Question about Fast ForWord

The spelling alternatives that you listed do NOT indicate a problem with perceiving sounds, quite the opposite!

You write:
“he spelled floor as “flore,” garage as “grag,” crystal as “cristel” and difference as “diffrents.””

For example, “flore” is a perfectly logical spelling, rhyming with “more” and “store” and “pore” and “bore” etc.; in fact it is the *standard* spelling “floor” that is weird and doesn’t really represent the sounds — should rhyme with “poor” and “moor” and “boor” . Your child is demonstrating both hearing the sounds correctly and knowing at least level 2 of the phonics code.

“cristel” and “diffrents” also make perfect sense — sound them out and pronounce them and he is right on.
In fact “diffrents” shows he knows there is a linguistic relation to “different”; he doesn’t know the linguistic rules for changing suffixes, but that’s a way in the future.

Now, “grag” by the rule would have a ‘hard’ g and rhyme with “bag” or “sag” or “drag” so he needs to learn the ‘soft’ g rule (g = j before e, i, y; also c = s before e, i, y). However if you corrected this and wrote either “grage” or “graj”, again his speling represents *exactly* the sounds he says. No problem.
This rule is introduced in my level 2 phonics and re-taught in level 3. So he is again demonstrating a *good* knowledge of sounds and phonics patterns to level 2.

Your doctor may be a very good doctor, but her knowledge of the phonics code seems to be lacking. Beware of people stepping outside their area of specialty; they can be just as ignorant as, or worse than the average person.

I haven’t seen any other information on your son and cannot diagnose at a distance. However if he has *no other* signs of auditory processing difficulty, the it would look like FastForWord is not the indicated approach. I would take him through advanced phonics — he doesn’t need levels 1 and most of 2, but some review of 2 plus 3 and 4 could do him good; I would teach him irregular and overlapping/variant spelling patterns. Whatever his other language difficulties are, it would make sense to work on them directly.

I agree with Victoria, who analyzed the errors extremely well. Most of these are spelling rules. I think Orton Gillingham would be a better recommendation.

You might look into Barton Reading and Spelling which is particularly strong on the spelling rules— probably others out there.

—des

The phonics have helped my son read but have not improved his spelling. He still spells much like the examples given.

Some of it is leaving out syllables-difference, for example, has three syllables and he will only say and/or spell two. He has been in speech for 9+ years but still ‘compresses’ many words

At some point visual memory has to come into play. I can’t quite put my finger on it but SOMEHOW we know to spell ‘boat’ not ‘bote’ and its not phonics as both are phonetically correct

You can use phonics to sound out words because you just keep trying the options until one makes sense;you cant do that with spelling-you only get one shot-my son applies the first phonetic interpretation that pops in his head!!!!

It sounds like this kiddo does as well

Honestly, I don’t know where to go with it myself.

I received mixed opinions on Fast Forward when I investigated it-some said my son, 11 at the time, was considered too old. Others said he would be fine. I chose to forego the expense

No idea if that was the correct choice

My gut suggests some sort of follow along reading where the child has multiple exposures to the correctly spelled version of “doesn’t” and HAS to be looking at it when it is pronounced-finger on, computer window showing only the word???? Does that fit Fast Forward’s format?

Ive done the finger follow thing with him but it IS timeconsuming and hard to do for lengthy periods of time-I don’t see that its practical for the amount of spelling remediation my son needs

We did Fast Forward with long lasting positive effects but I am not sure that it will do what you hope it will. My son was a dismal speller even after fast forward. In my experience, it has a very positive impact on receptive language. There was a very marked difference in my son’s ability to perceive language. Of course, this is necessary to learn to read but is a far cry from reading.

We had him tested by an audiologist which showed difficulties in decoding sounds. After doing FFW, he was normal.

FFW basically slows down language with the help of technology so that a child can perceive it more accurately. Then it gradually speeds it up to normal speech. It is entirely an audiological approach.

Beth

>improved his spelling. He still spells much like the examples given.

OG should help spelling as it explicitly teaches it. You can totally rely on visual memory with these kids as they won’t remember the patterns. Phonics won’t help spelling entirely as the kid will just spell phonetically.

Se this sentenc iz spelled fonetickly.

