Helping a 9 year old read longer books

[Coffee_Books]

My 9 year old (going into 4th grade) was diagnosed with ADHD and is also on the spectrum. He's always been an excellent word decoder, has an amazing vocabulary and can sound out words well beyond his age level. However, when it comes to actually reading a book, he has some trouble.

He finds it hard to focus, so he tends to jump around with books instead of reading start to finish, but then obviously he doesn't get what's going on all the time.

He also seems to have trouble following the line of text. His eyes skip down to the next line so he'll get mixed up. The more text on the page, the harder it is for him. He does better with graphic novels or even picture books that have 2-4 lines per page, but for school he needs to read bigger books and he also loves books and stories so much that I don't want his ADHD to limit him.

To be clear, when he's reading for fun, he can skip around, reread his favorite book, read graphic novels or picture books, whatever he wants. I'm not trying to ban him from anything and I love Dog Man as much as he does! I just want to help him build his capacity for reading when he needs it.

Unfortunately at the moment, his IEP is for ASD, and doesn't include ADHD though his teachers are aware of his reading issues and trying to help. I'd love some advice on things I can do to help him at home.

[ELucas13]

My son has a learning disability and we use something called Learning Ally which reads out loud and highlights words as he goes through the book. You can get this through your school or if your child has a documented disability. There may be other apps as well that can assist.

Audio books could be an option and your child can follow along in their actual book.

[pbj4 in reply to ELucas13]

My 9yo son had ADHD and a visual perception learning disability and uses the Learning Ally assistive technology. It works well for him in reading the books for class. He too loves Dog Man but struggles to read a chapter book because the words all begin to "melt together"

[abryans]

I also have a child with dyslexia. The challenges you describe are not unusual. She and I did things like taking turns (I read a line and then she read a line, or could be a paragraph or a page). We also used a magnifier that highlighted one line of text at a time. Most importantly, I think, I read books she love to her. Her interests and comprehension were far more advanced than her reading, so I made sure she was hearing interesting books that she loved. She is a senior in high school now and she both reads and uses audio books for pleasure and for school. She takes AP classes and is busy applying for college. When she was in first grade, they said she might never learn to read,

[Aloysia]

1) have your child tested for eye-tracking problems. There are other possible causes, but it's fairly easy to get tested for this to rule this in or out. My daughter has this.2) meanwhile use an index card (or bookmark turned sideways) while reading. Just place the card under the line you are reading so there is less visual distraction. If needed, you can also cut out a part of the index card so that the lines above are covered at the same time as the lines below.

3) all the other suggestions so far are spot-on (audio books, reading out loud to them, etc).

Best of luck!

[Coffee_Books]

Thanks. These are great suggestions.

[Onthemove1971]

There are really two things that come to mind when you are discussing this issue.

1. Focus- when children struggle to focus they can, like you said loss their place while reading. But also lose what is being discussed in that section of the book/material.

Just curious have you considered medication to help with focus. There are non-stimuant medication ( Intuitiv) which doesn't change the child's personality at all it just helps their brain with the area of focus.

In addition there are "low tech" ideas like already mentioned: index cards, line guide or using ones own finger to trace where they are in the written material. You should also be able to buy a line guide with overlay of color and a black line to place under the line in the book/material.

Or you could use more high tech options like many voice-to-text software programs/App. that can help read written print into auditory format so the reader can follow the print ( one method of learning ) and listen (a second type of learning) to the book. Many of these programs allow the reader to speed up the reading process or slow it down. These are great because you can choose a male voice or female voice. You should also be able to highlight the text yellow as the person reads the entire sentence. This can often help the reader follow along without losing their place. One example of this is an App called Easy Reader.

In addition there are services that offer books/materials in downloadable format like Bookshare and Learning Ally. The difference is Bookshare has more titles and can have both computer voices and Human voice where Learning Ally books are only recorded by a reader so they have less "volume" of books to offer the reader.

I know that Bookshare is free to the reader if they fax a copy of a 504 plan or IEP to them. It's a very easy process to qualify for the service.

Hope this helps gives you some suggestions to help with this issue.