My daughter is in the 6th grade. At this time with her learning differences, she is reading at a 3 to 4th grade level. Trying to get through the textbooks is impossible and frustrating, not to mention the fact that she is not getting anything out of them. I have been reading to her, but she wants to read them herself. I thought that there were adaptive textbooks out there, that looked just like the regular books, but on a lower reading level. Unfortunatly my school district is very small, and until I came along and began to make noise, never had to deal with this issue. The Special Education teacher has never heard of this, and does not know how to obtain them. ( or else i’m getting the run around, but I am trying to be nice) Anyone have experience with this issue?
Re: adapted textbooks
There are entire books written about “Textbooks and the students who can’t read them.” (That’s the title of the one in my backpack now.) So — you’re not alone. It’s sort of sad if it’s already more important that she look like she can do things all by herself, than that she understand the material.
I have not seen what should exist — Textbooks on CD Rom where teachers could print out re-written sections in easier-to-read format. (Prentice-Hall, are you listening? I could use some free-lance work ;)) Globe-Fearon generally makes my favorite lower-reading-level texts but they aren’t directly connected to higher-reading-level texts to my knowledge. So — at least in this case… I don’t think they’re giving you the runaround.
What I’d do in your situation is look at the chapter, and figure out the most important stuff therein — and tell her the important sections to read. Well, actually, I’d find a way to discuss the content enough for her to learn it — and then have her read it… having already covered it so that she had a chance of comprehending it. If her decoding skills are poor then frankly, I would insist on trading paragraphs with her and correcting her as she goes — if she’s not getting the right words there’s not much chance of comprehension.
Re: adapted textbooks
I have not heard of adapted textbooks but as a teacher I like the idea. I used to find textbooks that were compatible in their content but at different reading levels and allow my students to choose the textbook that worked best for their reading style. Call the publisher of the textbooks your daughter’s school uses and you can ask directly about adapted textbooks. All the publishers have 800 numbers that are easily found viz 1800 555 1212.
For my own dyslexic son, I adapted the textbooks myself. He had trouble listening to me read the dry books that textbooks are outloud. I could sum up a chapter in a textbook in a pargraph, type it up, and let him read that. Most of the textbooks are filled with ‘filler’ anyhow.
Good luck.
Re: adapted textbooks
Thanks for all the great suggestions, I will give them a try. I guess i am just frustrated, My daughters iep stated that she would have books on tape last year, and they would never follow through and get them, by the end of the year, i requested them or a software program which reads scaned text for this year, unfortunatly this year it did not happen either, Everyone is being very nice and doing nothing, This is the first problem i have had with them, and i guess i will just have to be pushy, thanks for the help.
My middle school son can’t read fast enough and we have his social studies textbook on tape from RFBD. They are free and you can borrow them for a year.