—des

Basic phonics teaches the most common spelling patterns and is a necessary base for everything else; the examples given show that this student has indeed mastered basic phonics. The *advanced* levels of a phonics-based program, OG or other good system, teach variations and irregularities. This seems to be where this student needs to go.

Victoria and all,
You have a good point. He does seem to be discriminating the sounds in the examples and I agree with you that he does seem to have phonetic coding down to a science (one test indicated a grade equivalency of 6.1, although I’ve worked with him on phonics in one way or another since he was 6 months old old!!! I’m including all those years I spent reading to him, pointing out each word as I read and reading them with an emphasis on the sounds.)

Since he recently had a full neuro-psych evaluation, I was trying to find something in the testing to validate enrolling him in Fast ForWord. My own observation is that he does have difficulty taking in verbal information, but exactly why he’s having this difficulty I’m not certain. I think it boils down to speed of processing and dysfunction in the area of the brain that deals with language in general (reading, speaking and general grasping of it).

So my difficulty is if there’s an auditory processing speed problem or just a general language processing problem. Can the two be separated?

P.s. Marycas as I mentioned above, I’ve done the finger under the word since my son was a tiny infant (and we read ALOT!), we also did 5 weeks at the LMB clinic and my son still can’t automatically “get” the application of orthographic patterns.

(On a side note: does anyone here know of studies indicating the effects of medication on RAN deficit? I found a couple, but am curious to learn more about this.)

Could you post the studies you have found with RAN and medication connections??

Thanks

Laura, he’s at a good age to try Sequential Spelling by AVKO. The spelling won’t be helped by FFW. If Seeing Stars didn’t help (which would have been my other recommendation, I’d start AVCO.

www.spelling.org

Does he have low receptive and expressive language scores? I took the FFW provider training this summer, but it’s really a risk of whether there will be long term benefit from FFW or not. Some it really helps and some it doesn’t.

Janis

Janis,
He only had some language testing. With the Clinical Evaluation of Language Fundamentals III. His score on Concepts and Directions was 63%ile, Fomulated Sentence 37%ile. WJIII picture vocabulary 43%ile and the NEPSY Verbal Fluency was 75%ile (semantic 26-75, and Phonemic >75%ile — I’m not sure what theses subscores mean). The only really low score was Speeded Naming at 9%ile.

Observationally, I see him “missing conversations,” or just getting pieces of them. One weird thing yesterday is on his binder reminder he wrote to read “poetry” and it was actually a behavioral “policy” contract! He did say his teacher is soft-spoken. His listening to language has improved with maturity, but I still see a lot of things. For example, he can’t always accurately verbally repeat the sounds in larger multisyllable words.

Last night I was reading through research and found something quite interesting about a connection with temporal processing and language. My son had an EEG when he was a baby (due to 2 seizure-like episodes). The result was right temporal lobe slowing. In the study I read, temporal processing problems were being treated with FFW. Here’s the link:
http://www.jyu.fi/humander/dyslexia_intervention.shtml

So, I’m thinking FFW may be of some benefit. (prior to SS or “another round” at LMB).

Laura, remember, if you decide to do FFW see if your public school district offers it. They may have a contract and it will save you $$$$. I have been working with the program for three years now. Children go through with varying needs and most do well. It is amazingly intensive auditory work. Also, be aware that there is FFW 1, Language and then later on FFW 2, Language to Reading.

Angela,
Thanks for pointing that out, but I don’t want to wait (and after LMB everything else is a “deal”). My school is notroiously stingy when it comes to providing services. I’ve heard there is one child in the district who has received FFW, but they had to fight to get it.

I’ll have to ask the provider (actually a friend of mine who also does PACE), if she has the FFW 2. Is that a newer program? She did mention something about two discs and figuring out where he’d be.

FFW is all auditory - 7 intensive games, sounds, syllables, language. FFW 2 adds a visual with the auditory and kids think it is easier because they can, in most of the games, use their visual skills to suppliment the auditory. Of course, rely on your provider, but I would do FFW 1 first and see how he does with just auditory skills. Then if FFW 1 seemed helpful, I would wait a while and then do 2.

Laura,

FFW providers can offer any of the programs. The parents normally pay a fee to Scientific Learning for the license to use the particular program. If within the first 10 days the provider sees that the child is doing very well, she or he then can move the child up to the next level at no additional cost.

Please let us know if you try FFW. I’ll be interested to hear your opinion and the outcome.

Janis