Hi, I would like to hear from people who have tried vision therapy with their children. How old was your child when you started? How often did your child practice? How long did it take until you noticed improvement in reading? HOw long did you have to do the vision therapy until it solved the vision problem?
My child is 9 and in 3rd grade. Reading has always been a problem. She has always hated it. I have done one-on-one reading tutoring since the end of 1st grade. Now she tests on a 4th grade level. THe recommendation for improving fluency and ease is lots of practice, reading for pleasure, etc. (Reading for pleasure will never happen since she hates to read) She knows the phonics rules and her sight word vocabulary is large. She does not have trouble reading words in a column, but in paragraph form it is a struggle that she fights. She hates reading all books, even on a lower level, like level 2, which should be easy for her. When she was evaluated this year by an educational psychologist, her scores for comprehension had to be extrapulated because she got too tired to finish the reading portion.
I had her evaluated by a developmental optometrist who practices vision therapy. He said she has a problem with convergence, so that the letters of one word naturally go into the next word and her brain has to work hard to focus so the letters don’t go into the next word. It gets harder as the print becomes smaller and the space between the words becomes smaller.
She has to do boring eye exercises for 20 minutes 5 times a week and she will go to their office monthly for an hour evaluation/training. It is not expensive since most of the work is done at home. (good, because with the extensive tutoring I couldn’t otherwise afford it) Her progress will depend on her effort and how ofter she does her eye exercises. I get the feeling it could take 6 months to see real progress.
Our educational phychologist does not believe in vision therapy. She thinks it is benign and will not help or hurt. I hate to waste my daughter’s time by forcing her to do her exercises. It is alot of work since she also has homework, and I force her to read outloud for 15 minutes a day. The exercises make her eyes tired, so I have her do them after her other work.
It make sense that this is her problem, but getting conflicting info from the “experts” makes my decision hard. Should I force her to do the vision therapy? I force her by making it part of the schedule and allowing her to earn a monthly reward. Will vision therapy make reading easier? THANK YOU FOR ANY FEEDBACK!!! I NEED SOME ADVICE!
Re: who has tried vision therapy?
My son has had vision therapy for just under a year and is almost done. He is a teenager. He has been diagnosed with dyslexia, ADHD (inattentive) and developmental coordination disorder. We started vision therapy after pursuing traditional therapies and with a limited purpose in mind. There is virtually no evidence that vision therapy is helpful for true dyslexia or for ADHD. In some kids a vision problem may mimic these conditions, but if the child is correctly diagnosed, the research does not support vision therapy as an effective treatment. My son has not experienced any improvements in reading or ADHD symptoms. He has experienced improved motor skills, and pretty dramatically too. Recent research suggests that DCD may have a visual component. There is really no research documenting a positive effect on DCD from vision therapy, but several writers have theorized that it may be helpful. You should be careful about choosing a provider. Look for someone COVD certified. We saw Harry Wachs in Washington, DC. He is pretty much the vision therapy guru and people come from all over the country to see him. My son is very motivated and does his exercises for 15 minutes every day. We’ve been told that he’s making unusually rapid progress, which may be because of the committed practicing.
Re: who has tried vision therapy?
Vision has played a role in my son’s reading problems but his issues have been intertwined with his vestibular system. We did do vision therapy for 8 months but didn’t see a difference in reading. Now he was 7 at the time and years away from decoding successfully so obviously it wasn’t going to be dramatic. We did see a difference in worksheets ect. He could line up math problems for example.
My son continued to struggle with skipping lines which is related to visual processing. We saw improvements with decoding more easily and irronically measurable vision changes (by a developmental optometrist) following doing Seeing Stars. He no longer saw any gains from the overprescription lenses he wore. We also have seen major jumps from changes in his vestibular system which we got from doing a therapy program called Neuronet. The vision therapy program my son did was “flat”—computer type work and didn’t involve the body. It wasn’t until we did work that involved the body that we saw improvements with reading.
Personally, if you have a child who decodes well and still dislikes reading, I would give it a try. The program you describe should not be overly expensive. I do know people whose children had different profiles from mine who had dramatic improvements in reading fluency from vision therapy.
Vision therapy is not a cure for dyslexia but some portion of kids have visual problems in addition to dyslexia.
Beth
Re: who has tried vision therapy?
My daughter completed a year of VT after being diagnosed with convergence insufficiency and visual processing problems. She was six turning seven at the time. It wasn’t long after she started the therapy that she was diagnosed adhd and that dr had the same opinion as one of yours. She said that the convergence problem was neurological and not really a big issue. I did some research and found that there is indeed a link between adhd and convergence insufficiency but nobody is sure why.
