why is my kid unable to read?? - Page 2

[AAK]

Originally Posted by lucysmom

Then again, not sure they have really looked at how the two eyes function together -- they are always testing first one, then the other. Sight in the good eye is 20/20. Without the weak eye, depth perception is affected; I haven't heard about other ways in which using just the one eye is detrimental to visual processing.

Thanks ...

When she is at the eye doctor, do they ever put the red/green glasses on her? I am sure there are more ways to check for binocular vision, but with my dd they put these glasses on (one lens is red, the other is green). Then, they dim the lights and the screen at the end of the room shows some large dots. Some are green, some red, and some white. My dd ONLY sees green. Regardless of whether the green/red/white dots are far away or up close. But, she is expected to always be blind in her right eye. I am not entirely sure what the response should be if my dd had normal binocular vision. But, I thought I would mention this test.

Amy

[Encinalien]

http://forums.atozteacherstuff.com/
I've been looking at this website. I've read a few things like if a girl needs help reading the teacher should see if she could identify the first and last letter of each word in a sentance. That would help you find out if they can visually see each separate word or not.
Also, you know, lots of mothers here use
www.starfall.com for their kids. In "it's all about me" in the I can read section, of the starfall site there's like wordboxes, I guess they're called, where the put the word into like a crossword thing where each word can only fit in one box. (my neighbor said the schoolteacher assigns that website to second graders, but I learned about it here where it's preschoolers that are using it.)
there's similar stuff on www.abcya.com.

Definately go with the optomitrist.

Yeah if she's not getting the sightwords or the phonics either, the word-box thing helps you see the word shape quickly. That teachers site also said if they're reading too fast, like they're just decoding without paying attention, to have them either re-read the same book every day for a week or to re-read each paragraph in a story.
Also they recommended if you're considering holding back a year take a sample the child's work to the first grade teacher to see if she thinks they're ready to start her class next year. And they say not to hold back just for not being able to read because first grade offers a "reading repair" something that the teacher can do individually with her to help her catch up.
Hope this helps. I love you guys.

[PGTlatte]

A developmental optometrist will check for much more than just binocular vision. Here is a link with a list of the functions they check:

http://www.childrensvision.com/OD.htm

I also came back to add - our son has seemed to be "right on the edge" of taking off with reading for over two years now. I started doing lessons with him at five and a half, using what formats he liked best. At first he was enthusiastic - we were using the Letter Factory DVDs and Click n Read Phonics. Once I made the transition to paper he began to be frustrated. He has made progress in the last year, but it has been very slow and very difficult. He wants to read and is really proud of himself when he feels like he is doing well at it. He wants to improve at it. And he very much wants to be at grade level. That may sound silly for a homeschooled kid but he wants to make sure he's learning at the same level as the kids who go to school. (I think this came from him being made fun of by a neighbor child who told him he doesn't know anything because he doesn't go to school, and I assured him we will make sure he is learning everything they learn.) So he is really motivated...but the leap I kept expecting just never happened, and we trudged on, like through thick mud. The diagnosis of his vision problems explains a lot. He is also excited to be doing the vision therapy because he hopes it will make it easier for him to read.

Originally Posted by AAK

When she is at the eye doctor, do they ever put the red/green glasses on her? I am sure there are more ways to check for binocular vision, but with my dd they put these glasses on (one lens is red, the other is green). Then, they dim the lights and the screen at the end of the room shows some large dots. Some are green, some red, and some white. My dd ONLY sees green. Regardless of whether the green/red/white dots are far away or up close. But, she is expected to always be blind in her right eye. I am not entirely sure what the response should be if my dd had normal binocular vision. But, I thought I would mention this test.

Amy

[eepster]

I was a late reader, and gifted. Obviously I am dyslexic, but I also have a lazy eye.

One of my first recomendations would be to distract her from focusing on learning to read right now. Get her wordless books, such as Floatsam, or puzzle and maze books. For books with words, ones where the words are individually isolated are easier than sentences and paragraphs, such as Richard Scary books. Make sure she has other ways to feed her interest in gathering knowledge, such as watching NOVA videos.


