Dyslexia

[happychappy]

Anyone know any good, not too expensive computer packages to help my son with his dyslexia?

Thank you

Sorry this is far to general.

What kind of computer package do you want?
Why does he need it?
How old is he?

Is it a typing package, a reading package, a package to help his literacy etc.?

Im not sure at the moment.

My son is 8, and has just been diagnosed. We don't live in the UK (Italy) and they don't have anything to help him. My Italian isn't perfect so I won't be helping if I help in Italian. His reading in English and Italian is about the same. He doesn't write in English but does (badly) in Italian. We have another month off before school starts and we've been working very hard on the Italian. The teacher in bitching about his written English (though he speak better English than she does). So I thought I find something fun for him to do. He's very anti books at this moment, but does like computers.

I found the Easyread system and he really liked it. Asked to do more. And for me it was really helpful in seeing exactly his difficulties. Probably I will go for this but if I can find something better I will buy that.

'Dyslexia' is a very vague term. What exactly is his problem and does it affect him in both languages?

If it's his written Italian (i.e spelling) then an English programme won't help.

Italian is phonetic so what yo say is what you write. This means as a condition its much less recognised than in the UK and in less phonetic languages.

I've spoken to some teacher friends about getting Italian programs but they are thin on the ground.

The other problem the English teaching here is based a lot on reading and writing and English is one of the most difficult languages to decode. He speak English perfectly well but this is not sufficient for the educational system here. In order to get good grades (and not fail the year he must also read and write well). This is for next year. I've asked the school to do more reading and writing in Italian and the English will come when he's older but they are very inflexible and old fashioned. I've spent the last year being told my son is lazy and sly. So its down to me. The school have had such a negative effect they he doesn't want to go near a book and do any homework. But he does love the computer so we thought this might be an option. The school want him to copy like a parrot but that is useless and a waste of time and something very difficult and boring and demotivating for him because he gets it wrong (the teacher then shouts at him).

Anyway rant over

You still haven't really said what exactly his problem is.

What difficulty does he have in reading and writing English?

BTW To say that a language in which each phoneme in a word are represented by a letter or group of letters is 'unphonetic' is actually completely untrue. English has a more complex phonetic system than do languages like Italian, Spanish & German but its writing system is based on representations of phonemes. I say this because if you believe that English is 'unphonetic' it is not only inaccurate, but you are putting up a barrier of perceived difficulty before you've even started!

I would suggest that you have a good look at this website:
[www.dyslexics.org.uk]

I can recommend Easyread. My son did it a few years ago and my daughter is currently doing it. If you can afford it I'd definately say go for it.

So sorry your son is going through this. It must be so demotivating for him.

Our LEA dyslexia specialist recommended

Wordshark and the Nessie programme

Not sure if they are better than Easyread but they are fun and structured

I don't know Nessie (which I have heard is good) but my kids have used both EasyRead and Wordshark - and I really don't recommend wordshark.

Ive used Easyread also and can recommend it.
syntheticphonics also have a lots of good resources online.

I've just had a good look at Nessie. It seems fairly similair to Wordshark - but far better and more modern.

Hi Happychappy
hope you've found something to help your ds. I'm having the same problem with ds in prima elementare. I was told the same thing that he is lazy and sly. At the moment I'm looking for a tutor to help him after school and might have to change schools.

I wonder if our children have had the same teachers.