Originally published on the Macaroni Kid website

For most dyslexic children, reading is an arduous task. They often struggle to sound out words and read with fluency and, as a result, find little pleasure in reading. While most children with dyslexia benefit from multi-sensory instruction from a trained professional, you can help your child develop her reading skills – and joy for reading – with the strategies detailed below.

Word Attack
Children with dyslexia typically have trouble with sounding out words – especially ones they haven’t seen before. Many students look at the beginning sound and guess at the correct word or simply skip certain words when reading. In doing so, their reading becomes inaccurate and may lead to a loss of meaning. To develop these decoding skills, your child will likely need comprehensive multi-sensory reading instruction,  but you can help reinforce these skills by encouraging him to sound out shorter words and syllabicate longer words when reading, rather than guessing. For a young child, have him trace letters in colored sand, salt, or shaving cream for a tactile experience. If your child struggles to spell a word, rather than immediately providing the correct spelling, use a set of magnetic tiles and ask him to spell the word sound-by-sound using the tiles.

Reading Fluency
Reading fluency is a key component to reading for meaning. Help your child improve her reading fluency with this four-step choral reading process:
1. Select a passage to read, slightly below your child’s approximate reading level. Have her read the passage aloud as a cold read.
2. Next, you read the same passage aloud to model appropriate fluency.
3. Your child then reads the same passage with you, keeping up with your pace.
4. Finally, your child reads the same passage out loud as a final read. Draw her attention to the difference between her first and final reads and empower her with the improvement!
Repeatedly practicing this strategy with your child will help build her confidence and fluency when reading.

Reading Comprehension
Becoming an active reader can help students improve their overall comprehension and memory skills. To build this skill, before reading a passage or text book selection, ask your child to review any headers, sub-headers, pictures, picture captions, and vocabulary words. You can also talk to him about prior knowledge he may have about the topic before reading, and have him predict what he thinks the passage will be about before he begins. Also, as he reads, have him highlight the topic (one, two, or three words describing the passage) in blue, main idea (what the author is saying about the topic) in green, and the important details (important information describing the main idea) in yellow. These active reading strategies will help improve his processing and overall reading comprehension skills.

Vocabulary
Many dyslexic children respond well to visual graphics ‎for learning new information. To help your child learn new vocabulary words, try this multi-modal approach:
Have her write each vocab word using a black marker on the front of a flash card. Then have her turn the card around and divide the back side into three horizontal sections. ‎At the top, she should write the definition of the word in her own words (not verbatim from a dictionary). She should then draw a horizontal line beneath it, and write a detailed sentence integrating the word. Finally, at the bottom she should draw a picture illustrating her sentence to help her remember the definition.
As students progress through school, the reading and language demands increase rapidly. Try these tips and strategies to help your dyslexic child feel more confident and successful in school‎.

The post How to Improve Your Dyslexic Child’s Reading Skills appeared first on EBL Coaching.

What is the Orton Gillingham approach?

Orton Gillingham is a structured approach for teaching reading and spelling skills, originally designed for students with dyslexia. It  is a systematic, research-based, multi-sensory method designed to help students build their decoding and spelling skills. It involves teaching individual letters and sounds as well as word patterns, while integrating the visual, auditory, tactile and kinesthetic modalities. Orton Gillingham sessions are typically very structured and each lesson builds upon previously taught lessons.

Orton Gillingham lessons often begin by teaching students single consonant and short vowel sounds and how to blend those sounds together to form words. The lessons then move along to teach students how to read and spell worlds with blends (ex. fl, pl, gl, etc.), consonant digraphs (ex. th, wh, sh, etc.), vowel digraphs (ex. oa, oo, ea, etc.), silent e patterns, multi-syllabic words, prefixes, and suffixes. Each lesson contains multi-sensory elements, including audio-visual card drills, sky writing, and sand writing, along with workbook exercises.

A sample Orton Gillingham lesson might be structured as follows:
1. Review previously taught sounds and word patterns
2. Teach a new sound or word pattern
3. Practice the new sound or word pattern using multi-sensory tools, such as sky writing, sand writing, shaving cream writing, and magnetic tiles
4. Integrate decoding practice
5. Oral reading using passages and stories specific to the sounds and patterns you have taught
6. Oral dictations and spelling practice

Let’s take a look at a more detailed lesson:
Audio-Visual Card Drill: The Orton Gillingham tutor holds up an audio-visual card with the vowel digraph ee on the front and the corresponding key picture (feet) on the back and says to the child: “This is the vowel digraph ee (holds up front of card), like feet (turns card around and shows a picture of feet on the back of the card), it makes the sound /ee/ (turns card back around to show letters). The tutor then says aloud the sequence of letter names/key picture/sound together with the student (i.e. ee, feet, /ee/), and the student repeats the sequence independently three times.

Sky Writing: The Orton Gillingham tutor models forming the letters in the air, while saying the name of each letter and then the sound the vowel digraph makes. The tutor then performs this sky writing together with the child and the child forms the letters in the sky independently three times.
Sand Writing: Similar to sky writing, the tutor models forming the letters, this time in the sand, saying the name of each letter and then the sound the vowel digraph makes. The tutor then performs this sand writing together with the child in a tray filled with sand, and the student forms the letters in the sand independently three times. The same sequence can be performed using shaving cream instead of or in addition to sand.

Workbook Exercises: The child may then complete exercises in an Orton Gillingham workbook, corresponding to the vowel digraph being taught (in this case the /ee/ sound). The child traces letters, identifies pictures that contain the sound, and performs other related exercises, such as filling in words and completing sentences. After this sequence is performed for all of the vowel digraphs in a given section, the tutor emphasizes decoding, or blending sounds containing these vowel digraphs together to form words, using cards and magnetic tiles.

Oral Reading: The child reads word lists, sentences, and stories contained within the Orton Gillingham workbook to reinforce the sounds taught in a given lesson. The child is encouraged to read orally from a controlled reader (book or story) at the end of each session to apply the sounds covered and any previous sounds taught.

The Orton Gillingham method can have a profound impact on a child’s reading and spelling skills, particularly for those who have language-based learning disabilities. However, even children who do not have diagnosed learning disabilities can truly benefit from this instruction. Read more at Ways to Boost Your Child’s Language Development – EBL Coaching.

Frequently Asked Questions About Orton Gillingham

Is Orton Gillingham tutoring the same as phonics tutoring?
Orton Gillingham is a type of phonics instruction, but it is much more structured and sequential, and it integrates multi-sensory tools such as colored sand, magnetic tiles, audio-visual flash cards, and white boards.

How long does are most Orton Gillingham tutoring lessons?
The length of Orton Gillingham tutoring lessons can vary based on the needs, age, and levels of each student. Some students receive one or two one-hour sessions per week, while others receive much more frequent lessons.

Can students with dyslexia benefit from Orton Gillingham tutoring?
Yes! The Orton Gillingham method is ideal for students with dyslexia. The structured, sequential, multi-sensory nature of the lessons make it an ideal approach for helping students with dyslexia build their reading and spelling skills.

EBL Coaching specializes in providing Orton Gillingham tutoring virtually and in person to students in grades peek-12. Contact us today at www.eblcoaching.com to learn more.

The post What Is Orton Gillingham? appeared first on EBL Coaching.