To a fair degree with me the things that the Drs recommended to help my eyes made reading more difficult. I prefer to use one of my eyes for close up work and the other for distance work. One of my eyes was just much better at reading, but had trouble seeing distances. The problem was it is believed that using both eyes for both reading and looking at far away object is better, so there was a huge push to prevent me from doing things that made reading easier like covering one eye with my hand while I read.

To this day, one of my eyes is my reading eye and the other is my distance eye. I sort of use both in the middle distance. Personally, it works fine. I really don't see what the big deal about depth perception is, the only time it's a problem is if I'm trying to hit a baseball with a bat (so I joined the fencing team in HS instead of the soft ball team, no biggy.) You can usually judge how far away something is from perspective.

[PGTlatte]

It is good you are able to adapt this way.

I have a friend whose husband has double vision for his far sight, to the point that his brain has learned to completely ignore one eye, so he has no depth perception. He regularly drives his car into things when he is trying to park it or navigate through a narrow space. Fortunately he can judge distance well enough to stay far enough away from other cars when he is at driving speed, but it's not good enough for when he is really close to something.

Originally Posted by eepster

I really don't see what the big deal about depth perception is, the only time it's a problem is if I'm trying to hit a baseball with a bat (so I joined the fencing team in HS instead of the soft ball team, no biggy.) You can usually judge how far away something is from perspective.

[shishkeberry]

My son is also 5.5 and the only word that he can recognize is his own name. He can read and write it pretty well, though.

[Linda on the move]

Originally Posted by eepster

I prefer to use one of my eyes for close up work and the other for distance work. .... To this day, one of my eyes is my reading eye and the other is my distance eye. I sort of use both in the middle distance. Personally, it works fine.

My eyes are like this now, but weren't as a child.

I don't see why it is a big deal. When I'm focusing on something up close and look up, it takes just a second for my eyes/mind to adjust. Other than that, I see fine.

Back to the OPer -- I think it's great that you are getting additional checks to make sure her eyes are working well.

[joensally]

Ditto other posters re vision issues. DS was like this and a dev opt, reading glasses and age resolved it.

It could also be that her eyes get tired and aren't mature enough for the heavy load of reading - her cognitive skills and her eye strength are out of sync.

I'll also echo other posters re not every gifted kid reads at 5.5.

[lucysmom]

An update: DD has an appointment with a developmental optometrist next month. And I feel like an idiot for not doing this before, but when she asked me tonight if I would put out a Bob book for her to try to read when she got up in the morning ("I'm at Level One" ), I asked her what she sees when she tries to read. She said the letters cross over one another and they are hard for her to figure out and she gets tired because of that.

So now I am fervently hoping there is a solution, but I am pretty certain that it is not a matter of her not being ready and reading will sort itself out in time. This kid so wants to read, it is hard for me to watch.

I don't know if this (whatever the vision issue ends up being) always can be addressed through therapy. God, I hope it can. I can't imagine how she will manage if not.

I really appreciated both the comments here that urged me to take the vision issue more seriously, and those that offered the generally good advice not to stress your kid out about reading.

[LauraLoo]

Originally Posted by lucysmom

I don't know if this (whatever the vision issue ends up being) always can be addressed through therapy. God, I hope it can. I can't imagine how she will manage if not.

It would be very likely that this can be corrected through vision therapy.

FWIW - my ds had a slew of vision issues -tracking, convergency, fixation, peripheral - it was kind of mind blowing at how bad it was. We didn't catch it until he was 7 - he could read, but it was VERY difficult for him. Reading more than 3 or 4 pages of a chapter book at a time gave him headaches. He did vision therapy for about 8 months and we just came back from a 6 month follow up check up. His vision improved dramatically during therapy, and now we are on a visit schedule to make sure that it stays that way. Now he reads entire books (100's of pages) in days.

[LauraLoo]

Here's a link to a couple of good sites where you can see what the words/letters might look like for your dd and learn more about vision issues:

http://www.visionandlearning.org/
http://www.childrensvision.com/

[lucysmom]

I looked at the example of how text may look to someone with convergence or tracking or teaming problems, in the second link that LauraLoo provided. This is exactly what my daughter described last night & this morning. I am both hopeful that this maybe can be be addressed, and anxious in case it cannot, but in any event, I am feeling pretty confident that this is what has stood in the way of her progress in reading.