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Dyslexia friendly strategies for the classroom

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The relationship between ATNR persistence and reading attainment (WORD). The boxplots show that children in the lower reading percentile groups have higher ATNR persistence than children in the higher reading percentile groups. For the weakest readers (the bottom 10%) 50% are showing levels of ATNR above a score of 4 (62% of the bottom 10% of readers score at 4 or above) with 25% (the upper ‘whisker’) showing extremely high levels of persistent reflex. For the top readers, more than 50% (62%) show no evidence of reflex (the median is at 0) and 25% (the upper line of the ‘box’) show a minimal score of 1. There are, however, ‘outliers’ across the range of reading attainments illustrating that, for example, there are some children who have average reading attainment but a relatively high level of ATNR.

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How can I support my child? - British Dyslexia Association

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The British Dyslexia Association is the voice for the 10% of the population that are dyslexic

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Useful website.

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Dyslexia Awareness: In partnership with Made By Dyslexia

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Microsoft and Made By Dyslexia have a shared mission to empower every person with dyslexia to reach their potential, and we have partnered to create tools to help make this happen. Empowering teachers, educators, and parents with knowledge is the first step to unlocking this potential, so we are working together to create free training which will be available globally on the Microsoft Educator Community.

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Schools must create an ethos which enables learners with dyslexia to achieve, writes Jules Daulby

Many learners with dyslexia are quite aware of their strengths and the needs they have to meet to ensure success. Ownership of their learning is particularly evident when specialist teachers have been involved; this is because part of the role is to ensure a child knows why they may not be reading and writing like their peers and what strategies can be used effectively. There is also value in teaching metacognition. How do I learn? What helps me make it stick? How can I help myself? Such self-awareness will help all children but it can be even more valuable if a child has a specific learning difficulty (SpLD) such as dyslexia.

Issues which make academic life harder include having a poor verbal memory, meaning they may only remember the last thing you say, and slow processing of information which can make it feel like the lesson is on fast forward, leaving students struggling to keep up. These same learners are then often taken out of class for interventions, making it even harder for them to catch up on subject knowledge. It's no wonder many children with literacy difficulties become frustrated and marginalised in a system which rewards things they can't do and doesn't enable them to show what they can do.

Teaching children to read and write is important, yet if school segregates students with literacy difficulties too often, this will disempower them. Boosters are fine if used sparingly and rigorously, but leaving students languishing in eternal interventions with no plan for how a pupil can independently access a curriculum in mainstream lessons is problematic. The student will feel less and less part of the school community and lose any belief they had in their abilities, focusing instead on their lack of literacy skills, believing they are "lazy" and/or "stupid". Other schools may not use any interventions, but neither will they provide technology or readers and scribes to allow someone who can't read and write to achieve in class. Ultimately, a student can be left in literacy-based lessons with no barriers removed and set up to fail.

Whole-school approach

When things go wrong for a child with literacy difficulties, it is likely to be due to a lack of whole school systems in place to support them. If a learner cannot access text and struggles to record their knowledge in a way which is commensurate with their understanding, they require reasonable adjustments in the classroom to remove this barrier and allow success in another way.

Students I have taught and assessed with dyslexia often name individual teachers who "believed in them", ones who asked what they could do to help and others who made them feel valued in the classroom rather than a hindrance to their performance data. Many pupils I speak to describe teachers as either liking or disliking them, though usually this is not the case, it's just how they are made to feel; perception is an interesting concept in education but whether it is in tune with reality or not, if a student feels like no-one cares, it can make or break their academic development. Individual teachers can therefore make a difference to a child but without a whole school ethos which is designed to enable children with dyslexia to succeed, many will fall through the net and, at worst, end up in a local pupil referral unit, despite not needing to be there. Students with SEN and disabilities are seven times more likely to be excluded from school and the majority of them will have literacy difficulties; it's a serious problem in England and one which, where leadership embraces adjustments and inclusive strategies, can be improved dramatically.

A culture in which students have ownership of their learning is key. When a teacher asks, "How can I help you learn?", a confident answer with knowledge of their difficulties and strengths should be expected. The solution may involve extra time, a laptop, being able to take a photograph of homework on the board, small changes to enable access to the curriculum and an ability to record their knowledge. Reasonable adjustments for students with dyslexia should be ubiquitous in the school and celebrated when a child can ask for them independently.

