Graphix or Lindamood-Bell before I’d choose those two options. That Scottish Rite program is Orton Gillingham based and had lots of rules for the child to learn. It’s probably not appropriate for a first grader. It wouldn’t be high on my list of programs for reading remediation.

http://www.schwablearning.org/articles.asp?g=2&r=318

Janis

Submitted by Anonymous on Sat, 05/10/2003 - 5:36 PM

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Here the Scottish Rite program offers one-on-one tutoring for one hour twice a week for free. My thirteen year old niece started it last summer. It turns out she has a great sight memory but never learned how to sound out words. This worked out adequately, until her memory topped out. The program has been great for her. She has much more confidence and is doing much better in school. She can now decode almost any word.

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