One of the biggest challenges for homeschool parents is teaching reading, and for a homeschool parent with children who have special needs, that big challenge can seem almost insurmountable for many. Teaching Special Needs Children to Read in the Homeschool can have extra challenges too, as you need to understand what the learning block is, and you also have to learn to over come it. I have so far, taught two children to read, only one with special needs, but their needs were not hugely preventing them to learn to read. However three more of my children have needs that are making this a huge challenge.
Over the last month or two though, there has been a huge LIGHTBULB moment. I started using more than one Phonics/Learning to Read curriculum at a time. In fact each day, my children are using three to four throughout the day.
Why more than one curriculum?
Why do I believe this is working?
- They see that letter sounds are used in more than their phonics books
- They are seeing many of the same letter taught a little differently in each of the programs, but used the same way in the same or similar words.
- The different programs reach different areas of the brain, utilizing the different learning gates.
- By spreading it through the day, they are thinking about it more than the typical 15 minutes that a single program would have them.
- By learning more than one letter a day in different settings, they are seeing how the whole alphabet works together to form more words.
This approach takes time, quite a bit of time actually, but I am teaching four at a time, at four different levels using the same basic three to four curriculums each day.
What Curriculums am I using to teach my Special Needs Children to Read?
We are using All About Reading and All About Spelling with all four, teaching the same thing to each at the same time each day. This is working wonderfully, and I am planning to purchase the next levels in May or August at one of the Teach Them Diligently events I am attending.
Both of these programs use hands on, auditory and visual learning gates to help the children gain and learn the concepts you are teaching. It is somewhat teacher intensive, but with the way I have set it up to keep all four at the same level and using them in a group setting, it is only taking be about 45-60 minutes a day to use both programs.
All About Reading is wonderful for those children struggling to learn to read, who have vision . The letters on the pages and the pictures are large and clear for them.
While I work with two of my children on their math, two of my children are using Reading Eggs on either a tablet or computer. This keeps them practicing phonics/reading skills, and learning, while I get a little one on two time with my children who need a little extra time to go over other concepts. Reading Eggs is a computer based program, and online, but I have noticed that my children are learning not only new words phonetically, but many sight words we haven’t covered in their other lessons. This saves me a bit of time and umm, shall I say frustration?
Explode the Code has been our family’s long standing phonics curriculum. However, with several with special needs all needing to learn to read at about the same time, I have found that they need Explode the Code and the above curriculums mentioned. Explode the code makes it fun, and helps me work with each on a more one on one level, but also gives us a little extra practice.
The special needs we are working with while I am trying to teach reading are:
- Amblyopia
- Strabismus
- Suspected ADHD
- Speech challenges. (Both All About Reading and All About Spelling are helping with this as we learn isolated letter sounds and blends.)
- Advanced learner
- Fine Motor delays
What our Day Looks Like
Each day we start out with All About Spelling, and work for about twenty minutes together. Then we move to All About Reading, working together, taking about twenty to twenty-five minutes. We then split up and the first and second graders do math while the Pre-Kers do their Reading Eggs. Then we swap or many times it is lunch time or time to make lunch and break until after nap, and swap. After nap we will start in with math and Reading Eggs or move on to Explode the Code, if we had already finished math and Reading Eggs.
Explode the code takes us about 25-30 minutes, as none of the four children are on the same pages, so I instruct one, move on to the next while the previous works on their own, then check, move on and so forth.
Between four children, I am spending about 90 minutes a day teaching them to read. However, that 90 minutes is split up into two to three segments each day. Many programs on the market say it should take about 30 minutes a day to teach their program. So, considering I am teaching four at the same time, 90 minutes is actually pretty good time.
Over the last couple of months, that we have been working on phonics/reading in this manner, I have seen more improvement than I did all year. We have had each of the above programs for more than one year and though we saw progress, it wasn’t what I wanted to see.
If you are struggling to help your child learn to read, I highly recommend trying to combine more than one program together and see how it goes.
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[…] Teaching Special Needs Children to Read From Betty at Peace Creek on the Prairie. Teaching our children to read is typically a homeschool mama’s first goal, and it can be really challenging with children with special needs. This post gives tons of tips and tricks that will help you to raise a reader! (Click to Pin!) […]