My daughter did improve in her reading after one year. However, I do NOT believe it was because of VT. She immediately tested amazingly better with processing after starting medication. She absolutely hated the VT exercises (done on computer) at home and refused to do them. She went once a week to the office. They released her at the end saying she was no longer in need of therapy. It may be coincidental but it was also when the insurance stopped paying. We also had decided we were no longer going to force her to go.
Just this past September (a few months after therapy) I took her to her dr for her yearly exam. This is the dr that referred us to the vision specialist for an evaluation and therapy. He looked at her and told me that he thought she needed to go back because he said her eyes were exotropic again (convergence thing) and that if you don’t continue the therapy the problems can come back. I asked him about the link between adhd and convergence issues and he had no idea of what I was talking about. We decided to take our chances because my daughter truly hated the experience. She already gets extra help in school and after school and we felt that for her VT was not the right thing.
I don’t know if I answered your question but just wanted to relate our experience. My daughter does have some LD issues as well but is physically reading very well right now. Her problems are more in comprehension. I know some people have had success with VT and if your child is up to doing it then it can’t hurt to give it a shot!
Vision Therapy
I took my dd to a vision therapist at the beginning of the year. She has the following problems: 20/800 vision when not corrected with lens, one eye crossed inward (visible upon close inspection but not otherwise), and according to the developmental optometrist convergence probelms both near and far. She said dd, who is an avid reader, had learned to compensate by relying 80% on one eye for her closeup work. Dd otherwise had problems with general klutziness, although she is otherwise quite talented athletically, losing her place in class etc.
This optometrist will recommend computer eye exercises where she thinks that will help a particular child’s problem, but in my dd’s case she did not. Instead she prescribed bifocals—which she thinks dd will not need long run—and prisms in the her glasses for both near and far. She asked us to test the prescription by having her read a text for five minutes and noting her speed and errors and then retest reading the same passage a month later. I gave dd a visually very challenging text—small print and little spacing between the lines—and she made 43 mistakes on her initial read through. A month later, she made only 14, so it seems to be working. Her eye appears less crossed to me than previously.
I think it would have been extremely difficult for me to sustain eye exercises for anything over a month with dd due to her personality. This was a big reason for me going with a developmentally optometrist whom I knew would opt for a route around eye exercises if appropriate. Testing etc. was covered by insurance, but the glasses alas were not. And she needs two pairs, one with bifocals and one without for sports.
vision therapy
Ours is a similiar story to yours. Daughter made great progress with one-one-one reading tutor and was testing at grade level. It was always tough to get her to read and there were fluency issues. Tested at 20-20 by opthalmologist but she fit the profile for vision problems-releuctance to read, trouble keeping her place, complained of sore eyes after 10 minutes of rading, rubbed her eyes alot with reading. Her tutor, a wonderful woman poohed-poohed vision terapy and so did a dear friend-a very powered reading specialist. so I delayed. Things did not improve. I bit the bullet and took her. I’m pretty conservative medically and this has a flavor of wacky.
Teh developmental optometrist was able to show us how she couldn’t maintain focus with one eye. She did the excercises twice daily with a ball on a string, focusing on the letters(written on the ball) and calling them out while th ball swung sideways, to and fro and circularly. She followed irregular lines with eyes only. the first week was tough -it was almost like motion-sickeness but we hung in there. A month later she had made huge gains and the next month was told she had only to do maintain once a week.
It made a huge difference-the fluency issues were addressed by her being able to track the print to read. No more rubbing eyes, no more headaches, no more continious excuses to get out of reading.
IT DID NOT CURE THE ADHD OR THE DYSLEXIA! but she was able to see to read.
She is now an avid reader - prefers fantasy and fable genres and won last summer’s reading prize.
For children who fit the profile, vision therapy is wonderful. I just wish that there weren’t so many greedy practioners out there. shop around for someone trustworthy.
Re: who has tried vision therapy?
MMM,
Was that the only exercise your daughter did?
I agree that for most kids it’s a combination of phonics along with possible visual and auditory processing deficits causing much of the difficulty.
Re: who has tried vision therapy?
We too did vision therapy , as just one intervention for a child with a bunch of intertwined issues (dyslexia, inattention, anxiety , NLD traits)
I could see my son wasn’t tracking properly - he moved his head when he was reading. So that alone made me feel open to the therapy. I thought of it as OT for his visual processing system.
Midway through about a year of VT he stopped being car sick, could play soccer better and showed some improvement in eye contact. His abilityt o navigate worksheets seemed better too. His reading is also MUCH improved but we’ve also done intensive reading remediation.
