In our clinic, we are commonly asked about Dyslexia and Dysgraphia. Our specially trained Occupational and Speech Therapists will assist with obtaining the necessary diagnosis for your child. We will work with you and your child to create a remediation plan and necessary accommodations for these deficits to help them become more independent and successful in their classroom and daily life environment.
What is Dyslexia?
Dyslexia is a language processing disorder. It is estimated that 1 in 5 students struggle with dyslexia. These students have a solid IQ (average to above average) yet struggle with reading and writing. Most think that dyslexia is simply transposing letters, but this is just one indicator. If your student is struggling with reading comprehension, adding or skipping words, demonstrating letter/number reversals and dislikes reading, chances are your bright student is struggling with dyslexia.
At its core, dyslexia is a certain type of phonological delay that disrupts decoding/encoding of sounds with specific letters and letter groups. This phonological coding is one of the foundation blocks of reading and literacy. Once that phonological component presents, it falls under the scope of practice of a speech pathologist for treatment.
Dyslexia can also present with memory delays--the brain has to be able to hold onto the first sounds in a word or sentence while it decodes the last. This is another area that the Speech Pathologist can address in treatment. While engaging the child in these phonological "brain exercises", our SLP also utilizes the Wilson Reading Program and the Lindamood Phonemic Sequencing Program to build those phonological coding skills.
Self-advocacy and building confidence are also incredibly important for our children--the frustration of trying to participate in classroom curricula while struggling with dyslexia can reinforce a negative feedback loop that can turn into a mental block ("I'll never be able to do this, I'm not smart.")
Another valuable objective we focus on in treatment is how to explain dyslexia to peers and adults, how it impacts their learning, and explain what tools and skills they have to accommodate their dyslexia.
This puts the child in the "driver's seat" that dyslexia is something that they can manage instead of something that will hold onto them and disrupt the rest of their lives.
What is Dysgraphia?
Dysgraphia is an impairment in written expression. Kids with dysgraphia have unclear or inconsistent handwriting, often with different upper- and lower-case letters and print styles. They also tend to write things slowly. Parents or teachers may notice symptoms when the child first begins writing assignments in school. This learning disorder usually occurs along with other learning disabilities such as ADHD and dyslexia.
Other signs of dysgraphia to watch for include:
a sore hand
Difficulty spacing things out on paper or within margins (poor spatial planning)
Frequent erasing
Inconsistency in letter/word spacing
Poor spelling, including unfinished words or missing words or letters
Unusual wrist, body, or paper position while writing
Step One: Learning Evaluation
Without the right kind of assessment, you cannot determine the root cause of your struggle. We take pride in offering the most comprehensive assessment available in order to be intentional about our strategies for improvement. We provide you, as the parent data about the true cause of your child's educational gaps. Then, we are able to customize a plan of action based on informed, calculated data.
Step Two: Intervention and Therapy
Dysgraphia: We use a multi-sensory approach for letter formation. It is important that children learn correct letter formation for efficiency, neatness, and rate of handwriting. For a child with dysgraphia, learning letter formation may be more difficult so we like to use a multisensory approach including kinesthetic experiences of building the letter, auditory experiences of a verbal sequence or song to form the letter, visual experiences of seeing the letter formed, and whole arm/body movements to practice letter formation. Make it fun!
If your child is displaying some of these difficulties, call us at 918-409-0157 to schedule.