:?: My son is 11y.o and in the 5th grade. He had a closed head injury when he was 4 y.o and had trouble with short term memory and word recall. His short term memory has improved but he has a lot of trouble with words (reading & writing). He is in an inclusive class at school. We have a terrific school system and they work well with him. I am concerned though that they are being too easy with him. He is a smart child and has many good ideas but has trouble putting them on paper. When he has to write a report he knows what he wants to say but it just takes him so long to write it out that he now uses a scribe. At school he has a tape recorder and he dictates his report into it. The teacher or an aide then transcribes it for him. He is graded on the content. At first I thought this was a good idea but now I am worried that he isn’t being challenged enough. He does still have reading and writing exercises that he must do. I’m not sure what if anything else could be done or if this should just continue. I would appreciate any comments or suggestions.
Re: Reading and writing difficulties
Thank you for your reply. I’m not sure how much that will help but I will give it a try. His problem isn’t really with handwriting it’s the spelling and sounding out of words. I’ve been reading out loud with him and when he has trouble I sound out the words for him. I’ve noticed though that even if the same word appears 2 or 3 times in a paragraph he can’t remember it from when I said it for him. I know its frustrating for him but at least he is trying. He enjoys our time together when we read. I’m just worried about how he is going to do in High School. If there is something I can do now to help I want to try it. He has had an IEP since kindergarten and the school has worked well with him but I just feel he should be doing more. Thanks again.
writing issues
While we know that most children should walk between 9 months and 14 months of age, we know so little about what ages are appropriate for them to do other things. As a teacher, I’ve seen 4th graders who write flawlessly well but I’ve seen many others who struggle to get their thoughts down on paper.
What is your concern? Does your son feel embarrassed by the presence of his scribe? I don’t see having a scribe as anything terrible in the 4th grade. and many executives go through their entire lives with a secretary typing up their dictations.
I’d agree with the other poster who suggested that he learn to type or at least try to type some of his shorter writing assignments.
Good luck.
spelling issues
[ His problem isn’t really with handwriting it’s the spelling and sounding out of words. He has had an IEP since kindergarten and the school has worked well with him but I just feel he should be doing more.
If he has identified issues with spelling, I’d say what he’s doing sounds about right to me. Most children without spelling issues are spelling just fine by 4th grade and certainly by 5th but - what did his testing say about his ability to encode words? Your description of him suggests he has an underlying ld with spelling.
There’s no shortcut to spelling especially for children with ld in the area. The looming presence of high school doesn’t mean a shortcut can be taken. Students with ld can still be troubled by those lds in high school.
voice dictation would be wonderful if it worked. Most folks say it doesn’t but you can always buy Dragon Naturally Speaking and give it a try. You could also explore the many spelling programs there are out there eg. Wilson and see if you want to try any of them with your son.
My own son had severe spelling issues and it wasn’t until college that it ‘clicked’ for him. Most of the words we use in our writing he can now spell on his own but for all of school, including high school, he dictated his work to a scribe or wrote out very badly spelled words laboriously on his own.
good luck.
Re: Reading and writing difficulties
It sounds like to me he first needs a good decoding and spelling program. That needs to be remediated first.
Janis
Daugther has a writing problem
Hi,
I do not know if this is what your son may have concering his writing problem or not but my 9 year old had a problem since day one, I thought it was due to her be a lefty but it never got better so I began to do some research on the subject and came across this thing called dysgraphia, it fit my daugther to a tee, I took her to her doctor but he said there was not much you could do but have her practice and be patient which I had none at this point but he had heard of it. A woman name Regina Richards wrote a book about it but I could not find it at the library or any real info. on the matter, someone said a supplement may help but I have not checked it out as of yet. As I said this may not be your son’s problem in that area but I thought it was worth mentioning, my child’s teacher never heard of it either but it is real, do not give up, my child just made the honor roll last month in spite of her writing challenges.
Good Luck!!!
Cam
Re: Reading and writing difficulties
I agree with Janis. If he has difficulty sounding out new words combined with difficulty in spelling, this is a red flag for not having a firm knowledge of the phonetic code. Grade 4 is just the time when this kind of problem becomes a major issue as the vocabulary level of reading advances and the list of memorized words doesn’t. Get a good research-based phonics program, preferably one that works on encoding/spelling in parallel with decoding/reading, and give him a thorough review. This isn’t an overnight miracle cure; it will take some time and work; but if you go through with it seriously, a year from now things will look very different.
Re: Reading and writing difficulties
I agree with Janis and victoria, and will go even further and recommend that you get a copy of “Reading Reflex” by McGuiness ($20 at bookstores, or check your library). Read the first three chapters, and then give your son the assessments in the book. You will learn a lot about what he needs this way.
Nancy
Keep the faith
Hello,
I went through the same thing with my son, it took us so long to realise he had a problem and even longer to work out how to fix it.
Just thought I would let you know that there is light at the end of the tunnel, we chose to get a software package to help, but I am sure there are other methods that can help
Duncan
Has your son learned how to type? The computer can be a wonderful tool for a child who has difficulty producing handwriting. My child has very poor handwriting, even after working on it for many years with OT, etc. He can write short sentences, but he does any longer written work on the computer. WHen he uses the computer, he writes at or above grade level even though we were told for years that he probably would not be able to do this.