Fourth grader with dyslexia - what to expect?

[Anonymous]

I wish we noticed earlier, but DS was good at masking the problem. He was recently diagnosed with dyslexia and now we're readjusting our expectations about what his education should look like. If anyone else has a story of getting a diagnosis at this stage, I'd be curious to hear what you did next. Years of intensive tutoring? IEP? Private school (we're currently in public)? I feel like an idiot for not catching it sooner, and all the literature refers to second grade as a sort of magical cut off for successful early intervention. It feels very discouraging.

[Anonymous]

To make a long story short, we placed our child privately at the Siena School in 4th grade, after it became apparent that MCPS had no idea how to educate a dyslexic child.

DC spent 2 years there, improved greatly both in terms of reading ability and in terms of sel-esteem and ability to self-advocate. DC was able to return to a public magnet program for middle school with an IEP. We provide some outside tutoring and support.

Siena was a terrific choice for us. Student's prime need must be language learning disabilities - both reading and writing - but accepted students may have additional challenges like ADHD. Fourth grade is not too late. But move quickly to put all the instruction you can.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I wish we noticed earlier, but DS was good at masking the problem. He was recently diagnosed with dyslexia and now we're readjusting our expectations about what his education should look like. If anyone else has a story of getting a diagnosis at this stage, I'd be curious to hear what you did next. Years of intensive tutoring? IEP? Private school (we're currently in public)? I feel like an idiot for not catching it sooner, and all the literature refers to second grade as a sort of magical cut off for successful early intervention. It feels very discouraging.

Op, at least you know now. A lot of these people never had their dyslexia identified until they were adults:
http://dyslexia.yale.edu/success-stories/

The good thing is there are good resources in this area. Schools like lab, Siena, kingsbury, jemicy, commonwealth--for school, camp, or tutoring.

Look up ASDEC too.

[Anonymous]

What is next depends on the type of dyslexia, the severity, your DC’s strengths, and any other issues that may complicate things. The person who did the evaluation should have a list of recommendations at the end of the evaluation. I would start with those.

I found Wrightslaw.com to be elpful in learning about IEPs and 504s. It also helped in learning about how to deal with the school. Since you have a diagnosis of dyslexia, joining LearningAlly and Bookshare are places to start. Virginia AIM will be available if your child receives an IEP and I think a 504. They will have the books your daughter needs in audio format. My DC used LearningAlly exclusively until MS/HS. BookShare seems to have the higher level textbooks. We also found the audio books in the children’s and young adults sections in our library to be helpful. Our favorite was Arlington Central Library. It is important to continue to read to your child at her cognitive level so that her understanding of language also progresses. We found the Newbury Award and Honors books were a great list from which to mine in the 4-6 grade years. You need to make sure your DC’s readingprogram is based onthe Orton-Gillingham method. Among other things means that it is multi-sensory. I recommend you reading Sally Shaweitz’s book, “Overcoming DYslexia” and Maryanne Wolf’s book, “Proust and the Squid”.

My DC has dyslexia, dysgraphia and ADHD that all interfere and compound with each other. Depending on the expert, he has both or all three forms of dyslexia (there is some disagreeement within the community). Decoding (orthographic), phoneme awareness and RAN issues. His percentile for all three were in the single digits. He was in the 2nd percentile for accuracy, rate and fluency in 3rd grade,but 25th for comprehension. Comprehension has always been his strength and his ticket out. He is also an aural learner which helps too. On his last evaluation in HS, he was in low average for both decoding and phoneme awareness- which is fantastic for him. He is still at the 1st percentile for RAN. There are no programs that help RAN as of yet. Maryann Wolf developed RAV-O but it has limited success if introduced after 3rd grade. He received instruction at school and we took him to a private reading tutor 2-3 times a week from mid2nd grade to mid-7th grade. He used Wilson reading program. Barton is another O-G reading program many people use. I was his scribe and reader for homework until he was able to be proficient on technology and when the technology was acting up. Kurzweil is excellent in the MS and HS years. He went fully on his own junior year of HS. He is now in his freshman year of college and he is relieving all the accommodations he received in HS.

It is a long slow slog where small steps add up to big ones. It will get better. Persistence and stick-to-itiveness are helpful traits for you and your DC. Find her strength and support that as well as that will be what helps her overcome her dyslexia.

Good luck in your journey.