What I can do to ensure that my child is taught to read.

Is there anything I can do to ensure that my child is taught to read, write and spell to a reasonable standard? The answer is Yes. Dyslexic children can learn like other intelligent children. What needs to be different is the method used to teach dyslexic children.

Firstly, the true nature of the child's difficulties must be assessed.  However, in reality this usually means that the child can be shown to be significantly behind.

Secondly, teaching must be on a true one to one basis and in our opinion using Multi Sensory Learning is the only method that works well and achieves rapid results.

Working with your child after school

Never provide extra schooling for your child away from school by either doing it yourself or by providing a professional teacher until after your child is assessed. If you do this before applying for an assessment you may be ensuring that your child never gets the proper help needed. Afterwards, you should do all you can to help your child to make progress.

Below is a true story that illustrates the problem:

Roy was doing poorly at school and was falling behind the other children in his class, and this was especially true of work involving literacy skills.

The school recommended that his mum work with him each evening and at weekends in an effort to improve the situation. Mum did this and Roy stopped falling behind. However, despite his mum's best efforts he never did catch up.

Mum continually asked the LEA to assess Roy for dyslexia but was told that he was not far enough behind to be eligible for an assessment. Roy left school with no qualifications and was unable to get a job. Mum telephoned and said 'I desperately wanted to help my child so did what the school recommended but in doing so I robbed him of his one chance to get the help he needed'.

'Please warn parents in the same position not to fall in to this trap'.