spelling problem - age 8

I would find a developmental optometrist. Surgical treatment of strabismus often provides only cosmetic correction. The eyes still need to be trained to work together, something that surgeons and opthalmologists often fail to consider. You could try orthoptics through a pediatric opthalmologist, but developmental optometrists are generally more thorough and have a better success rate. There can be secondary problems with visual function also, and a developmental optometrist is trained to test and treat these.

Here’s a website that discusses treatment options for strabismus:
http://www.vision-edge.org/strabismus_amblyopia.html

Other websites that discuss vision, which may have more information about strabismus, are:
http://www.visiontherapy.org
http://www.vision-therapy.com
http://www.children-special-needs.org
http://www.childrensvision.org

Not everything you describe is necessarily vision-related. Developmentally, spelling follows reading. From your description, it seems as if your daughter does not actually decode words when reading. If this is the case (which the spelling also indicates), then I would drop all work on spelling and concentrate on reading. A child can get by with memorization up until about grade 3. After that, without decoding skills, the child is forever stuck at a 3rd grade reading level. I would recommend getting the book “Reading Reflex” from your local bookstore ASAP.

A program such as Audiblox (http://www.audiblox2000.com) would probably help with the math reasoning. PACE is also very good, but so expensive that you would want to get any vision therapy out of the way first. Audiblox is home-based and easy to do. Getting started requires the book, video, and starter kit of manipulatives (although you can assemble your own manipulatives after reading the book, instead of ordering from the website).

Mary

in your geographic area:
http://www.covd.org

Mary

While strabismus may be *part* of the problem, what you are reporting is a very very common pattern, with kids who have no vision difficulties as well. The school/teacher have taken the easy road that as long as the answer is right they don’t care about the technique, and a child with a good memory can get by for a couple of years on memory alone; then the work gets harder and the memory banks fill up and a large crash occurs.

Your child needs techniques and methods, not memorizing a pile of disconnected facts. Get “Reading Reflex” or any good phonics book, and give her a crash course. This will show up in spelling improvements within a couple of months.

Also look at the teaching math bulletin board here for suggestions on teaching math as a system of logic, rather than memorizing magical spells. I just posted some hints on learning basics, and there are many other good suggestions there.

Thanks to Mary and Victoria.
After reading your posts, I began to wonder if I am suspecting dyslexia, when in fact, I should just be working on phonics! She had lots of phonics at age 4,5, & 6, and became a 1st and 2nd grade reader. After that, no more phonics. Well, she is 8, and probably forgot lots of phonics, and the problem is showing up in the spelling. Also, like you forecasted, she is stuck at the 3rd grade level of reading. You both were extremely helpful.

Perhaps I was quick to suspect dyslexia because of all the letter reversals (shop/sohp) and also because she is very talented in art, very creative, and right brained. But, for now, I will work hard on the phonics. (Question: if she is dyslexic, is phonics still the way to teach her?)

Thanks for all the strabismus information. I’m going to try a developmental optometrist, and see what happens. Catherine

I just want to mention that it is possible to have both vision problems and dyslexia, and that they can be inter-related.

My daughter has severe congenital astigmatism that was undiagnosed until age 3, when she started to develop amblyopia. Eyeglasses equalized her vision and reversed the amblyopia. However, she was still not reading at all at age 8-1/2. That was when I got Reading Reflex and started tutoring her at home. Within 6 weeks she was decoding words at a 2nd grade level. However, her reading fluency was terrible. That’s when we took her to the developmental optometrist and found she had severe developmental vision delays, probably related to the astigmatism. She was in vision therapy for 8 months, during which time I made the mistake of dropping work on Reading Reflex.

After vision therapy, I took dd to a speech and language pathologist for a complete evaluation. At age 9 she tested as reading at a 2nd grade level. However, her rate and accuracy were two standard deviations below the norm. The test results were striking. She had phenomenal receptive language skills (comprehension, concepts, etc.) but she tested at the kindergarten level in phonological awareness. She also tested as having average decoding skills when reading real words, but very poor decoding skills when reading nonsense words. This revealed that she was using her excellent receptive language skills to “figure out” real words, disguising the extent of her problems with decoding.

Anyway, the upshot of all this is to point out that my daughter had both vision problems and delays in development of phonological awareness. The latter is typical of dyslexia. The vision problems were addressed by vision therapy and PACE (which developed her lagging visual processing skills), and the phonological delays were addressed by the explicit teaching approach in Phono-Graphix.

Whether or not my daughter is dyslexic depends on how you define dyslexia. The true definition of dyslexia is difficulty learning to read despite normal intelligence and opportunity. Since my daughter now reads, some people would not consider her dyslexia. However, what I have found is that dd has a constellation of problem areas, most revolving around written language skills. For example, spelling also has not come naturally to her (we are now using Avko’s Sequential Spelling for dyslexics, with great success), and she has difficulty with writing skills. Dd also has trouble remembering math facts, in spite of good comprehension of math concepts. This is also typical of certain types of dyslexics.

Incidentally, two good approaches to math are Math-U-See (http://www.mathusee.com) and Singapore Math (http://www.singaporemath.com).

