Wanted: Strategies!

: If reading is hard for your nephew, read out loud to him. Every chance he’ll let you. Get some books on tape at his level and let him listen to the tapes and follow along in the book.Make sure he’s reading at his level or he can get frustrated. He should read himself about 1/2 a day if you can get him to do that. YOu read outloud from more complex books.If you want book suggestions, post again.I wouldn’t do anything about the spelling at this point except help him to memorize for spelling tests if he can’t IEP out of them. The first task is the reading.Also have him type on the computer. You could buy a Mavis Beacom program that teaches typing to kids.Good luck.I’m looking for strategies to help my 9 year old nephew. He is said
: to have both auditory and visual processing disorders. I take care
: of him often and would like to know what I can do as a layman to
: help him. My sister-in-law (a single mother) is “too
: busy” to go over strategies with me. He has extreme
: difficulty reading and spelling is really hard for him as well. He
: can remember names and dates very well and is otherwise a wealth
: of knowledge (he watches a lot of TV, thankfully the History
: Channel and Discovery Channel). He is also pretty good at math.
: Any help that anyone can give would be greatly appreciated. Thanks
: in advance.

I am an Special Education student majoring in LD. When I saw your question, I consulted my one of my textbooks and here are the suggestions it had:Auditory Processing Listening to sounds 1. Have the child close their eyes and identify sounds that you make. Examples of such sounds include dropping a pencil, trearing a piece of paper, using a stapler, bounding a ball, sharpening a pencil, etc… 2. Place small, hard items, such as stones, beans, chalk, salt, sand, or rice, into containers with covers. Have the childrenm identify the contents by shaking and listening. 3. Have the child close his eyes. Clap hands, play a drum, or bounce a ball. Thythmic patterns can be made - slow, fast, fast. Ask the child to repeat the pattern. Auditory discrimination 1. With eyes closed, the child judges from what part of the room a sound is coming and whether it is near or far. 2. Child learns to discriminate between high and low sounds. 3. Blow a whistle and walk around the room. Through listening, the child tried to follow the route taken. Auditory memory 1. Place five or six objects in front of the child and give him or her a series of directions to follow. For example, “Put the green block on the floor, place the yellow flower on the coffee table and put the orange ball at the window.” Increase the list as the child progresses. 2. Have the child memorize nursery rhymes and poems and play finger games.Visual Processing Visual perception 1. Using colored pegs, have the child reproduce colored visual geometric patterns on a pegboard from a visual model. 2. Have child use wood or plastic blocks to match geometric shapes and have them build copies of models. 3. Ask the child to find all the round objects or designs in a picture, then all the square objects, etc. 4. Make a domino-type game by making sets of cards decorated with sandpaper, felt, self-adhesive covering, or painted dots; have students match the cards with each other. Visual memory 1. Show a collection of objects. Cover and remove of the objects. Show the collection again and ahve the child identify the missing object. 2. Show a short series of shapes, designs, or objects. Have the child place another set of these designs in the identical order from memory. 3. On a flannel board, place pictures of activities that tell a story. Remove the pictures and have the pupil tell the story by depending on visual memory of the pictures. 4. Make a pattern of wooden beads, buttons, or blocks. Have the child look for a few seconds; then have the child reproduce the pattern.Hope you find this helpful!! You should be commended for caring enough to put forth the effort.

I am an Special Education student majoring in LD. When I saw your question, I consulted my one of my textbooks and here are the suggestions it had:Auditory Processing Listening to sounds 1. Have the child close his/her eyes and identify sounds that you make. Examples of such sounds include dropping a pencil, tearing a piece of paper, using a stapler, bouncing a ball, sharpening a pencil, etc… 2. Place small, hard items, such as stones, beans, chalk, salt, sand, or rice, into containers with covers. Have the child identify the contents by shaking and listening. 3. Have the child close his eyes. Clap hands, play a drum, or bounce a ball. Rhythmic patterns can be made - slow, fast, fast. Ask the child to repeat the pattern. Auditory discrimination 1. With eyes closed, the child judges from what part of the room a sound is coming and whether it is near or far. 2. Child learns to discriminate between high and low sounds. 3. Blow a whistle and walk around the room. Through listening, the child tries to follow the route taken. Auditory memory 1. Place five or six objects in front of the child and give him or her a series of directions to follow. For example, “Put the green block on the floor, place the yellow flower on the coffee table and put the orange ball at the window.” Increase the list as the child progresses. 2. Have the child memorize nursery rhymes and poems and play finger games.Visual Processing Visual perception 1. Using colored pegs, have the child reproduce colored visual geometric patterns on a pegboard from a visual model. 2. Have child use wood or plastic blocks to match geometric shapes and have them build copies of models. 3. Ask the child to find all the round objects or designs in a picture, then all the square objects, etc. 4. Make a domino-type game by making sets of cards decorated with sandpaper, felt, self-adhesive covering, or painted dots; have students match the cards with each other. Visual memory 1. Show a collection of objects. Cover and remove one of the objects. Show the collection again and have the child identify the missing object. 2. Show a short series of shapes, designs, or objects. Have the child place another set of these designs in the identical order from memory. 3. On a flannel board, place pictures of activities that tell a story. Remove the pictures and have the child tell the story by depending on visual memory of the pictures. 4. Make a pattern of wooden beads, buttons, or blocks. Have the child look for a few seconds; then have the child reproduce the pattern.Hope you find this helpful!! You should be commended for caring enough to put forth the effort.

: I wouldn’t do anything about the spelling at this point except help
: him to memorize for spelling tests if he can’t IEP out of them.IEP is a verb? LOL

: I’m looking for strategies to help my 9 year old nephew. He is said
: to have both auditory and visual processing disorders. I take care
: of him often and would like to know what I can do as a layman to
: help him. My sister-in-law (a single mother) is “too
: busy” to go over strategies with me. He has extreme
: difficulty reading and spelling is really hard for him as well. He
: can remember names and dates very well and is otherwise a wealth
: of knowledge (he watches a lot of TV, thankfully the History
: Channel and Discovery Channel). He is also pretty good at math.
: Any help that anyone can give would be greatly appreciated. Thanks
: in advance.Number ONe: keep him interested in learning and convinced he’s a smart kid no matter what other people tell him. Reading and spelling do not smartness make. Talk to him about the stuff he knows about. (That gives him a lot of practice developing language skills as well as helping him learn about that stuff better — it’s like studying.)Number two: Read with him — take turns so he gets good reading modeled and gets to practice some himself. It can be really, really discouraging for you because you see the huge gap between what he knows and what he can read. Keep it up anyway — and try to get him into listening to books on tape, too. Depending on his auditory skills that could be a challenge (they don’t have the video that the History and Discovery channels do to help it all make sense).Number Three: if you’re helping him with homework, don’t get hung up on teacher demands. Figure out what he needs to get from a homework assignment and help him get that. THe kinds of work that may well be “good for” most kids to figure out how to get through on their own are simply horribly tedious exercises in frustration for other kiddos. So for those charming “answer the questions at the end of the chapter” exercises that are usually five times as long as they should be, help him think through the answers.