I do believe the vision therapy played a part in some of these improvements. He did not do exercises everyday, although if he had we may have seen even more impact.
Re: who has tried vision therapy?
The ball on the string was the main one. It was tough - as the ball swings side to side- its a tracking exercise. To and away and its a depth focusing exercise. But circularly - its both simultaneously. I was on the opposite side operating the ball and I nearly got sick, too!
It was summer we did this everyday, twice a day, set the timer, 3 minutes each way -sideways, to/from, circle left, circle right. you can start at 1 minute on each and work up. The results were amazing. It wasn’t fun but the timer helped-it was only a few minutes for each. We did do a reward system.
The ‘spagetti’ thing has a name but I can’t remember it. It was several examples, each getting more complex, of 4 lines that went from 1,2,3 or 4 at teh top and connected to a,b,c, or d at teh bottom. the lines loop and cross many times but you have to be able to follow the lines to get the right answer. Hope that explains it. the doc said we could make our own if she got bored with his samples just make sure the lines crossed at a large angle (at least 45 degrees). Its a tracking exercise.
My daughter was also having trouble with left/right so she had an exercise for that.
Does this hlep?
Re: who has tried vision therapy?
[quote]We too did vision therapy , as just one intervention for a child with a bunch of intertwined issues (dyslexia, inattention, anxiety , NLD traits)[/quote]
KarenN - Your son sounds very much like mine. He was assessed for VT back in the winter and it was recommended but he doesn’t have time to start it. My DS is going to a program that works on SI issues first and then processing issues next. He does a lot of the traditional VT type exercises there along with others designed to help him get both sides of his body working together. He attends that program twice a week for an hour and a half each time, takes a drama class (he wants to be an actor), and plays basketball (not well but steadily improving) so along with school he doesn’t have time to go to 3 VT sessions a week.
We’re still considering VT for the summer but it looks like we won’t have time then, either. And the other activities are improving his tracking so we may not do VT at all.
Re: who has tried vision therapy?
Jerirat,
Kids with complicated profiles often have SI/motor based issues that compound vision problems. Those kids benefit from therapy that uses the whole body. We had limited gains from “flat” vision therapy and like you saw gains doing other types of therapy that did not specifically target visual systems.
My son has both dyslexia and nonverbal learning disabilities.
Beth
Hi
We found VT very helpful. We found a wonderful doctor who was an expert and addressing specific deficits. He didn’t just give us a plain vanilla program. We worked on everything including balance, right left differentiation, tracking, accomodation visual spatial work, memory exercises, sequencing etc.
My son was able to learn to read through a very good phonemic awareness based program but he still hated to read and had math issues because of the visual spatial/sequencing issues. I felt vision therapy with this doctor was something that addressed his underlying deficits. The school’s approach was to teach around the problem and that just wasn’t working for us.
My son is in 5th grade a B student in a regular class he gets a little help with writing but they think he won’t need that after this year. When originally tested in 1st grade his performance IQ was pretty low related to what was termed a visual motor deficit by the psychologist. He was tested 6 months ago and it went up almost 20 points after VT interactive metronome, some audiblox, and some other stuff. We just kept plugging away at the deficits and it made a huge difference.
He just couldn’t learn effectively until we addressed the deficits. Now he is an effective learner.
I had taken my child to a vision therapist in 3rd grade. I had not trusted the test that the therapist used as a determination that my child needed vision therapy. My child needed to read numbers down a column and then across, and because she could read the numbers down faster than across it was suggested she need therapy. Now the columns of numbers were far apart and even I would have trouble and slow down making sure I got the right row. She also had double vision when a stick was too close to her eyes. In a couple of books I read, one said that just reading is exercizing your eyes. Another book suggested vision therapy is a expensive alternative to those whose kids won’t do it at home. I had done the exercizes during the summer of third grade and had gotten the goal of so many inches to the eye and then dropped it after a couple months.That was a couple years ago.My child has improved in reading and fluency,but I had just recently went in for testing. My child is in 6th grade now, and the same clinic, different therapist said my child is still having the same problem. Now she didn’t do the reading down and across the column test. The therapist did do the double vision test and I was suprised my child was the same as she was in 3rd grade. So, a part of me doesn’t trust the clinic I went to,because they didn’t do the same test. I do think the home exercizes might have been beneficial, but that was not the remedy to my child’s reading, as my child needs continued phonics help and still does.You might also be looking into books with large type, also glare from bright light on bright white paper also makes it hard to read.