He has trouble learning to read at the end of CP. Maybe he’s dyslexic?
A child who has difficulty deciphering CP should not be labeled too quickly. It may simply be a delay and we can only really start to decide on dyslexia in the middle of CE1. However, ask yourself now about the prerequisites: does the child know how to distinguish sounds and syllables, for example, differentiate n from m, b from p? Does he not have difficulty coordinating the two eyes? The speech therapist may, to be sure, recommend an orthoptic assessment (and detect a possible eye coordination problem), an ENT assessment (audiogram), to identify possible hearing disorders, or a psychometric assessment. When these causes are eliminated, it is the durability of the symptom that will alert you. If, after 30 to 50 rehabilitation sessions (which is recommended initially), the difficulties persist, we can talk about dyslexia.
My 9-year-old daughter is bad at spelling Is it for life?
French spelling is a very complex system… And it takes time to master it. There are phonetic problems related to sounds, lexical problems related to the spelling of words (“pome” for apple or “canard” for duck, for example), and syntactic problems related to grammar. In the event of a delay, the difficulties will improve over time, with appropriate support (speech therapy or simple academic support), with maturity, and especially through reading. On the other hand, if the child suffers from dysorthographia (associated with a diagnosis of dyslexia), they will experience spelling difficulties throughout their life that will need to be overcome through rehabilitation and adaptations.
My son is deciphering at the end of the senior section. Does he already know how to read?
Deciphering is a necessary condition, but not sufficient! This is the very first step, which, around 5-6 years old (at the very beginning of CP), will lead the child to identify the correspondences between written letters and sounds. The letter “r” is pronounced “reu”, the “ch” is pronounced cheu”, etc. It is a laborious but essential learning process, which creates a link between the world he comes from (he heard all these sounds through contact with his parents, the outside world) and the one he is going to (the symbolic universe, that of reading). Why is it essential? Because, by deciphering the word orally, he will call upon his “mental dictionary”. If he has already heard the word orally, the meaning will immediately enrich the sound. The child then enters the second stage of learning: fluent reading, the one that makes sense. This will go all the faster if he has developed during his first years a good mental dictionary, rich in words heard during early childhood. Some children at 6 years old have 200 words, others 2,000 words. The latter will, of course, move from decoding to fluent reading with more ease.
He doesn’t read at the end of CP. Does he have a problem?
FALSE
As we have just seen, it is often the weakness of the vocabulary that explains the delay in reading. The word read by the young child does not refer to any “subscriber” in his mental dictionary. In this case, reading takes longer. Learning to read also requires a high level of availability, which some do not have, whether because of an inability to make an effort or because of latent anxiety. Reading is, for some children, anxiety-provoking: it is a leap into the void, into a world full of symbols. A child who is too agitated or too anxious will need a little more time than another. On the other hand, if the difficulties persist and the child mixes up the letters, it is necessary to consult in the middle of CE1.”
Is it serious if my child can’t read by All Saints’ Day?
A children’s author explains why we must give children time to learn to read and give them time to discover the pleasure of reading.