|
Q2: Can teaching phonics intensively harm a dyslexic child?
A: Most dyslexic children have difficulty with phonetic decoding,
for a variety of reasons. Some tend to have poor sequencing
skills, so it is hard for them to retain the concept of sounding
out letters in sequence, and then transitioning from each
letter having a unique sound to blending consonants. They
tend to be global or whole-to-part learners, and have difficulty
understanding a step-to-step process that requires them to
work with parts or segments of words, so translating letters
to the sounds of words create an additional step in the process
of word recognition and understanding.
Brain scans of dyslexic children have shown repeatedly that
they tend to process the sounds of words differently than
non-dyslexic children. Because of this, it can be anticipated
that learning to read by a phonetic approach will be slow
and laborious for most dyslexic children. It is somewhat similar
to trying to force a left-handed child to write with the right
hand. In the case of dyslexia, teaching phonics often amounts
to forcing a visual thinker to learn to read with his ears
rather than his eyes; an odd approach to dealing with a visual
medium like print.
Generally, if attempts are made to force or pressure a child
to read using strategies that are unnatural, it will create
dyslexia in an at-risk or potentially dyslexic child, and
will worsen the symptoms of dyslexia in a child who is already
struggling. The child will become increasingly confused and
disoriented. Added repetition or practice would tend to reinforce
the confusion, frustration and sense of failure, as well as
the disorientation, rather than to help the child actually
learn to read. Once this pattern is set, the confusion becomes
overwhelming, and the child can disorient even before attempting
to read, perhaps as soon as seeing the teacher bring out the
book. At that point, reading instruction would be impossible
until the child is taught strategies to deal with the disorientation.
BACK
|
|