[senco-forum] Ruth Miskin's Fresh Start

Or perhaps, in some cases there is an actual block which it takes a trained
eye to spot?  No teaching system works if there is a block.  Here is a list
of some I have come across:

   - glue ear/hearing/auditory processing - solution Dr, sound therapy,
   strategies

   - vision issues - eye test, behaviroual optometric test and possibly
   then visiontherapy and/or glasses

   - ADHD - solution - Ritalin - have seen this work wonders for 3
   children in past 19 years (not pro drugs but when all else has been tried
   and the dr knows his/her stuff...).

   - sensory-motor issues - assessment and therapy by an occupational
   therapist

   - an inability to discriminate rhyme - solution - work exclusively on
   rhyme until the kid gets it then teach word families etc...

   - an inability to transfer phonic knowledge from words taught to other
   words with the same patterns - solution - teach nonwords until the pattern
   transfer was facilitated

   - a difficulty with the sequencing of letters within words - solution
   - to arrange words in alphabetical order by 2nd, 3rd or 4th letter

   - an over-reliance on the shape of the word, the context of the
   language and a lack of applying the phonic skills carefully taught and
   firmly in place - solution - used multi-fonted text to break down reliance
   eon visual skills which were learning to a very poor accuracy of decoding
   and to move the phonics skills away from just learned to being applied.
   This got terrific, measurable and separately verified results in reading
   accuracy, reading speed and comprehension.

   - Short-term memory - could not retain ideas long enough to get them
   onto paper despite excellent ability and preparation of work - solution -
   Omega 3 supplement and use of laptop to write.  Touch typing, Dragon
   Dicatate Naturally Speaking

   - a difficulty to retain and apply learned phonics - solution -
   Acceleread Accelewrite shifted this boy's single word reading level from the
   1st percentile to the 24th.  His nonword reading was already there but he
   wasn't applying this skill.  Follow up work involved lots of phonically
   controlled dictation of text using text to speech software (Write:Outloud)

Poor old Miskin is getting quite a bashing!  Miskin is fabulous for those
children who are going to learn given good teaching.  The 3% need trained
help.  Martin Turner advised that Miskin is top of the line in reading
schemes.  I agree... but do not like the way she splits some words into
syllables as she does not allow for open syllables such as mo in motor.  But
that is a minor point - real hair splitting!

In my experience, any system that teaches grapheme to phoneme
correspondences and vice versa plus blending and segmenting is likely to be
a winner for most children, as the Rose review clearly states.

And if this system is failing the child then teach differently to take their
needs into account - whatever it takes to get success.  The children's
responses are great indicators.

When the horse is dead the best method is to dismount.

Philippa

On 10/26/07, Jeff Hughes <jeff at box42.com> wrote:
>
> Perhaps we have a variant on the Pareto (80/20) rule at work here with the
> "freshness" of the approach and the beliefs of the users being the key
> factors?
>
> .... and if it works use it but monitor progress to identify when you need
> to switch strategies!
>
> Jeff
>
>
> >>>>
> ===============================================
>
> Jeff Hughes, Chartered Educational Psychologist
> Chartered IT Professional   Chartered Scientist
> Principal Practitioner       psychologist.co.uk
> Box42 Ltd          Email: jh at psychologist.co.uk
> ===============================================
> >>>>
>
> Disclaimer:
>
> This e-mail, and attachments, are intended for the named recipient(s).
> All information contained here is privileged and confidential.
>
> If you receive this message in error, contact the sender immediately
> and permanently delete the message and all address information.
>
> Do not keep, copy or share this information unless you are certain
> you do so for legitimate reasons. Thank you for your co-operation.
>
>
> >From computer at Box42 Ltd, St Helens. WA10 3BF  Tel: 08453 700 442
> Reg Office: WA10 3BJ39 UK  Company No: 2904434  Vat: GB 643 7211 52
>
>
>
>
>
>