Read and Spell Blog

Writing information down facilitates its transfer into long-term memory and provides an opportunity for learners to engage with content on a deeper level, including through review.

Read and Spell Blog

3 Common reading problems for students

Developing strong reading skills in students is one of the key goals of every early education program. It is through reading that students expand their vocabulary and learn about the world. Reading is also the key to success in spelling and writing.

And while 6 and 7-year-olds are fluent speakers, they require instruction in how to navigate print. If a student is having problems with literacy skills, it can affect their performance across the school curriculum and have a negative impact on motivation to learn and self-esteem.

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Autism and reading comprehension

Research on reading has shown that children acquire decoding and reading comprehension skills at the same time, but that each skill develops independently of the other. Children who are autistic typically perform at average or above average levels when it comes to decoding written language.

However, they are generally better at sounding out and identifying words than understanding what they have read. This may be because comprehension is a more abstract skill than decoding. It relies on a reader’s sensitivity to story structure, ability to pick up on referents, make inferences and use prior knowledge of the subject to make sense of the text.

Attention and working memory are also implicated. Metacognitive monitoring strategies ensure the reader is following along.

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Orton-Gillingham reading instruction

The Orton-Gillingham approach is a multi-sensory way of teaching reading, spelling and writing skills to students who struggle with language-based learning difficulties, including dyslexia. Lessons focus on mastery of the smallest units of language first, including phonemes and graphemes, and then build to whole word, phrase and sentence level instruction.

Many current reading methods and courses are grounded in this approach, including Touch-type Read and Spell, and it can serve as a guide for tutors who offer literacy skills support for individuals with specific learning difficulties.

Because Orton-Gillingham focuses both on enhancing phonological awareness and teaching English language rules, it can also be useful for English Language Learner (ELL) students.

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9 Strategies for dysgraphia

Dysgraphia is a specific learning difficulty that affects writing skills. While no two individuals will experience the same set of symptoms, dysgraphia can cause difficulty with forming letters, spacing words and even organizing text into complete sentences. Students with dysgraphia may struggle with taking notes in class, completing homework and long-term assignments, and performing well on traditional assessment measures.

Producing text by hand is often both difficult and painful, causing everything from cramping in the muscles of the hand to excessive sweating and high anxiety. Over time, this can lead to poor performance and falling behind in lessons due to an inability to take notes. It may also result in avoidance of school and extra-curricular activities that involve writing.

Fortunately, there are strategies and classroom accommodations for dysgraphia that can help. These include allowing the use of audio-recorders in the classroom and teaching touch-typing so computers can be used as an alternative to handwriting.

Encouraging children with learning difficulties to succeed at school

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Encouraging children with learning difficulties

Specific learning difficulties like dyslexia, dysgraphia and dyscalculia can make it difficult and sometimes impossible for a child to achieve the same results as his or her peers in a traditional classroom setting. Some children face a constant struggle with reading and writing and many are at risk for developing low self-esteem, particularly when their condition goes undiagnosed and/or untreated.

The thing to remember is that there are alternative learning approaches, strategies, and tools that can help students with learning difficulties achieve their full potential at school. Moreover, a positive attitude and plenty of encouragement from parents and teachers can do wonders when it comes to inspiring these children to stay motivated and persevere.

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Strategies for students with autism

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a broad term used to describe various forms of autism, a brain-based condition that impacts on behaviour and affects the way individuals communicate.

While many of the challenges children with autism face in the classroom are related to developing social skills and interacting both with their peers and their teachers, some autistic students may struggle when it comes to literacy skills.

More often than not, the issues present as problems with reading comprehension vs. the actual decoding of language. Teachers may observe children reading fluently only to discover they have not understood the text that was processed.

Fortunately there are a number of strategies that parents and teachers can implement to help kids with ASD strengthen reading comprehension, including visualizing the story, integrating multi-sensory learning to bring words and concepts to life and acting out dramatic renditions of a text to enhance understanding of social interactions through the use of gesture and facial expressions.

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What motivates students to learn?

Teachers and parents recognize the power of motivation in enhancing learning outcomes and helping students to achieve their best at school. A motivated student might do his or her homework without being asked to, go above and beyond the requirements of assignments and participate in classroom discussions without being prompted.

More importantly, he or she may be more able to view a bad grade or poor exam result as a learning opportunity instead of as an academic failure. So what motivates students to learn and how can we encourage them?

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Motivating kids to read

Reading is the key to success in almost every subject across the school curriculum and research has shown that it is the biggest driver of vocabulary acquisition. The more kids read, the more words they learn from context and the more texts they can access.

Understanding how different text types work also helps them improve their critical thinking skills and engage with the ideas presented, in addition to becoming better writers. So, if reading does so many wonderful things, how do you get children to pick up a book and start reading?

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Self-confidence vs self-esteem

The terms self-confidence and self-esteem are often conflated. Confidence is a measure of faith in one’s own abilities; esteem is about our sense of self. It involves both thoughts and emotions and influences how we perceive others and interact with the world.

When children have healthy self-esteem, they tend to be confident. Similarly, if a child has a negative self-view, which can be the case for learners with undiagnosed learning difficulties, it can cause them to lack confidence.

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Challenging spelling words

While most words are relatively easy to learn, every individual will encounter challenging spelling words that they frequently misspell. Making spelling mistakes is frustrating for students and can lead to low self-esteem for learners who may be labelled as lazy and penalized by losing points on written work.

For adults, having poor spelling skills can cause them to miss out on career opportunities and lose face in front of friends and family. It’s important to understand that spelling skills have nothing to do with intelligence and that there are plenty of strategies that can help. If spelling becomes a persistent problem, there may also be an undiagnosed learning difficulty to blame.