Reading Difficulties

1. Reading Difficulties What can teachers do?

2. What information is out there? • When you go to look up a reading disability what do you suppose you find? • On the internet what do you think I found?

3. Some things might be….. Definitions Help for parents Research Articles related to selling a product Many types of Dyslexia What do you think about this?

4. Do you agree or disagree? A problem reader is one who is reading below his or her grade level. In most instances, reading problems can be prevented. Most cases of reading difficulty should be handled by the classroom teacher. Low achieving readers need to have tasks broken down into their component parts. There is no one best approach for working with low-achieving readers. These statements are designed to help you explore your beliefs and attitudes. • Thomas G Gunning Assessing and Correcting Reading and Writing Difficulties The knowledge you bring to the topic Have you ever read books or articles on reading and writing difficulties? Do you remember from your school days what steps were taken to help those classmates who struggled with reading and writing? Think about your students. What problems are they manifesting? How are they being helped?

5. Reading Difficulty Defined Watch this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zWRQCewUMLw What do you think about this clip? Despite having an average intelligence, stable personality, a caring family and dedicated, highly competent teachers, she was reading at a level far below what you would expect. You can see she lacked the skills necessary to read the literature, social studies and science selections typically required of a fourth grader.

6. What do you think? • Her difficulty reading was interfering with her functioning both in school and society. She probably couldn’t read the ads on the cereal boxes or engage in activities that you would expect as a young child. • There are two reasons why she has a reading difficulty. • First there is a difference in overall cognitive ability and her reading achievement. She had an average ability and she was reading well below grade level. • Also, her lack of reading ability was interfering with demands made by her life circumstances. She was having Functional Difficulty. (Thomas G Gunning 2002)

7. IQ Controversy • Problems with using intellectual ability to define reading difficulty • There is no agreement on a definition of intellectual ability or on how to measure it. Gardner(1999) uses linguistic, logical-mathematical, spatial, kinesthetic, intrapersonal, musical and interpersonal and may there be more. • Are intelligence test fair? Have all kids been able to practice assembling puzzles and learning vocabulary? The tests may also include items from the students’ culture (Salvia and Ysseldyke, 1998) • Students from disadvantaged environments tend to score lower on IQ tests (Siegel, 1998).

8. Students in the early grades have not had many opportunities to achieve, so it is hard to find a huge discrepancy, so many school districts adopt a “wait and fail” tactic (Gunning, 2002)

9. Listening Capacity • One Solution to the IQ controversy has been to use listening tests as measures of students’ potential(Spring&French,1990:Balian, 1999). • Listening capacity is a measure of a readers’ ability to comprehend written text read aloud. It is a proxy for intelligence. (Ron Cramer 2004) • Therefore, if Nick has a reading level of 3 and a listening level of 8, he is 5 years behind using the listening capacity formula. (this is not the same as grade level formulas. It is quite different.

10. So…. Adopt a broad view of Ability. How do you think students manifest ability?

11. Solving problems • Discussions • Knowledge of the world around them • Gunner states in his book, Assessing and Correcting Reading and Writing Difficulties, that one way of estimating students’ learning abilities is by teaching them and seeing how much they learn. Many students who have been written off bloom when provided the right kind of instruction (Heibert &Taylor).

12. So what is Dyslexia?

13. According to (Gunning 2002) It is a label. • 2 problems with the term dyslexia: • The term has little meaning. • some say it is a serious problem • some use it for spelling problems • some use it to describe mild reading problems. • The term , dyslexia suggests a neurological disorder. This may be taken that this accounts for the reading problem. • *Not always. Other factors contribute like absenteeism, illness, a mismatched reading ability.

14. We need to look beyond the label and see the individual student! Labels may actually be a hindrance. They could lead to lower expectations. Do you struggle with this? How? Often, in order to receive special services, students must first be labeled as learning disabled, at risk, special needs, remedial or corrective. A label may be a device for getting a child specialized services that he needs.

15. Look it up on Wikipedia! Dyslexia Definition www. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dyslexia Alexia Definition www. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexia

16. Factors Involved in Reading Difficulties *Cognitive Factors cognitive ability memory Associative Learning Attention *Social and Emotional Factors Fight or Flight Belief in ones self Parental Pressure *Visual Processing Deficits Reversals Delayed or Faulty Directionality *Language Factors Articulation Phonological Rapid Automatized Naming (RAN) Word Finding Problems *Orthographic Processing *Physical Causes Neurological Factors Hearing Impairments Visual Impairments Physical Health *Educational Factors *Social and Cultural Factors *Family Factors *Economic Factors You Be the Detective!

17. A student is referred to Title One. What is a typical reaction?

18. My main goal when faced with this reaction is to make Title one the place that all of the kids in the school want to be. • I make learning fun and authentic • I don’t waste their time • I make my students accountable for learning • I have high expectations • I don’t judge my students on only oral reading • I provide motivation • There is a community of respect • I give my students choices • I find out what works with my students so I can tell other. A child learns from a read aloud-Do it. A child learns from re-reading a book-Do It. Share with their parent, grandparent, the principal, tutor or teacher what works. • They will make connections “I don’t want to go” “I’m stupid” “Waste of my time” “I’m not going to learn anything anyway” “But I’m going to miss____.”

19. Brain-based learning ideas http://www.uwsp.edu/education/celtProject/innovations/ Brain-Based%20Learning/brain-based_learning.htm What do you do in your classroom? How hard or easy is this to do. Diffrentiated Learning www.reachingallkids.info Linda Irwin and Mary Stanko show us how it’s done.

20. Using the Web • Organizing and Outlining Information: • Inspiration: older student version • Kidspiration: K-8 version both provide tools for you and your students to create graphic organizers with text and images • Drawing Software : KidPix Students can draw pictures for vocabulary words, stories and concepts. • Children’s Literature Web Guide: Internet Resources related to books • http://www.ucalgary.ca/~dKBrown/ Includes resources for parents and teachers. Has great readers’ theatre Children’s Book Award links and even book discussion groups. • Free Text Readers: • Acrobat Reader • Microsoft Reader • ReadPlease 2003 • Tex-Edit Plus 4.5.1 • Phonemic Awareness: http://www.starfall.com/ Free website with songs about letter sounds and stories that the kids can read. Primary grades.

21. Learning through Listening Activities Learning through listening website: Foundation for the blind http://www.learningthroughlistening.org

22. THE RACEAnonymous Whenever I start to hang my head in front of failure’s face, my downward fall is broken by the memory of a race. A children’s race, young boys, young men; how I remember well, excitement sure, but also fear, it wasn’t hard to tell. They all lined up so full of hope, each thought to win that race or tie for first, or if not that, at least take second place. Their parents watched from off the side, each cheering for their son, and each boy hoped to show his folks that he would be the one. Teacher Notes will finish the poem!