Is My Child Dyslexic?
What Is Dyslexia?
Dyslexia is a learning difficulty affecting a child’s reading, spelling, and writing ability. It’s not uncommon, and it’s important to remember that it, in no way, equates to a lack of intelligence or issues with vision. Instead, it involves difficulties in processing language; children with dyslexia find it hard to decode words. For example, a child might confuse letters, reading “star” as “rats” or “tars.” Further, they may find it hard to follow sentence sequences. For instance, in the sentence “The cat sat on the mat,” a child with dyslexia might misread it as “The sat cat on mat.”
Dyslexia varies in severity and can coexist with other learning challenges. Early identification and support, such as specialized teaching strategies, help children with dyslexia develop better reading skills and boost their confidence. If your child has struggled learning how to read, you may have asked yourself, “is my child dyslexic?” The answer may surprise you:
Your Child May Not Be Dyslexic
When a child is first learning how to read, many parents wonder if their child is struggling due to dyslexia. While this could be the case for some, the vast majority of kids are simply not getting the proper reading instruction. They may have lacked learning phonics, which is the relationship between letters and sounds and it’s keeping them from truly comprehending text. In these situations, once the child receives a step-by-step approach where phonics rules are taught explicitly beginning with simple sound-letter correspondences and gradually move to more complex patterns, they have a much easier time learning to read.
Consistently, parents of struggling readers express that they don’t know how to teach their child to read and additionally, that they don’t feel qualified or confident to take on the challenge. A Good Start was created to give parents a program to jump start and unlock their child’s understanding of how we learn to read through fun and games. It’s also an instructional guide for teaching beginning reading.
Program Details
The program begins with downloadable Book A and Book B to teach children the letters of the alphabet. In Book A, “Learning About the Alphabet”, you will teach beginning readers about the uppercase and lowercase alphabet letter names and to associate each letter with a corresponding picture.
In Book B, “Learning More About the Alphabet”, you will teach beginning readers about the sound each letter of the alphabet makes through the use of memorable graphics. Upon completion of Book B, children move into Book 1: Short “a” Words and move sequentially through Books 1-5 to master new words with each vowel pattern.