How to check if your child is at risk of reading failure
Addressing ‘At Risk’ pupils in the early stages of reading
The Solomon Method is designed specifically to remedy reading delay as a neurological process. It does this exclusively through reading, as distinct from other professional intervention such as optometry, audiology, speech, occupational or physical therapy.
The delayed or "at risk" reader has generally not developed the process of hearing the speech sounds (phonemes) that make up words.
With all beginning readers, and particularly with the dyslexic reader, the task is to establish the process of identifying (not necessarily memorising) the speech sound of each consonant and then blending it with a short vowel. If the child is not able to identify the consonant sound, the parent or teacher should work with the child on The Solomon Method material in "Teaching Literacy from the Beginning" or FAT CAT SAM.
The goal of The Solomon Method for the delayed or "at risk" reader is to establish the sound blending process through phonemic awareness which is normally achieved by the age of six. When functioning, this process enables the child to separate and reproduce one speech sound (phoneme) that is part of a word. The initial consonant such as the 'c' in 'cat' is usually the first sound to be extracted. The child who can play 'I spy', using the first speech sound to identify the word, has achieved the first step in phonemic awareness. The next stage is to blend phonemes into a continuous string that makes part of or a whole word. The blending process consists of holding a consonant 'in the head' while adding and blending a short vowel but not completing the word. That combination of consonant and short vowel is referred to as a 'non-word string'. The pupil must be able to separate the sounds 'c' and 'a' in the word 'cat' and join them to form the non-word blend 'ca' before adding the last consonant.
The ability to repeat correctly a non word string is a difficult, if not impossible, exercise for children who have not yet developed particular neurological pathways. If these pathways are not activated the result is a long term stumbling block to effective reading and often the cause of adult dyslexia.
The Solomon Method is designed specifically to remedy reading delay as a neurological process. It does this exclusively through reading, as distinct from other professional intervention such as optometry, audiology, speech, occupational or physical therapy.
The delayed or "at risk" reader has generally not developed the process of hearing the speech sounds (phonemes) that make up words.
With all beginning readers, and particularly with the dyslexic reader, the task is to establish the process of identifying (not necessarily memorising) the speech sound of each consonant and then blending it with a short vowel. If the child is not able to identify the consonant sound, the parent or teacher should work with the child on The Solomon Method material in "Teaching Literacy from the Beginning" or FAT CAT SAM.
The goal of The Solomon Method for the delayed or "at risk" reader is to establish the sound blending process through phonemic awareness which is normally achieved by the age of six. When functioning, this process enables the child to separate and reproduce one speech sound (phoneme) that is part of a word. The initial consonant such as the 'c' in 'cat' is usually the first sound to be extracted. The child who can play 'I spy', using the first speech sound to identify the word, has achieved the first step in phonemic awareness. The next stage is to blend phonemes into a continuous string that makes part of or a whole word. The blending process consists of holding a consonant 'in the head' while adding and blending a short vowel but not completing the word. That combination of consonant and short vowel is referred to as a 'non-word string'. The pupil must be able to separate the sounds 'c' and 'a' in the word 'cat' and join them to form the non-word blend 'ca' before adding the last consonant.
The ability to repeat correctly a non word string is a difficult, if not impossible, exercise for children who have not yet developed particular neurological pathways. If these pathways are not activated the result is a long term stumbling block to effective reading and often the cause of adult dyslexia.
Parents who are at a loss to know whether their child is an 'at risk' reader may find the following initial assessment helpful.
By the time children turn six, we should assess whether they can:
- Identify the SPEECH sounds (phonemes) of the consonants of the English alphabet. Ask: "What is the first sound we speak when we say: bat: fish: rat: dog: sock: man: zebra: tap: goat: jam: key: hat: pan: queen: wagon: yak: lamb: nest: van?".
- Looking at a picture chart representing the above words point to the picture where the word for that picture is made up of the letters: 'p. a. n' : 't. a. p': 'y. a .k'.
- Without pictures, listen to three sounds and say what the word would be if the sounds are joined together. 'm.a.n': 'r.u.n' 'h..a.s.' 'p.i.t'.
If the above tasks appear to be beyond the pupil's capacity, the parent or teacher may find appropriate preliminary instruction in "Teaching Literacy from the Beginning". If the tasks in 2 or 3 seem difficult, the concept of a phoneme as a unit of speech is not fully understood and the process of phonemic awareness will need intervention. The appropriate instructional stage is The Solomon Method first phonemic reader FAT CAT SAM.
Julia Solomon
