Has this reading disorder/difficulty got a name?

[StarlightMcKenzie]

DS reads apparently fluently unless you read over his shoulder and see that he is still getting the meaning across but with entirely different words to what is on the page.

Often the meaning is plausible though entirely at odds with what is actually written.

So he might read 'Mike looks a lot like his Monkey', as 'Mike looks a lot at his monkey'.

Due to these mistakes I'm thinking his comprehension isn't quite as bad as everyone seems to insist as his sentence often makes more sense (As in the example), but it isn't right.

Any ideas?

So he is not reading all the words as they are printed on the page. Does he have difficulty with concentration? Does he need glasses? My DC do this sometimes, I just make them read the sentence over again until they've read it correctly (as printed on the page.) DD1's reading has improved immensely now she has reading glasses.

FWIW I don't think those two sentences have a similar meaning at all. The first means that Mike and his monkey look alike, the second that Mike looks at his monkey.

I agree it sounds like he's skipping ahead and missing out words so he's making up the general meaning of the sentence which changes it a bit.

I would guess that either he's literally skipping over a word and then making up what it could be from the context due to either difficulty reading, impatience or thinking it doesn't matter or he's getting to the end of the sentence but not managing to keep it all in his memory by the time he gets to the end so he's approximating and sometimes getting it wrong. Or possible difficulty making out the words as Sneepy suggests (glasses).

Is he understanding the purpose of these smaller cue words or auxiliary words? Would he be able to tell the difference, for example, between "looks a lot like" and "looks a lot at"?

I'm probably splitting hairs but I don't think the second sentence makes more sense - in fact it's incorrect because we would say "Mike looks at his monkey a lot" unless you're Lola from Charlie and Lola.

No, he's a fairly new reader so doesn't understand auxiliary words. Neither do I though

I didn't mean that the two sentences meant the same, only they coukd equally be plausible. I made a mistake as I have just looked at that sentence and is says 'Mike looks like his Monkey'. Ds said 'Mike looks at his monkey'.

I made him read it over and over with the same mistake. And almost every sentence he reads has something like that going on.

Do you underline the words with your finger? When he misreads one, have him sound it out then read the whole sentence again with the correct word. If you only get through 2 sentences before he's had it, that's ok--he needs to learn to look at each word carefully and not rush ahead.

Yes he does. Thanks. I'll keep going.

Perhaps words don't mean anything so he's just trying to do an acceptable job in order to finish rather than engage!?

I think if he's a new reader it might just be over eagerness!
My eldest son does this if he's in a rush and isn't that keen on the book.

It can really affect the meaning of the sentence so I ask him to re-read it more slowly and carefully.

He can be quite flippant and say it doesn't matter, but I've had to explain how one word can change everything. And then explain the difference of what he read to what is actually written.

Sometimes he'll say what he can predict is coming next and what he imagines should be written. If the gist is more or less OK and he's read most of the words properly, I let it go.

You could try making him slow down and coughing/ stopping him/ pointing to hint that he's misread a word. it'll affect the flow, but I'd do that until he's paying more attention.
Are his eyes OK? Is he tired when reading? Ds is better in the morning, but we don't always have time then.

OK sorry, English teacher vocab coming in there Auxiliary is just a posh name for "helper" words. What I mean is things like prepositions - the verb is "look" but we tend to use it with another word. To look [at/like/with/to/after] (there are probably more).

You're right that he won't have been taught anything like this but it will be more assumed that he knows the difference. Maybe you could draw or find two pictures (just google image search) of somebody looking like their dog, and somebody looking at a dog. And see if he can match the right sentence to the right picture. Or just have some fun with helper words - you could pick a random verb and then add as many words as you can think of to it and draw a little cartoon or do an action (like charades) for each one.

e.g. looks like/looks at/looks after, to hold up, to hold on, to hold hands. Run away, run to (something), run over, run like (something).

They're not all auxiliaries (mostly prepositions actually) but it doesn't matter, you're just getting him to see that the little words like "the" "and" "of" "to" "on" "like" are important and mean something in themselves and can change the whole meaning of a sentence. It's possible that he's just thinking they are unimportant and what's important is Mike and the monkey. But if this is what he's doing then he should be doing it in speech as well which might mean that he has trouble following instructions accurately or explaining something. But then it might just be that he hasn't twigged yet that reading is something we do with the same kind of language we use to speak to each other.

Off to find a picture of someone looking like a dog ........

Those are brilliant ideas Berttie, thank you. I'll definately do those things. He needs help with literacy and I'm really struggling in what to teach.

Bertie he has a dx of ASD so it is highly likely he does it in speech too. Those kinds of excercise will help language in general I think. Thank you.

Could it be a tracking problem so he skips words and then makes sense of it by filling the gaps ? Or his processing speed doesn't match his eyes, so visually he sees the words but there is a delay in him making sense of it.

I think most children do this at times, (by times I mean periods so they may do it for a few weeks then not for a bit and then do it again). I would just put my fingers under the words and not move my finger along until the word that is written is read correctly. you could also try using a piece of card with the corner cut out so he can only see the word he is reading not what comes after it, teach him to slow down and look carefully at what the text actually says.

I love pictures of people who look like their dogs

If he has ASD it's possible he's compartmentalised "reading" as some kind of separate thing to "language in general" as well so it might be a good idea to practice using reading and writing for communication - writing notes to each other is a good one, using notes for a treasure hunt type thing with clues to find the next note (also good practice of prepositions! :)) and also letting him use instant messenger programs like Skype to speak to a relative or someone. Writing emails or postcards works too but can be a bit too long winded waiting for replies.

I'm not sure. Perhaps fictional reading is compartmentalised.

Maths problems written in language he seems to have no problem understanding though he still makes those mistakes, he just manages to still get the answer right

Could he simply say something different from what he thinks?

That's a brilliant idea about the instant messenger though. His writing is terrible (he has the most perfect cursive handwriting if you can make sense of the words he's writing) so having to make sure it is written for someone else to understand might help him.