What does a reading tutor do?
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Anonymous
| I would like to help my 2nd grader with her reading skills. I have the time to read together with my kid myself, but am not sure if a tutor or specialist does something more than just read with the kids? I'm trying to decide if it's worth something to look into. Grades are fine, teacher has just said to practice at home to work on her stamina. If she gets to a word she doesn't know, she will try to read it fast and make up letter sounds that are not even in the word. I have to stop her to break it down. Also, she sometimes skips words when reading like "and", "The" "can" "it" etc. Thoughts? |
Anonymous
| A tutor could be helpful, especially if you are in MCPS where they don’t cover phonics enough - that’s why she doesn’t have any strategies for unfamiliar words. |
Anonymous
| We did Hooked on Phonics at home to provide some structure. It was incredibly easy and helpful. My son's skills seem like they were very similar to your child's. |
Anonymous
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OP here, so did you feel like your son improved on Hooked on Phonics?
Ugh, and yes we are in MCPS fwiw. |
Anonymous
He improved, absolutely. I think the biggest "issue" he had was impatience. The program slowed his reading down speed-wise, but he progressed and improved overall very quickly. I worried that it would seem too babyish, but he really liked it. I think he benefitted most from the physical books vs the app. |
Anonymous
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OP back again with question for the PP.
Did you purchase the kindergarten level hooked on phonics? It seems like there is a Pre-K, kinder, and adult version, nothing for individual greats ( we are 2nd grade). |
Anonymous
| A good tutor will assess your child and determine their strengths and weaknesses. They will work with your child to achieve grade-level reading proficiency. |
Anonymous
Anonymous
| A reading specialist assesses the child’s decoding, fluency, and comprehension. If decoding is weak, the tutor determines where the learning gaps are. When weak phonics skills underlie decoding issues, the tutor engages in a systematic, sequential teaching program, addressing the most common graphemes at progressing levels of difficulty. They also have the pedagogical skills to “gamify” the learning process to increase engagement. As well, they know ways to improve long-term retention of the information. Last, a good reading tutor can help to identify when there is a co-occurring issue, like a need for a speech-language pathologist. |
Anonymous
| My daughter is very similar and we made sure to get an OG-trained tutor to help her with the basics. It's been slow but really beneficial. ES doesn't focus on phonics anymore so kids who need that basis to read, are having a lot of trouble. I hope they go back to the right way to read soon, there has been so much research on this, but schools are really behind. |
Anonymous
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OP here.... For the two PP...
1) what is an OG trained tutor? 2) any good recs for tutors that do what you described? |
Anonymous
Orton-Gillingham trained. Orton-Gillingham is a multi-sensory phonics-based method used for kids with dyslexia, but my kid does not have dyslexia, I just wanted to get a proven phonics method to make sure she had that solid background. I found a tutor through my neighborhood moms group, but we're not in Montgomery County, sorry! |
Anonymous
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Get her tested for dyslexia. People will say I'm overreacting, but please do it anyway. Sounds like she's compensating for poor reading skills and trying to hide from what she can't do.
Agree on getting an O-G tutor regardless of whether you test. You can also get Brainspring to do a test on Zoom. I think it's less than $200 and you can decide not to tutor with them, but can indicate specific weaknesses although not diagnose dyslexia. How is her spelling? |
Anonymous
Also the really smart ones can fake it for a long time. She might have memorized a lot of whole words, but that will come back to bite her later if it's the case. Too hard to keep that up forever. |
Anonymous
| Let’s not over react here. Is the teacher assessing with DRA? Is the DC on grade level? Reading does take years. Your DC is 2nd grade. Many of the mistakes you describe are common. Certainly more attention by the parent can help. Certainly a tutor or program could augment. But it’s not like she sounds like she is struggling. |