Teaching Strategies for Elementary Children with Dyslexia

Teaching Strategies for Elementary Children with Dyslexia

Introduction

At a commonsense everyday level dyslexia is often defined as an unexpected difficulty in learning to read (Lauren & Joanne, 2009), write and spell. But like many definitions as soon as it is examined more closely it becomes more difficult to pin down and a number of problems and ambiguities arise. Who decides that the difficulty is unexpected, and on what basis? How behind does a child have to be for it to be counted as a difficulty and how is the difficulty judged or quantified? Do all children need to show the same sort of difficulty or can they show different types of difficulties and still be called dyslexic?

In examining definitions of dyslexia it becomes apparent that different definitions highlight different aspects or levels of the problem. Goswami and Bryant (1990) have proposed that in looking at learning disabilities like autism and dyslexia it is important to look at the links between the different levels of explanation so that we can begin to see the links between biological causation, cognitive impairments, and behaviours such as poor reading and spelling.

Strategies for Dyslexia

A teacher with dyslexic children in his/her classroom should have a flexible approach (De Fries, 1991). Teachers should understand the special need of every dyslexic child so that he/she should feel comfortable in participating in the learning process (www.learningrx.com/teaching-dyslexia-reading-programs-faq.htm). Some teaching strategies for children with dyslexia are given below:

When writing on the blackboard, use different coloured chalks. Write in bold letters with sufficient space after each word. The writing should be clear and easily visible. Allow dyslexic children to sit in the front rows so that the blackboard is easily visible and they can easily distinguish between different letters. Make sure that dyslexic children have copied the full text from the board correctly. After finishing writing, you should speak out each word loudly and tell children to check for any spelling mistakes etc.

Multisensory teaching technique is the best approach for teaching children with dyslexia. By this technique all senses of a dyslexic child are used. By a combination of all senses in the objective, learning should be made easy. Use vision, hearing, touch and movement together to promote effective learning.

When comes to reading do not tell the child with dyslexia to read aloud in front of their peers. You should practice reading aloud with dyslexic child when alone. Another alternative may be to give reading material in advance to prepare for a class reading (Harn, Linan-Thompson & Roberts, 2008). Tell the child to prepare reading at home in front of the mirror. This will save the dyslexic child from the fear of reading in class.

You should try to teach one rule at one time. Let the child practice the same for reading and writing. Once the child is fully comfortable with one rule, then shift to the next rule.

When preparing to give homework assignment to a child with dyslexia, it should be according to the special needs ...