Alex* has strong verbal comprehension and perceptual reasoning skills. Her excellent reading and comprehension skills make her a strong reader. So, why does she hate reading? Reading is a struggle for Alex due to her slow reading rate.
Reading fluency is Alex’s greatest weakness, she has struggled with reading since first grade. In spite of years of intervention Alex’s reading speed continues to be significantly lower than her verbal comprehension abilities.
Alex is able to perform to her potential in school due to the extra time she is provided on tests. When Alex is required to read within a time limit she is severely hindered in the amount of material she can process. Without extra time, Alex is unable to read enough material to demonstrate her comprehension of the material. Alex qualifies for extra time on standardized tests, but she is working harder than her classmates. Is there anything that can be done to help her?
Here are some ideas for Alex and her family to explore:
- Read Naturally Program to build reading fluency
- Use Rapid Naming material to integrate visual and auditory modalities
- Use visual worksheets to build visual attention
- Have a visual assessment to make sure her vision skills are strong.
Reading fluency is skill that can be developed. While most students increase their reading speed as they learn to read, other students need specific exercises to read quickly.
Hello, my son has a small chromosome deletion on chromosome 5 and one thing it has greatly affected is his academics. He is 16 and was assessed that he was at a 3rd grade reading level but right now the program the school is using with him is a 2nd grade reading level. His fluency is around 55 wpm. His comprehension is good. Does the fluency rate really matter as long as he can answer the questions about what he read?
Your question is a good one. We want our children to read so they comprehend what they are reading. So, fluency is not the most important part of reading. However, when reading fluency is slow many children find reading difficult. If your child has a learning issue which impacts his ability to read quickly he should have extra time for reading assignments and tests. Using text to speech software can also be helpful to allow him to continue to develop his knowledge and not be held back due to his reading speed. I just posted an article on Reading Fluency vs. Reading Comprehension. I hope this helps you.
Hi… My 14 year old son completed a GL assessment test at his school in june last year, of which i was failed to be informed about by the school untill the beginning of December, to top this unbeilevable failure of communication from the school i have only just managed to get a copy of my sons assessment report 2 days ago! The schools SENCO sent me a copy of his report via an attachment in an email but a am unable to make head nor tail of what the results mean as i do not fully understand the meaning of the sub headings and am completly clueless as to the scoring that is used. There is no explainitary notes to inform me on how to understand the report, it’s scoring methods, it’s meanings, or what the actual over all report itself concludes, nothing at all what so ever, so i now find myself feeling even more frustrated and annoyed than i was before i actually managed to finally get a copy of the report!!!!!……please help, as the school have been more than useless and have left me feeling as though i am really failing my sons educational needs!……..
Daniels ‘generated dyslexia portfolio report’ states…..
Dyslexia index – B
Single word reading – 55
Single word spelling – 7
WORD LITERACY CLUSTER – 62
naming speed – 87
reading speed – 47
PROCESSING SPEED CLUSTER – 134
phoneme deletion – 20
non-word reading – 34
PHONEOLOGICAL CLUSTER – 54
Recall of digits forwards – 18
recall of digits backwards – 8
WORKING MEMORY CLUSTER -26
writting (free writing) -84
it also state that daniel’s ‘Ability score in this report is from Cognitive Abilities Test (CAT3) – Non-verbal reasoning score’ (which i also have no clue as to what this is either!)
much thanks
kate
I am sorry that you are frustrated with your son’s services. In looking at his scores I can’t tell if these are raw scores, standard scores, or percentiles. I also don’t know what tests they are coming from so I can’t interpret the scores. I suggest that you meet with the school and ask them for a report that includes the name of the tests that were given along with standard scores and percentile ranking. I think with that information you will be able to gain a better understanding of your son’s strengths and weaknesses so you can understand his learning style and get him the help that he needs.
I don’t know if you would be able to help me, but it’s worth a shot. I’m a 23 year old female college drop out. I have tried and failed multiple times to pass traditional college courses. I never seem to have what it takes to complete the courses, even if I know the material. The classes I have been able to successfully complete were shortened, intensive courses.
A couple of months ago, I was diagnosed with ADHD (inattentive) and Dyscalculia. My IQ scores were as follows:
Verbal Comprehension: 130
Processing Speed: 89
Working Memory: 89
Perceptual Organization: 100
I’m not sure what all of this means, but I know that it has drastically affected my life. Most of my life, I have been told that I am very smart but that I lack the effort to be successful. My stress and anxiety has always been a problem. I have been hospitalized five times for thoughts of suicide and in 2010, I received electroconvulsive therapy to alleviate my symptoms (which, unfortunately, didn’t help much and, as to be expected, severely affected my short term memory). I was never diagnosed with bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, borderline personality disorder or any other “main stream” diagnosis. I have had several doctors look me in the eyes and tell me, “I don’t know what is wrong with you.” I have made significant progress with my depression and anxiety by receiving a service dog, talk therapy, and medication, but it unfortunately, it still lingers. Up until a few months ago, I had just accepted that I was just an unmotivated individual with depression and anxiety issues. I believe that most of my residual anxiety and depression stems from my learning disabilities.