Top tips for creating confident dyslexic learners:

ensure students have ownership of their difficulties and strengths and are able to communicate them to others; the school also has to listen and act

teachers should constantly explore with the student their knowledge of what helps them learn

metacognitive strategies, including those linked to dyslexia, can empower a student to know how to learn independently; regular staff training on literacy difficulties and dyslexia is essential

make learning relevant to help students make links and transfer knowledge; teachers generally know how well this can help children with SEN and finding "ways in" to subjects should be part of the planning process

repetition is important; there's often a belief that children with dyslexia and other SEN need lessons jam-packed with excitement; though relevance and interest are great learning motivators, what is often required is repetition to build knowledge and confidence

over learning until something becomes automatic can be very useful

modelling is crucial; teachers should ask what they are working towards and they should model answers in class and give accessible examples of work for students with dyslexia to access

develop a student's motivation by helping them to build on small but regular successes

challenging tasks should be presented "little and often"

multi-sensory techniques can be very engaging; see it, hear it, speak it and write it

building a narrative around the subject aids memory

technology can remove many literacy barriers; top tech aids include text to speech, dictation, word prediction, electronic graphic organisers and contextual spelling/grammar checkers.

Working with parents

An essential part of a school culture which supports a learner with dyslexia to succeed is partnership with parents. It is likely that a literacy difficulty is genetic and therefore other members of the family may have similar issues with learning. Involving parents in what helps the child is vital; they may see how their son or daughter copes with homework, using technology, for example, or finding other ways which help them. These methods might be transferable into the classroom or communicated to teachers, so they can employ similar strategies at school.
Enabling children with dyslexia to learn despite them having a non typical approach to literacy does not mean having low expectations; in fact, it's quite the opposite. These students spend most of the time in mainstream classes and until (or if) their reading and writing abilities are comparable with their peers, adjustments must be put in place. The key thing reported to me by children who struggle with literacy, though, is how they are made to feel. Perhaps the single most important question from a school and its teachers for these learners is "How can we help you to learn?" Listening and acting on their advice communicates to the learner that they're valued and that their success in education is important.

Further information

Jules Daulby is Director of Education for The Driver Youth Trust, a charity campaigning for better outcomes for those with SEN and literacy difficulties:
www.driveryouthtrust.com

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Schools must create an ethos which enables learners with dyslexia to achieve, writes Jules Daulby Many learners with dyslexia are quite aware of their strengths and the needs they have to meet to ensure success.

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Dyslexia International promotes teacher-training programmes, based on the latest research, to ensure that literacy is taught as effectively as possible in classrooms around the world

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Dyslexia International | Better training, better teaching

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We are a not-for-profit organization providing teacher-training programmes that embody latest scientific research to ensure that literacy is taught as effectively as possible in classrooms around the world.

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The Dyslexia-SpLD Trust informs, advises and signposts parents, teachers and local authorities about training, interventions and research regarding dyslexia.

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The Dyslexia-SpLD-Trust, or the Trust, is a collaboration of voluntary and community organisations with funding from the Department for Education to provide reliable information to parents, teachers, schools and the wider sector. It acts as the important communication channel between government, leading dyslexia organisations, parents, schools, colleges, teachers and the sector.

For specific information and guidance on how to support children and young people with dyslexia-SpLD please feel free to contact us.

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The Suffolk Dyslexia Association gives information and support to parents of school age children and adults about dyslexia.

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The Suffolk Dyslexia Association is a small local charity which was formed in 1981. We give information and support to parents of school age children and adults about dyslexia. The committee are all volunteers and we offer a membership.

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Dyslexia Outreach Team

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Dyslexia Outreach Team | Community Directory

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The Dyslexia Outreach Team is staffed by 5 experienced teachers, all of whom hold specialist qualifications for the...

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This video is part of Nessy Dyslexia Training .

The majority of people with dyslexia show problems with short-term verbal memory and experience significant difficulties in auditory processing (not all children have this difficulty).

If children don't seem to be able to retain spoken information it is important to get a hearing test to make sure there is no physical problem with being able to hear.

What is it?

An easier way to understand auditory processing difficulties (APD) is to think of it as 'hearing dyslexia'.

What are the difficulties?

It is important to understand the types of challenges these students will face throughout the day.

Repeating instructions

Auditory dyslexia will cause general problems with listening.
Look out for students who always ask for instructions to be repeated and cannot seem to remember even a short list of spoken instructions.

Verbal sequential memory

Do not expect spoken information to be remembered.
Look out for students who have a poor recall of times tables, months of the year and the alphabet.

