I am reading a book by Sally Shaywitz called Overcoming Dyslexia. One of the things I wanted to share from this book was the earliest clues that your child might be dyslexic.
Listening is key!
Clues that your child might have problems with their phonologic skills come through listening to your child.
Here is a list of things to listen for:
-Is there a delay is speech? Did your child not start talking until they were a year and a half? two years old? This could be a sign of future reading problems.
-Pronunciation problems, they leave off the first sound of a word (nana for banana), they mix up sounds in a word (aminal for animal). Pay attention to these pronunciation problems when the child is five or six, because they should be able to say most words correctly.
-Difficult time rhyming, most four and five year old are happy to find a word that rhymes with ball...children with dyslexia struggle identify words that rhyme.
-Hard time coming up with words they want to tell you about. They might know the word jungle, but when they are telling you about their picture of the monkey in the jungle...they just can't remember the word jungle. As children become older they learn to avoid using the words that don't come to their minds quickly.
-Probably the easiest thing to identify in young children is difficultly in learning the names and sounds of the letters. Most preschoolers will master this before entering kindergarten, but a child with potential dyslexia will have a hard time learning to associate the shape, name, and sound of letters.
Parents are most keyed into their children. For this reason, a parent is probably going to be the first one to observe that their child might be dyslexic. Hopefully this helps you parents that are wondering what signs you should be looking for in your child.