Being diagnosed has been an eye-opening and heart breaking ordeal. I have started new medication and I seem to be responding well. I have a lot more energy and I feel alert and oriented. Though I have made progress, I am still having difficulties processing and retaining information. I plan to attempt school again in the spring, but I’d like to gather as much information as possible so that I can anticipate what accommodations I will need to be successful.
Thank you for taking the time to read this.
I wish you all the best in your academic career. It is wonderful that you are gathering as much support as you can to help you succeed. I am glad that you are seeing professionals to help you with your depression and anxiety. I can only comment on the educational challenges that you are facing, but I do believe that emotional issues can impact learning and that learning issues can impact emotions. It is important that you continue to work with a good doctor to help support your emotional well-being and to help you process your feelings about your learning challenges. Given that I don’t have your whole history I trust that you will discuss any suggestions with a professional who is both qualified and is familiar with your personal history. My suggestions are based on learning profiles, so please take any advice that sounds like it will help you and discuss it with your therapist and disregard anything that does not sound like it matches your needs.
Given your diagnoses with ADHD (inattentive) and Dyscalculia you should be eligible for some accommodations. You have a significant difference between your Verbal Comprehension Index and Processing Speed Index so you should definitely get extra time on in-class assignments and tests. I have listed some accommodations below that might help you. Additionally, I suggest you learn to use Inspiration and Dragon Speak Naturally to enable you to organize your thoughts and then dictate them into the computer.
Classroom Accommodations:
Read the whole articles at:
http://www.add.org/?page=college_accommod
http://www.bu.edu/cpr/reasaccom/educa-accom.html
• Tests:
Extended time on tests and assignments,
Testing in a separate and quiet place,
Testing over several sessions
Use of a computer
Dividing an exam up into parts and allowing student to take them in two or three sessions over 1-2 days helps reduce the effect of fatigue and focus on one section at a time.
• Lectures:
Permission to record lectures,
Audio-taped text book,
Assistance with writing class notes (i.e., note taking service),
Reading assistance service (i.e., reading group)
• Courses:
Written instructions from professors,
Priority registration with a professional in the disability services office,
The possibility of class substitution within the curriculum,
Reduced course load
Advance notice of assignments
Textbooks on tape
Use of a calculator for math
What students with ADHD can provide for themselves:
• Choosing:
Right college: with good reasonable accommodations for students with ADHD,
-Support group for students with ADHD,
College with large number of ADHD-LD specialists,
College with many registered ADHD students
To disclose your ADHD diagnosis at the earliest possible opportunity and request appropriate accommodations including those that the school may not readily offer but you can justify the need.
• Contact:
School’s office of disability and be familiar with its resources;
Health officials to provide them with documentations that prove your ADHD status and proof that ADHD affects your academic performance;
Writing center and utilize it properly;
Professors beyond the classroom, make use of office hours, if only to introduce yourself. Set up appointments to clarify assignments.
• Find:
How and where to access support from tutors, whether on campus or online;
Healthy study environment early on: proper time management (including a schedule that includes time for studying, socializing and exercising), distraction free study environment;
A study buddy or study group: sign up for classes with friends, or make friends in the classes you have so that you will support each other in and out of class;
An academic coach (through the college counseling office or privately) that will check in with you throughout the week to ensure success.
Thank you for this website entry! My son is a First Grader whose comprehension and decoding skills put him at a Third Grade level. However, his reading speed is at a Second Grade level. Finally, the teachers moved him up because his reading speed did not *decrease* as he moved up levels, even though he was not at the fluency level. He has had a full visual exam and has a significant prescription and has been receiving OT for handwriting. He also has Tourette’s/OCD. Do you believe that vision therapy and/or continued OT would improve his reading speed? His visual-perceptual scores are very high.
Great question. There are many ways to look at this issue. Let’s consider the reading speed first from:
1. An academic/achievement point of view
2. A developmental view
3. An individual difference view
1. The academic viewpoint: Your son’s reading skills, including reading speed are above grade level. So, all is good.
2. The developmental viewpoint: You son’s cognitive development for decoding and comprehension are advanced, even his eye tracking is above age level. It may be that the vision skills needed for tracking are still developing. If so, his reading fluency will increase without any intervention. From this perspective you would wait and see what happens.
3. From an individual difference viewpoint, your son has a significant difference between his reading comprehension and reading rate and we would like those to be even. If you look at the issue from this perspective you would see a vision therapist to see if he has a tracking issue which vision therapy could address.
My humble opinion is to wait, and see what happens on the developmental level. Your son may just want to make sure he is decoding the words and comprehending what he is reading, so he reads at the rate that he is comfortable and secure at. He is young enough that there is a lot of development going on. If in a year there is still a discrepancy, I would address the issue. That said, there is no down side of going to a vision therapist now to see if eye tracking issues are interfering with his reading speed.
Now, we look at the OT issue along with the Tourette’s/OCD factors. I would continue OT to help build his skills. You don’t say whether this is for sensory integration issues or fine motor skills, but either way OT is important to get the motor skills fluid. Down the road this can make a big difference in writing skills.