Other problems linked to a poor auditory memory can be a difficulty in spelling because they can't remember the sequence of the letter sounds. Sounding out a sequence of phonemes and blending them will be difficult.

Can't concentrate

A difficulty staying focused on auditory information being given will mean people with dyslexia may not be able to follow or concentrate on a verbally driven class. Look out for children who are shifting their attention to and from tasks that demand listening and organising vs. reading and copying.

Distracted by background noise

People with auditory dyslexia are likely to have problems picking out important sounds from background noise. This will cause a difficulty hearing the teacher in noisy situations.

Note taking

They struggle to take notes when information is presented orally and at a rapid pace.

Sound discrimination

Difficulty distinguishing different sounds in words (auditory discrimination) e.g. "e" and "i" or similar sounding words e.g. "seventy" and "seventeen"

Naming

Thinking of the right word/name and attaching names to places or people is difficult. There is often difficulty thinking of the right word.

Mixing up syllables

Confusing the order of the sounds in multi-syllable words, e.g. "Sundenly" "Shuspicious"

5 Helpful Strategies

Do not rely on auditory teaching methods. Reading aloud and listening are not effective methods of learning for these children. So where auditory channels are weak then teach using visual and kinesthetic (movement and feel) approaches. Spelling rules are auditory and therefore likely to be less effective but this can be off-set by linking visual clues and actions to the strategies. Phonics programs that do not use visual strategies are likely to be ineffective.

1. Link a funny picture to the word or letters you are trying to remember
2. Give student one task at a time and talk at a slow pace.
3. Practice rhyming, segmenting words into syllables, segmenting compound words, sound-blending and using similar sounding words (like obvious/oblivious).
4. Provide seating near audio source. Example: front of the class or near a video monitor
5. Eliminate unnecessary background noise during tasks. Example: TV, stereo, outdoor noise

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Auditory Processing (Hearing) Dyslexia - Nessy UK

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This video is part of Nessy Dyslexia Training . The majority of people with dyslexia show problems with short-term verbal memory and experience significant difficulties in auditory processing (not all children have this difficulty). If children don't seem to be able to retain spoken information it is important to get a hearing test to make sure there is no physical problem with being able to hear.

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This video is part of Nessy Dyslexia Training .

Visual dyslexia is not a physical problem with the eyes but a neurological difficulty with the brain.
It is important to get eyesight tested to make sure these problems aren't being caused by the eyes.

What is it?

This type of dyslexia is a reduced ability to make sense of information taken in through the eyes.
It is specific to letters and words and the same person may have an excellent memory for pictures.

When someone with dyslexia is reading or spelling they have to hold a sequence of symbols in their head and process them into writing. Something in this process can go wrong.

1. Slower reading speed

The brain is less efficient at recognising letter symbols, matching them to sounds and outputting the answer.
This causes slower, hesitant reading with many small mistakes.

2. Visual discrimination difficulty

Children with visual dyslexia often confuse similar looking letter shapes and words, especially those that are a mirror or reversal of one another, e.g.. b's and d's, 'was' and 'saw'.

This will cause them to make mistakes when reading and spelling.
Letters and numbers can be written back-to-front or upside down and there is no visual recognition to self-correct the error.
The most common numbers for visual dyslexics to reverse are 9, 5 and 7.
Mirror writing is very rare.
Left-right confusion.

This same difficulty with the orientation of letters can extend to directional confusion between left and right.

3. Mixing up the sequence of letters

This is most often seen in spelling. The child may know how to spell the word but the information is output from the brain in the wrong sequence.

Typical errors are:
'dose' for 'does'
'hlep' for 'help'

Omitting letters when spelling is also common.

4. Visual recall - not recognising the same word

Visual memory allows us to recognise and remember letters, numbers, symbols, and words. Where there is a problem with accessing this visual memory a child won't remember words they read just a few moments before. It may also cause a word that is learned one day to be forgotten the next.

5. Struggling to spell homophones and sight words

Homophones are words that sound the same but are spelled differently. e.g. 'their' and 'there', 'pane' and 'pain'.
Sight words don't follow phonic rules so they have to be learned by remembering the way they look e.g. spelling 'does' as it sounds 'duz'. Homophones and sight words are particularly problematic as many children with visual processing dyslexia who often rely upon sounding out the word to spell it because they cannot remember the way it looks.

6. Difficulty copying

This task is very difficult for a child with visual dyslexia. Copying will be much slower because only a small portion can be remembered at a time. Even glancing away can cause some of the words to be forgotten. The copied text is often inaccurate or incomplete.

