Both my sons have severe speech delays. Therapists have mentioned Apraxia, but not “officially” said that is the problem. My older ds is 11, and almost done with therapy. He struggled with reading for MANY years before it finally “clicked” around age 9-10. He still struggles with spelling and writing, but is making progress. As a homeschool mom I know exactly what things caused difficulty, and there was/is a direct correlation between his speech and his reading difficulties.
Having watched him struggle as we fought our way through a variety of reading curriculums and strategies, I would like to avoid as much of the trouble as possible with my younger son.
My ds#2 is almost 6. We held off Kindergarten for a year, so he’ll start this fall. Are there any reading or phonics “tricks” or curriculums or strategies that will help circumvent the particular difficulties caused by the speech problems? I bought a book of “phonemic awareness” activities to precede actual phonics instruction, but even these simple sound games seem to only cause confusion and frustration.
Re: Reading and Speech
You might try the book Reading Reflex by Carmen and Geoffrey McGuinness. It explains how children should be taught to read and then gives you the lessons. Another great option if you have high speed internet is Headsprout Early Reading. It is also a research based method and it is very motivating to kids and requires little work on the parents part. Another great computer reading program is Funnix, but you do have to sit with the child through those lessons. These are all research-based and I am personally aware of people who use them with kids who have reading problems. I use a program similar to Reading Reflex myself called ABeCeDarian, and it is a bit easier to use than Reading Reflex and has more (and better) content. You’d need the Level A teacher manual, workbook, and fluency reader. You should be able to pull all of these up on a search, but if not, let me know and I’ll give them to you.
Janis
Re: Reading and Speech
Thank you for the suggestions.
I’ll look at the websites, and the info Victoria offered.
I used RR with my older son, but he took SOOO long to learn the sounds, and he just could not feel/hear the difference between so many pairs of sounds which have similar mouth positions. I need something that has more emphasis on producing the actual sounds of speech, rather than just the visual aspects.
Edited to add:
Janis, I looked for the sites you mentioned, and easily found the first 2, but got a variety of different hits for ABeCeDarian, none of which appeared at first look to be a curriculum. Could you please direct me to the correct one? Thanks.
Re: Reading and Speech
Here is the ABeCeDarian website:
http://www.abcdrp.com/
It does have a lot of components that Lindamood-Bell has, but it does not do the articulatory feedback part, if that is what you’re looking for. I have taken Lindamood-Bell LiPS training, and I greatly prefer ABCeDarian. But with any of the good programs, it takes much repetition and hard work for some children to master the code. From what I have read, there isn’t great research support for the articulatory feedback portion. That’s why I don’t use it. I think it adds an extra layer of memory work that is unnecessary…tip tappers, lip coolers, etc.
Janis
Re: Reading and Speech
The articuulatory stuff was something we did with individual students who couldn’t seem to get the sounds otherwise, for that same reason (why add a layer if it’s not necessary). Some students, though, needed to focus that much attention on it (though of course I always wonder if all or any combination is what really made things “click” - sometimes it’s just a little more time, sometimes it’s one extra ingredient…)
The general rule in teaching is to start simple and teach one thing at a time.
I have seen some phonemic awareness stuff, and while the ideas are good, the presentation is still lacking. A lot of sites and books just list a whole bunch of things to do, without clearly stating in what order or at what pace. Also, some of the deletion activities suggested are quite complex mentally, and I have often thought that, if I had been presented with these as a young child, I would have been very confused myself.
I saw one site that stated that research shows that teaching a *few* PA activities seems to work better than teaching many — apparently the confusion factor is common.
I send out my collected reading notes, now up to a book in progress, free to anyone who asks. The posts on teaching the alphabet and sounds give an outline of a simple and direct method that might be good for you.
I just sent out a bunch of these yesterday and unfortunately the three to aol subscribers bounced back — have to see what can be done about a resend — but if you’re not an aol subscriber no problem, and if you are I’m going to see what can be done.
Just send a request to [email protected]