MamaArcher's Blog

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Monday, April 16, 2007

Dyslexia Questions Answered

Here are some questions that were left in my comments section and I will attempt to answer them.

So I know lots of people think part of dyslexia has to do with reversing words and letters,etc. Is there any part of dyslexia that affects seeing and writing letters/words backwards? I also know that it is common for children learning to write to reverse some of the letters for a while.

This is a common misconception. On one hand it is true but dyslexia is so much more than this. Flip flopping letters is very common for all children as they begin the reading and writing journey and usually dissolves itself as time goes on. This has often led to people downplaying or even denying dyslexia as a learning disability. Dyslexics do however have this problem but it is a result of a problem with sequential memory and it plays out in this way. Sometimes there are also eye tracking disorders that go along with and contribute to this. The flip flopping of letters alone is not a good test for dyslexia.

What kinds of things in your child made you think that there was something
unusual?

1. my husband is also a dyslexic
2. he could not learn his alphabet
3. he could not rhyme

What kind of teaching style did Sylvan use that was detrimental for your son?
Sylvan used primarily a whole language approach with my son, even being informed that we knew he was most likely dyslexic (he had not been officially diagnosed yet) and knowing that we wanted a phonics based program. I was simply told over and over again to "stick with the program." He did learn his alphabet and was able to know from memory words like said, does, house, other words from memory but he still could not sound out dog or cat. For this service we paid $4000!

Labels: Homeschooling, Learning Disabilities

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posted at 8:00 PM
2 comments

2 Comments:

At August 24, 2007 10:01 AM, Elizabeth B said...: I was reading your blog and found this post, you might enjoy my dyslexia page. ( http://www.thephonicspage.org/On%20Reading/dyslexia.html ) It talks about how whole word methods like this make dyslexia worse and has some free and cheap methods to help. I really recommend Hilde Mosse's book, "The Complete Handbook of Children's Reading Disorders." for a full understanding of the problem.
At August 24, 2007 10:15 AM, MamaArcher said...: thank you for the recommendation on the book I will look into it.

I whole heartedly agree that whole language makes things much worse! Phonics all the way!

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