| Subject: Re: Difficulties learning a foreign language |
Author:
Rod Everson
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Date Posted: 10:18:03 07/13/11 Wed
In reply to:
Karen B
's message, "Difficulties learning a foreign language" on 07:14:19 07/06/11 Wed
I have two suggestions for you to consider.
First, Spanish is a fairly straightforward language to learn to read in that the sound/symbol relationships are much simpler than English. So, if she really like Spanish class, point that out to her, showing her how if she sees a letter in a Spanish word, she can usually assume correctly what sound it represents. In other words, use her Spanish interest to convince her that print is just putting sounds to paper, and reading is just decoding those sounds.
Because English is so much messier, those relationships aren't always picked up by kids who struggle with reading, so after you're pretty sure that she's figuring out the Spanish relationships, start showing her the English ones. For example, does she know that the letter "a" represents /o/ in want, /ae/ in table, and /a/ in cat? Or is she pretty much convinced that reading English words is a guessing game?
When you get to the English part (if you ever do) consider the information on my website for teaching the English code, as that's what I used it for for the past decade or so, and I worked primarily with kids I would consider dyslexic during that time.
My second suggestion is to immediately have her evaluated by a developmental optometrist to see if she has a vision skills problem holding her back, such as convergence insufficiency, for example. Go to the COVD website to find a developmental optometrist in your area.
You might find that she needs vision therapy badly, and that providing it addresses a lot of her school problems. That was the case, at least, for many of the kids with whom I worked over the years.
Rod Everson
OnTrack Reading
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