What Is Dyslexia?
According to the International Dyslexia Association, “Dyslexia is a “specific learning disability” that is neurobiological in origin. It is characterized by difficulties with accurate and/or fluent word recognition and by poor spelling and decoding abilities. These difficulties typically result from a deficit in the phonological component of language that is often unexpected in relation to other cognitive abilities and the provision of effective classroom instruction. Secondary consequences may include problems in reading comprehension and reduced reading experience that can impede growth of vocabulary and background knowledge.”
Did you know, that your ability to read is not an indicator of your intelligence? Many dyslexics have average or above-average IQ and are gifted in visuospatial processing. At Really Great Reading, we believe that all children have the right to learn to read and it is imperative to have the right explicit, systematic, engaging, multisensory, and developmentally appropriate instruction in phonology, sound-symbol association, syllable instruction, morphology, syntax, and semantics.
Evidence-Based Phonics Programs for Dyslexia
Really Great Reading’s Phonics Suite contains three research-based programs for teaching foundational reading skills to emergent readers and beginning readers:
Countdown for K
Explore Countdown & Download a Sample Lesson
Countdown to reading success!
Playful and powerful scientifically-aligned foundational reading skill instruction for kindergarten.
Blast for 1st Grade
Explore Blast & Download a Sample Lesson
Blast off to reading success!
Exciting and engaging scientifically-aligned foundational reading skill instruction for 1st-grade students.
HD Word for 2nd-12th
Explore HD Word & Download a Sample Lesson
Bring words into high definition!
Powerful and mature scientifically-aligned reading skill instruction for the 2nd & 3rd-grade classroom.
How dyslexia affects reading
According to the International Dyslexia Association (2015), students with dyslexia require structured literacy instruction in phonology, sound-symbol association, syllable instruction, morphology, syntax, and semantics.
Kilpatrick (2015) believes that there are three components necessary for successful reading intervention programs: “1. Eliminating the phonological awareness deficits and teaching phonemic awareness to the advanced level; 2. Teaching and reinforcing phonics skills and phonic decoding; 3. Providing opportunities for reading connected text.”
How to teach a child to read with dyslexia
The Really Great Reading approach contains critical, evidence-based components of phonics for dyslexia instruction. Our explicit, systematic, engaging, multisensory, and developmentally appropriate programs teach students the key skills they need to become efficient and accurate decoders. These skills lead to their success not only in word identification, but also in comprehending what they read.
Using phonics programs for students With dyslexia
The International Dyslexia Association (2015) also states that instruction for students with dyslexia should be systematic and cumulative, explicit, and include diagnostic teaching. Our instruction is systematic, explicit, and multisensory.
Student practice is cumulative and controlled. The easier, more foundational skills of phonological awareness, phonemic awareness (specifically segmenting and blending individual phonemes in words are taught first.
Manipulation of phonemes and letter-sound fluency are taught next. Then, we move on to encoding, decoding, phrase, sentence, and passage reading. Teachers are able to use our complimentary, diagnostic assessments to pinpoint, and then correct, their students’ specific areas of weakness. Our assessments cover decoding, phonemic awareness, letter-sound knowledge, and sight word knowledge.
Evidence-based reading interventions for dyslexia
We also have Phonics Boost and Phonics Blitz, which are programs specifically designed for older emerging or struggling readers in Grades 3-12. These students require a slower teaching pace and more targeted dyslexia reading strategies that involve practice with both phonemic awareness and phonics concept tasks.
HD Word is also appropriate for older students who need to quickly fill in gaps in their decoding skills. At Really Great Reading, we wholeheartedly believe that strong foundational reading skills instruction can help struggling readers, such as those with dyslexia, overcome the reading hurdles before them.
Addressing dyslexia with phonics programs
At the heart of Really Great Reading’s instruction is phonics; students are taught to understand the systematic relationships between sounds and the spellings of those sounds. Systematic, explicit phonics instruction is critical for students with dyslexia. In fact, Eide (2011) explains that brain research has shown that “the use of intensive phonics is the only way to teach dyslexics and learning disabled individuals how to read and is the best way for everyone to learn to read.”