7. Visual pursuit and tracking

When reading, if the child misses off the end of a word, skips over a word or misses out lines this is the ability to visually track along a line of text. When reading aloud it will cause hesitancy and many errors.

8. Slower written output.

Don't expect as much written work to be produced. There will be lots of ideas but putting those thoughts into words will be a much longer to process.

5 Helpful Strategies

When teaching a student with visual processing difficulties place an emphasis upon auditory channels (unless this is also weak then it will have to be kinesthetic).

1. Use a structured phonic approach

Understanding spelling rules will help. Gain mastery of all the phonic sounds, syllables, prefixes and suffixes so a child knows how to construct a word using sounds.

2. Mnemonic spelling strategies can be used to help spell sight words

The first letter of each word spells out the word you need to remember. A funny picture reinforces the memory.
e.g. was a sausage helps to spell 'was'.

3. Use the ability to rhyme as a spelling strategy

Rhyming can be used to help to by recognise common letter patterns
e.g. if you know how to spell pink then it will help 'drink', 'stink' and 'think'.

4. Copying must be kept to a minimum

It is better for the teacher to attach a print out of homework in a student's planner than to expect them to record it. If possible, add the phone number of a friend they can call if they forget what has been set for homework.

5.Try different colours behind text

A white background can cause visual stress. The 'glare' causes words to blur or even move on the page.
White light is made up of several colours, each with its own frequency. Some of these frequencies can confuse the brain.

Use coloured backgrounds or lay coloured acetate over a white page to eliminate the colour frequency that is causing the problem. Daily eye exercises like those developed by Anne Arbour are likely to improve visual tracking accuracy and reduce reading errors.

To reduce reading errors use a reading ruler or card with a section cut out that only reveals a few words at a time. When paired reading use a finger or pencil to follow under the words and keep the eyes focused upon the right place.

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Dyslexia and Visual Processing - Nessy UK

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This video is part of Nessy Dyslexia Training . Visual dyslexia is not a physical problem with the eyes but a neurological difficulty with the brain. It is important to get eyesight tested to make sure these problems aren't being caused by the eyes.

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The International Dyslexia Association define dyslexia as
"...a deficit in the phonological component of language..."
A poor ability with phonological skills is one of the most important identifiers and causes of dyslexia.
75% of people with dyslexia show signs of a phonological processing problem.
Many definitions of dyslexia include a problem with phonological skills.

What is it?

Phonological awareness is the ability to identify and manipulate the sounds of language.
A phonological learning disorder is a difficulty working with sounds and linking them to the letter symbols they represent.

What are the difficulties?

It is important to understand the types of challenges these students will face throughout the day.

1. Manipulating Sounds In Your Head

Say these letter sounds aloud. c ... a ... t
Close your eyes.
Can you remember the first sound?
What would be left if you took away the first sound?

A student with weak phonological skills would struggle with this task
because they have got to hold the sequence of sounds in their head and change them.

2. Sound Discrimination

Discriminating between short vowel sounds will cause difficulty.
Listen to the vowel sounds in the middle of these words "bet ... bit".
It is common to mix up 'i' and 'e'.

3. Rhyming

Listen to this word "hop".
Can you think of a word that it rhymes with?
"stop, drop, flop"
Identifying words that rhyme will be difficult.

4. Phoneme Isolation

Which sound do you hear at the start of these words?
"find" "friend"
Separating out individual sounds will be difficult to do.

5. Syllable Division

Listen to this word
"potato"
Can you split this word into separate syllables?
po-ta-to
Identifying the different components of sound in a multisyllabic word is difficult for students with a phonological weakness.

6. Blending Sounds

Listen to these sounds
"h...e...l...p"
Blending sounds into a whole word will be harder and cause these sorts of problems:
Missing out or forgetting one of the sounds, e.g. hep
Matching a sound to the wrong letter symbol, e.g. halp
Mixing up the sequence, hlep
It's completely forgotten and a random word is guessed!

7. Mixing Up Similar Sounding Words

A phonological difficulty can make it hard to tell the difference between similar sounding words.
allocate instead of accolade
pacific instead of specific
probably instead of properly

8. Finding The Right Word

People with a phonological difficulty often can't think of the right word for what they want to say.
This means they often have difficulty expressing ideas spontaneously.

5 Helpful Strategies

Phonological development is often helped by linking pictures or actions to sounds and letters.
These act as memory cues because they can be more easily remembered.

