6 year old possible dyslexia

[Boshi]

Has anyone had any experience with getting school support for their dyslexic child in primary? Is it common to have dyslexia diagnosed at this age or is it more usual to wait for them to start junior school?

Just wondering how I can support ds while he is still in year 2, he’s a bright kid and his teachers always comment on how articulate and bright he is, but this is not reflected in his reading or writing. His writing is illegible and most words will be spelt wrong, he reads words back to front, among other things.

Any advice from anyone that supported their child at home or any tips on how to best get support at school.

Thank you for all the resources, I will have a look at them all. He is having a sight test, he was tested a couple of years ago and they said he was slightly short sighted but I will ask further at his test in a couple of weeks.

I am happy to pay for private testing but it’s moot if school won’t make any changes or offer extra support. I am also suspecting dysgraphia.

I am not convinced school will offer much help now but the more information I am armed with the better to make a case for early screening.

I will try the reading ruler, but his issues are missing linking words and reading words backwards, and decoding long words from the middle etc rather than the first letter.

Lots to take on board, I only became aware of this as a possibility yesterday, in a way it explains why his writing and reading doesn’t match up with his apparent intelligence, his teachers often comment on how intelligent he is but put his lack of progress down to behavioural issues.

I hope if we catch it early enough it won’t affect his potential to do well at school, in many ways he is smarter than his brother who is at a selective school, but because of these issues he just may not achieve as well, which does makes me sad for him.

In yr2 the teacher questioned whether something was going on with Dd. We went to the optician first, who diagnosed an eye convergence insufficiency - they don't come in together properly to keep a focus point. We were given a few exercises to do at home. Roll on to end of yr3 and I increasingly noticed Dd skipping lines when reading, swapping out easy words eg she might say them instead of him. Her spelling was also poor and I literally couldn't get her to learn spellings, despite all my best tricks. But her comprehension was great so she was keeping up at school. School didn't see what I was saying about good comprehension masking poor mechanics. On my insistance school did a dyslexia screening and were surprised that it came out with 3 reds out of 5, dyslexia highly likely. I then went to a private assessor to get a screening again, because I had already booked it before school did theirs. She picked up on the eye issue and explained how connected it is. She recommended we see a 'behavioural optometrist'. I took Dd for an assessment, which took several hours, I stayed and it was really weird to watch, for example Dd was asked to copy out simple shapes like a diamond and she drew a 5 point star. She also had issues with reflex reactions that I had never noticed. We are 3 months into treatment sessions, and do some prescribed exercises every day at home. They include exercises for coordination and reflexes as well as eye exercises. I honestly wasn't sure I wasn't just wasting money on something completely made up. But Dd's reading has really improved just in the last week or two. She's not skipping lines, replacing words. The other day she voluntarily read 2 whole chapters out loud. She's finished her first ever chapter book. Dd is probably still dyslexic and I do plan on coming back to the dyslexia to do a full assessment, but honestly the eye stuff has been amazing. Sorry this is long, but I wanted to post in case anyone else comes across this. It's called eye convergence insufficiency and can be related to the left-right brain communication and reflexes.