Primary School wont diagnose dyslexia

[bethalexander]

My 9yo DD is really struggling with her spelling and is bottom of her class. We think she has dyslexia but her primary won't test her. Getting her tested privately costs a fortune. Surely the primary have a duty to test her?

'the mandated mainstream method in England'
but not all posters are in England and not all dyslexia is language related I am genuinely confused at the belief in an one-size fits all 'solution' to dyslexia. Within the circle of people we know who are dyslexic, they all use different techniques. They also share a belief that diagnosis and support for people with dyslexia remains a real issue - and this is a group that includes parents of children with dyslexia; adults in the workplace and professionals/academics working on dyslexia.

I think that the EP realised with my dd that given her strengths in other areas and what she is going to be doing for a living when she leaves school there would be no point in wasting time on learning to spell. With school, studying, extra lessons and working her free time is precious. It has been full on since last August. She even worked on Boxing day. Dd has been offered a scribe for her GCSEs and when she is studying at home and in the classroom she has her stress ball. She was also taught some other techniques to help her learn when reading.

Whilst phonics might help some, others need a stress ball to learn. That is the nature of dyslexia.

Tomatodizzymum

"That aside those that are lucky enough to find the mainstream methods of teaching are working for dyslexic and other SEN children are very lucky. "

The whole reason the current mainstream approach (phonics) was adopted in 2007 in the UK was not down to "luck", but rather to a mountain of research that shows that it is the best way to get all children reading, including (most) dyslexic children. Before that, the mainstream approach was less appropriate, and did result in higher levels of illiteracy. (By the way, the first group to experience phonics teaching are currently in Year 7, so it is obvious that the high illiteracy levels you are refer to in your subsequent post have nothing to do with the current mainstream approach of phonics.)

"As I said earlier it's not about having the right and most modern approach". What it's about is having an evidence-based approach. Modernity has nothing to do with it. Education is full of 'modern' fads that have no actual evidence to support them. But as I pointed out above, meta-analysis of the range of research indicates that systematic phonics is the only proven approach to remediating the reading problems experienced by children with dyslexia.

Aplaceonthecouch

"not all dyslexia is language related"

It's certainly true that there is a lot of what is rather weirdly described as "co-morbidity", or overlap between different learning disorders. But most people see the primary symptom of dyslexia as difficulty with reading and writing/spelling.

"I am genuinely confused at the belief in an one-size fits all 'solution' to dyslexia."

It's not a question of an unthinking "belief" in a one-size-fits-all solution, because that's not how science works. Rather, what we know is that currently available evidence demonstrates that phonics is the only approach (that has so far been tried) that has been shown to work in proper systematic trials. Not only that, there is evidence from other research areas about how the brain processes print that indicates why it works. If your doctor knows that penicillin will cure 95% of infections, she's not going to start you out on some obscure drug that anecdote suggests might work in a handful of cases.

"Within the circle of people we know who are dyslexic, they all use different techniques."

But how many of them had the opportunity to learn to read using systematic phonics? The point I'm trying to make is that, if someone didn't have the chance at the most effective treatment at the appropriate time, of course they will try other things. It's only relatively recently that the consensus has grown firm that phonics is the best approach for remediating dyslexia.

www.interventionsforliteracy.org.uk/assets/Uploads/The-Rose-Report-June-2009.pdf

www.iferi.org/why-children-fail-to-read-a-new-paper-by-sir-jim-rose-1st-june-2015/

I think I haven't adequetly explained what I meant by "Those that are lucky enough to find the mainstream methods of teaching are working for dyslexic and other SEN children are very lucky" by that, I do not mean that mainstream methods don't work for SEN children, I mean that those people have never encountered a child for who they don't work for! That would, in my experience, be rare and lucky.

Yes, I have taught reading and writing and I first came across phonics based teaching in the USA about 15 years ago. I have two older children that were in school in the UK post 2007, it worked well for one and not so well with the other. I also use phonics methods at home with my current 5 year old.

I'm not saying phonics is not a great way of teaching, but it must be used without downplaying the importance of context clues, meaning, illustration and basic memory, like the example I gave for read and read. Also those words where the same sound can produce several spellings (Paws, Pause, Pores for example). English is too complex to think that one approach trumps others or that any "research" is concrete.

You do realise that evidence-based approach for children can be very flawed! It is good to look at the limitations of research if you want to apply it in real world scenarios. There are probably several critiques of the Rose Report, and specifically the evidence-base, that's usually how these things roll and how new information comes to light.

I'm not saying phonics is not a great way of teaching, but it must be used without downplaying the importance of context clues, meaning, illustration and basic memory

Oh dear

Have you come across present day Synthetic or
Linguistic phonics in the UK tomatodizzymum because it's very very different to US phonic teaching methods.

I doubt there is any critique of the Rose report in my last link as it was only published seven days ago.

Synthetic phonics is certainly great start to reading, but does it cover everything? All those irregular words? Is it really all you need for every single child?

Synthetic phonics covers everything and even teaches all those words that have unique representations for the sounds ... Like the /v/ in of ??

Last worked in the UK 5 years ago and my oldest is only 12, so yes probably have, but I'm not a primary school teacher so obviously I don't know the ins and outs of using it in a classroom.

The last "report" is not a paper, just a report. But have you read it?