1. Use Pictures

Say this word aloud.
"bicycle"
There are three sounds that are difficult to separate.
Associate the word with a picture.
Draw a wheel around each sound.
bi-cy-cle
Funny pictures are more memorable.

2. Use Actions

Say this word aloud.
"skipping"
Relate an action to the sound then do it.
This helps to strengthen the link.
Skip and say the separate sounds - "skip-ping-skip-ping"

3. Smaller Chunks

When blending a sequence of sounds, break up the word into two parts.
Cover the final letter.
Sound out the first part.
Ch...u...n...chun
Stretch out the last sound and reveal the final letter.
Chunnnnn ....k

4. Speech Therapy Techniques

Use a mirror so the student can see the shape they are forming.
This helps to develop phonological understanding.

5. Own Voice Dictations

Record your voice saying a word you find difficult to pronounce.
Record someone else saying the same word.
Listening back to helps to hear the difference.
Those with a phonological difficulty will usually need longer exposure to language.
All these strategies and lots of activities to develop phonological awareness are included in the Nessy program.

Summary

Phonological development is helped by linking pictures and actions, to sounds and letters.
These act as memory triggers because they can be more easily remembered.
Those with a phonological difficulty will usually need longer to learn the different sounds that make up language.

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Dyslexia and Phonological Difficulties - Nessy UK

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The International Dyslexia Association define dyslexia as "...a deficit in the phonological component of language..." A poor ability with phonological skills is one of the most important identifiers and causes of dyslexia. 75% of people with dyslexia show signs of a phonological processing problem. Many definitions of dyslexia include a problem with phonological skills.

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A person with dyslexia needs a boost to their self-confidence before they can learn to overcome their difficulties. They have already experienced failure and deep down they often don't believe they are capable of learning.

To re-establish self-confidence provide the opportunity to succeed and give praise for small achievements.

2. Don't ask person with dyslexia to read aloud

Words are likely to be misread or skipped, causing embarrassment.

3. Don't give a punishment for forgetting books or sports kit

Offer positive strategies such as having one place to put things away.

4. Don't use the word 'lazy'

People with dyslexia have to work harder to produce a smaller amount.

They will have difficulty staying focused when reading, writing or listening.

5. Expect less written work

A person with dyslexia may be verbally bright but struggle to put ideas into writing.

Allow more time for reading, listening and understanding.

6. Prepare a printout of homework and stick it in their book

Provide numbered steps, e.g. 1. Do this. 2. Do that etc.

7. Do not ask them to copy text from a board or book

Give a printout. Suggest they highlight key areas and draw thumbnail pictures in the margin to represent the most important points.

8. Accept homework created on a computer

Physical handwriting is torture for most people with dyslexia. Word processors make life much easier. Allow them to use the Spell checker and help with grammar and punctuation so that you can see the quality of the content.

9. Discuss an activity to make sure it is understood

Visualising the activity or linking it to a funny action may help someone with dyslexia remember.

10. Give the opportunity to answer questions orally

Often people with dyslexia can demonstrate their understanding with a spoken answer but are unable with to put those ideas in writing.

Nessy Reading & Spelling is a fun, multisensory, games and evidence-based program utilising the proven effective Orton-Gillingham method.
Register now

1 in 10 children have dyslexia, do you know the ones in your classroom? This 2-hour course gives a basic overview of the different types of dyslexia, how to identify them and help support struggling learners.
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Children with dyslexia need to be identified as early as possible so strategies can be put in place to help. Do you know what to look for in your classroom?
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10 Teaching Tips for Dyslexia - Nessy UK

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A person with dyslexia needs a boost to their self-confidence before they can learn to overcome their difficulties. They have already experienced failure and deep down they often don't believe they are capable of learning. To re-establish self-confidence provide the opportunity to succeed and give praise for small achievements.

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Warning Signs in the Classroom

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Dyslexia: 10 Classroom Indicators - Nessy UK

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10 Classroom Warning Signs of Dyslexia. Dyslexia usually becomes more prominent in school when there is a focus on a child's ability to read and write.

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Indications, Hints, and Tips

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spelling; phonics; orton-gillingham; research based content; nessy

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Indications, Hints and Tips: Primary | British Dyslexia Association

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The information contained on this page is specific aimed at primary school aged children and includes information on, Written Work, Reading, Numeracy, Time, Skills, Behaviour, Practical Aids, Resources to support literacy.

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Dyslexia

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