What is Literacy Tutoring?
“Just read with them at home and they’ll catch on.”
“All kids get it eventually!”
“They just need more time.”
“Just make flash cards.”
“They’re too young to worry about it yet.”
But…what if they don’t catch on? What if there is an undiagnosed learning difficulty?
Chances are, if you have a feeling that your child could use some help – then you’re probably right!
Early intervention is key. Research shows that intervention in Grade 4 takes four times as long as intervention in kindergarten, both due to brain development and an increasing amount of content as children age. Reading difficulties can be predicted with overwhelming accuracy as early as kindergarten and yet schools do not do universal screeners on students — why delay getting children the help that they need?
With qualified help by Grade 1, 90% of children will achieve grade-level reading ability. If intervention is delayed until Grade 4 or later, 75% of children will continue to struggle for the rest of their school career.
Don’t delay – I can help!
Does your child have trouble with reading? Is spelling causing frustration? Do their writing skills need improvement? No matter what their particular literacy need is, I can help!
Whereas traditional tutoring supports and reinforces classroom content, my approach is more that of a specialized literacy teacher. I plan individualized lessons for each student: building foundational skills, filling in gaps in knowledge, addressing problem areas, and advancing skills in order to achieve success in all areas of literacy.
Skills are taught in an explicit and systematic way with lots of chances for review in order to gain mastery. Whenever possible, skills will be taught integrated together and not in isolation.
I rarely teach “just” reading – full literacy is so much more!
My methods and activities are based on decades of research known as the Science of Reading.
This evolving body of research has clearly determined how the brain learns to read and what activities are the most beneficial. This research has shown the most effective ways to teach all children – even those with learning difficulties – to read. It has become a personal mission of mine to learn all I can about the reading brain and the most effective literacy practices that are backed by evidence.
“Every teacher deserves to know the Science of Reading, and every child deserves a teacher who knows it.”
Dr. Pamela Kastner
Specific lessons will be tailored to the unique needs of your child and may include any or all of the concepts below:
Phonemic Awareness: individual sounds, blending and segmenting sounds, manipulating sounds, etc.
Phonics: letter names and sounds, digraphs, vowel teams and diphthongs, blending and decoding skills, etc.
Fluency: automaticity, attending to punctuation, phrasing, expression, self-correction, inflection, appropriate rate, etc.
Spelling: phoneme-grapheme mapping, spelling generalizations, irregular words, suffixing conventions, etymology of words, etc.
Vocabulary: homophones and homographs, synonyms, antonyms, context clues, adjectives, nouns, verbs, using morphology, etc.
Morphology and Etymology: Latin and Greek roots, word history, prefixes, suffixes, inflectional endings, etc.
Comprehension: making predictions and inferences, using our schemas, asking questions, making connections, summarization, fact/opinion, cause/effect, main idea, etc.
Writing: proper letter formation, planning, drafting, revision, editing, syntax, sentence construction, punctuation, word choice, grammar, etc.
“Teaching reading IS rocket science.”
Dr. Louisa Moats
Sources:
- International Dyslexia Association – Universal Screening: K-2 Reading
- Reading Rockets – Is it a Reading Disorder or Developmental Lag?