Here is a quote from the report, taken from one Prof. Dorothy Bishop It is not helpful to assume that all poor readers are the consequence of poor teaching and that additional or earlier reading instruction will fix the problem. and recognize that they may need more individualized instruction tailored to their specific needs.’ VERY significant!

It doesn't suggest that using pictures to guess instead of learning to read is important or significant though. There's a reason for that...

It doesn't suggest that using pictures to guess instead of learning to read is important or significant though. There's a reason for that...

I'm lost, who mentioned pictures?

You appeared to, here:

I'm not saying phonics is not a great way of teaching, but it must be used without downplaying the importance of context clues, meaning, illustration and basic memory

But perhaps you weren't talking about picture cues at all..

Has anyone assumed that all poor readers are the result of poor teaching?

You do seem lost tomatodizzymum... You're arguing somethin isn't a paper when no one mentioned papers and you talk about multi cuing but then say no one mentioned pictures ??

"That would, in my experience, be rare and lucky."

In general, the claim (which is supported by evidence from a number of schools) is that children for whom excellent phonics teaching doesn't work are those with very significant and profound special needs. No one is saying such children don't exist, only that if good phonics doesn't work, it is unlikely that anything else will.

"I have two older children that were in school in the UK post 2007, it worked well for one and not so well with the other."

But we are talking about good phonics teaching here, and it is well known that phonics is not taught well in many UK schools. So the tiny sample of one or two schools that your children happened to go to cannot tell us anything about what good phonics teaching can do.

"I'm not saying phonics is not a great way of teaching, but it must be used without downplaying the importance of context clues, meaning, illustration and basic memory, like the example I gave for read and read."

Context clues are fine for read and read, but there are very, very few words in the language that fit that criterion. The problem is with the much wider use of so-called context clues as taught by multi-cueing, whole language strategies. There has never been any evidence to show that this is a good way of teaching reading; it was based entirely on out of date and unsupported theorising from the 1970s.

"English is too complex to think that one approach trumps others or that any "research" is concrete."

Putting the word research in quotes doesn't make the actual, existing and extremely extensive research, or the scientific consensus about it, any less real. Have a look at this paper, which is a review of all the different strands of research that contribute to the current consensus, and was published by the APA in 2000. The evidence has only got stronger since then. www.pitt.edu/~perfetti/PDF/How%20psych%20sci%20informs%20teaching%20of%20reading-%20Rayner%

That's a good point about the quality of phonics teaching kesstrel. But I think it goes further than that and perhaps links back to the piece mrz posted and people disagreed was average. It's about expectations as well.

One of the things we noticed very quickly when we switched from doing PiPs to doing phonics properly, was how quickly the number of children put onto IEPs for reading and writing issues decreased. And the ability of the whole cohort increased as well. It changed our expectations of what children should be achieving completely. And I think that affects the teaching and attitudes towards children who aren't reaching age related expectations.

If you know that almost without exception every child with very low attainment on entry and a disadvantaged home backround or some type of SEN reaches level 2 at ks1 and level 4 at ks2, then that's the bar you set. You become much less focused on progress from a starting point.

Pictures in books are called illustrations because they illustrate the story. To illustrate something means to clarify and explain it. Surely many of you answered essay questions that said "Illustrate your answer with examples" Hopefully you didn't draw pictures!!

mrz several people have mentioned bad teaching being a factor in children not learning. But we are talking about good phonics teaching here, and it is well known that phonics is not taught well in many UK schools. So the tiny sample of one or two schools that your children happened to go to cannot tell us anything about what good phonics teaching can do. So phonics teaching didn't work quickly for my child because his school and teachers were shit that doesn't explain why it worked fantastically for my daughter (same teachers, same school, same approach). Actually it is a very good school with fantastic teachers.

I mention papers (as in scientific papers) because those are what all of you are referring to when you mention evidence and it's this evidence that is being questioned. The report you provided was not a paper with evidence, it is an information document stating current research and aimed at people who think dyslexia is a myth!

Actually it's not true that the evidence is being criticised, What's being criticised is applying this evidence incorrectly to education.

I have never said that phonics is not a very good method. I am not denying that there is evidence that children do better with phonic teaching. I am saying that there is more evidence that they do even better when phonics is used with other methods. That teaching phonics is not a magic potion to fix literacy problems in children. I have an issue with two themes in this post, one that phonics is being held as THE teaching strategy rather than the most important building block in a comprehensive strategy and secondly I am concerned by a belief that children introduced to phonics will rapidly learn to spell, reaching high standards as young as Year 1.

Except when the illustrations tell a separate side story

Yes tomatodizzymum but that's not an assumption

Did I say the links were evidence? It seems you are the one making assumptions

"So phonics teaching didn't work quickly for my child because his school and teachers were shit."

Please don't misrepresent what I said: that is a gross misrepresentation, and such tactics do your argument no favours.

There is a wide variation between children in how much phonics teaching they need, even using the same programme. In addition, a very good programme such as the one in Mrz's school (which I seem to recall was where this discussion started) will be more effective in less time, but some children are still likely to need more input than others.

Being a "fantastic school" with "fantastic teachers" in every other respect will not necessarily make for excellent phonics teaching, if teachers don't have the training, the resources, the decodable books, and the top-quality programmes that some other schools may be fortunate enough to have. This is not a reflection on teachers' ability at all.