Dyslexia and reading comprehension
Although not the immediate focus of our instruction, orthography, and morphology are naturally enhanced when decoding is taught through our approach. Part of what we are helping students do is digest multisyllabic words by breaking them into six syllable types. When students see patterns in these decodable chunks, affixes naturally expose themselves.
Spear-Swerling (2016) indicates that “at more advanced levels of word reading and spelling, interventions should also explicitly and systematically teach structural and morphemic analysis (e.g., recognition of common prefixes, roots, and suffixes), as well as useful spelling generalizations (Lovett, Lacenzera, DePalma, & Frijters, 2012; Masterson & Apel, 2010).”
In the Really Great Reading lessons, prefixes and suffixes are explicitly taught along with their meanings, and when prefixes and suffixes are isolated, base/root words are often naturally exposed and then explored.
Phonics teaching methods for children with dyslexia
Dyslexia is characterized by effortful and slow reading, and lacking fluency (Shaywitz & Shaywitz, 2008).
“In order to decode unknown words fluently, readers need to develop at least the following knowledge and skills to a fluent level: knowledge of sound-symbol relationships, blending of sounds into words, recognition of reoccurring patterns across words (phonograms), and coordination of phonemic/ orthographic and meaning information to determine exactly the right word” (Torgesen, 2006).
Really Great Reading lessons teach to students’ understanding rather than their memory. The lessons teach flexibility, strategies, and common patterns rather than having students memorize a list of syllabication rules that are difficult to apply. It is important to understand that we absolutely target students’ true understanding of the underlying substructures of words: syllable types, prefixes, suffixes, base words and root words, and spelling patterns.
Because we are not targeting their memory, we are targeting their conscious understanding of these features, allowing them to recognize these patterns more fluently. It is only when a student has a conscious understanding of these features that he or she can really build up automaticity with decoding. The International Dyslexia Association (2017) states that “it is important for these individuals [students with dyslexia] to be taught by a systematic and explicit method that involves several senses (hearing, seeing, touching) at the same time.”
Multisensory phonics instruction for dyslexia
Throughout our programs, children are actively engaged in learning concepts using their whole bodies. They listen carefully to words and phonemes, move their bodies to help build their phonemic awareness, and manipulate objects during phonics instruction. Using multiple pathways into the brain seems to help students learn the concepts faster and retain them better. This allows our programs to move quickly through a robust and rigorous phonics scope and sequence.
We have been refining our approach for the last 10 years, and even teachers with a great deal of experience with other programs are often quick to recognize that our approach is more succinct, efficient and digestible than many other approaches. We know it works well with all students, including dyslexic students.
Our program teaches students to play with the sounds in spoken words and then to analyze and attack those words on paper in developmentally appropriate ways. Countdown, Blast Foundations, HD Word, Phonics Boost, and Phonics Blitz lessons set students on the path to becoming successful decoders and, ultimately, successful and fluent readers.
References
Eide, D. (2011). Uncovering the logic of English: A common-sense approach to reading, spelling, and literacy. Minneapolis: Pedia Learning.
International Dyslexia Association. (2015). Effective reading instruction for students with dyslexia. Retrieved from https://dyslexiaida.org/effective-reading-instruction/
International Dyslexia Association. (2017). Dyslexia basics fact sheet. Retrieved from https://dyslexiaida.org/dyslexia-basics/
Kilpatrick, D. A. (2015). Essentials of assessing, preventing, and overcoming reading difficulties. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons.
Torgesen, J.K. & Hudson, R. (2006). Reading fluency: critical issues for struggling readers. In S.J. Samuels and A. Farstrup {Eds.}, Reading fluency: The forgotten dimension of reading success. Newark, DE: International Reading Association.
Shaywitz S. E., & Shaywitz B. A. (2008). Paying attention to reading: The neurobiology of reading and dyslexia. Development and Psychopathology, 20(4), 1329-49.
Spear-Swerling, L. (2016). Instructional considerations for students with dyslexia. Retrieved from https://www.texasgateway.org/sites/default/files/resources/documents/10B rief_DyslexiaConsiderations.pdf
