In my past couple of posts, I have been discussing some things that dyslexia tutors focus on during dyslexia tutoring. Today, I will be discussing the issues that dyslexics have with small words.
Reading small words accurately can be a challenge for dyslexic student, and the challenge that these small words give them is one of the hurdles that they must cross to increase their reading fluency. Some examples of these small words are “of, for, at, to, on, no, etc.” A dyslexic tends to misread or reverse these words quite often, saying “no” for “on”, “for” for “of”, and so on. In order to help a dyslexic student make progress, it is necessary to stop them when they misread a word (even a small word) and have them try that word again. If the child continues to have difficulty, I will usually have them look at the very first letter and tell me what that letter says by itself. Then, once they say the first letter’s sound, they can proceed to sounding out the rest of the word. Usually, once they say the sound of the first letter, they are well on their way to reading the word.
The same emphasis that is placed on reading larger words accurately should be placed on reading small words as well. Every word in a sentence is important, and it is necessary for a dyslexic student to increase their accuracy if their reading comprehension is going to improve.
Peter