One more thing I should mention. Letter reversals are a red flag for developmental vision problems — at least, after age 7. My dd had a lot of reversals and problems with directionality (left/right, up/down). This problem got much better after vision therapy and PACE.

Reading Reflex has been very successful with dyslexics, but also works great for other children. I definitely recommend getting this book and starting it, independently of what happens on the vision side. It teaches decoding skills very well.

Mary

The “gift of dyslexia” and”right brained people in a left-brained world” describe what I’d call one flavor of dyslexia, and it’s more common in boys and doesn’t really sound like your daughter at all — folks who are downright gifted in spatial memory and can draw on that to overcome problems with language.

Girls often have language and rote memory strengths that mask problems, and so they look like they’re doing fine until that “Third grade wall” when the memory just can’t compensate for the fact that they have been learning this stuff one thing at a time, in little separate compartments. They don’t make the connections between things, don’t see the relationships. This is the opposite of the kiddo who struggles with words in some ways *because* he sees the “big picture” more easily than the details. Does this sound more like your daughter?

FOrtunately once you see that you can start teaching in ways that guide her to see connections and relationships and to think logically (the stuff that comes intuitively to many folks, so it’s often not taught at all). You may be surprised at some of the ways she’s been interpreting the world ;) And yes, teach phonics — and teach patterns and the logic behind the language. So you might want to include some discussion of “rules” and not leave that to inference — but spend much more time on teaching the application of those rules and patterns or she’ll be like my kiddo who could recite the i before e rule and rattle off every exception — and misspelled ‘em all the time. I don’t think it was a waste of time for him to learn the rule, though — he just needed a bit of guidance in applying it.

**They don’t make the connections between things, don’t see the relationships. This is the opposite of the kiddo who struggles with words in some ways *because* he sees the “big picture” more easily than the details. Does this sound more like your daughter?***

Yes. Exactly like my daughter. Funny, but I have a 15 yr old son, who “sees the big picture” more easily than the details, so I can relate to what you’re saying. He is very right-brained, and maybe a little dyslexic (spelling), although a fast & excellent reader since age 5. I havn’t seen or read any books about significant differences between boys & girls, regarding dyslexia, and how they make connections, handle details, etc. If you have any suggestions, I’d appreciate it. Your post was very helpful - thank you! Catherine.

As a child I had two surgeries for strabismus…the first one was at 3 years of age…and I had trouble again….after the 2nd surgery at 8 I had a year or so of eye therapy/patches to strengthen my eyes and muscles. Even an opthamologist can’t tell that I had these surgeries because the eye therapy did what it was supposed to do..I am an excellent speller now, an artist and a voracious reader… I also had training in phonology when I was a kid. I think you may need vision therapy but I strongly feel that she needs to be instructed in phonemic awareness and strengthening the orthographic sound symbol relationship of spelling so that she can spell more efficiently. From what you have shared with us she is only using her visual skills and not making the connection to the Alphabetic Principle which is the sound symbol relationship of the words.

You may want to look in to the Spalding Program…The Writing Road to Reading which does a lot of categorization of the phonemic spelling patterns and organizing them in a book format that she can refer back to. Also a rhyming dictionary can be fun for her to use too…

Thanks!
A few behavioral optometrists have told me over the phone, that because my dd had 3 surgeries, & because it is congenital, that her chance of success with vision therapy is minimal. (surgery at 9 months, 2 yrs, & 5 yrs) . In spite of this, I’m going to try it. Were you born with strabismus, or did it develop by age 3? My dd was born with it, so she never used both eyes. Lately, I have noticed that one eye is beginning to wander, and if I don’t try therapy, she’ll be having more surgery soon, as I see it.

This time I’ll have my name in the name spot ;)

I’m trying to think of some books that will be more on your wavelength but htey’re just not coming… it will be one of those 3 a.m. things, I know ;) The main thing is to steer the kiddo *away* from rote and into thinking — but to structure it enough so she has a chance of figuring out what you’re talking about. If you look at the vocab. exercises on my site (www.resourceroom.net — click on “reading comprehension” to get there) you’ll see some of the kinds of things that work. Get her to do lots of paraphrasing and comparing. Some good resources would be Joanne Carlisle’s “Reasoning and REading” books (I think you can get lots of little books or just get “Level ONe” and “level two” that have ‘em all) and PRiscilla Vail’s “Clear and LIvely Writing” — or anything else Priscilla Vail’s written. She has lots of good ideas for getting kids to think. Some of the other comprehension ideas on my site (“main idea”) were inspired by JOanne Carlisle’s stuff, so if that stuff looks good to you, hers will too.

Just plain “language generation” exercises can be fun and helpful — start with “how many things can you think of that you’ll find in a grocery store.” Then wehn she’s come up with them, organize them into where they’d go. The whole thinking process of “here’s an idea, expand on it” may be new to her… but it will get easier! You can go from there to “how many things can you think of that you’d find underground…” “how many different kinds of food…” “what would you see at the mall…” and cater them to things she knows & likes.

s

I may have been born with Strabismus but I am not sure. I know some of my cousins had problems with “lazy eyes” Vision therapy is worth it…and it will take some time to strengthen her eyes..