How to Teach Reading Skills to LD Secondary Students

Secondary students with LD can learn reading skills

Teaching reading skills to children with learning disabilities can be a challenging but rewarding experience. According to the Learning Disabilities Association of America, 4 to 6 percent of all students are classified as having a specific learning disability. These figures do not even include the number of students who have never been diagnosed. Some things to look for in a student with a suspected learning disability can include problems following directions, a short attention span, difficulties reading out loud, their being frequently disorganized, reversing letters (especially p, b, q, and d), restlessness, poor memorization skills, and poor coordination. Diagnosing a learning disability and working hard to teach the student reading skills to overcome it can lead to academic success.

Things You'll Need

• time patience energy parental involvement teacher involvement student involvement evaluations books that the student loves

Instructions

How to teach reading skills to secondary students with learning disabilities

1. You will need to know the specific learning disability that the student has before you can do anything else. If the student all ready has a known disability, then you have a place where you can start. If they have never been diagnosed, a conference needs to be called that will involve the parents, teacher, and a guidance counselor. In this conference, the focus should be on the child, their struggles, and a game plan to figure out what is going on. The guidance counselor will be able to help set up testing to see what kind of learning disability the student has.

2. Once a diagnosis is confirmed, you will need to do as much research on that disability as possible. Many of the common disabilities among secondary students that interfere with reading skills include dyslexia, a vision problem, and auditory and visual processing disabilities. Each one signifies a different method to teach the student, so it is important to learn as much as you can about the particular disability and its components in order to be the most effective in helping the student.

3. When the research is done, teachers, parents, counselors, and even the student, will need to come together as a team for an Individualized Education Plan (IEP) meeting. An IEP presents the goals that the team has come up with for the student's school year and identifies the plan and resources they have in place to meet those goals. All children who have learning disabilities are eligible for an IEP under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA).

4. Secondary students with learning disabilities often feel as though they are not intelligent and that books are a waste of time. The biggest challenge you will face is to convince them that neither is true. Most students with a learning disability are on average intellectually equivalent to their peers. Be patient and give the student frequent encouragement. You will need to be available and willing to spend the extra time with the student to tutor him in the area in which he is struggling.

5. All secondary students, regardless if they have a learning disability or not, should spend at least 30 minutes a day reading. It can even be something that he enjoys like a basketball magazine. Doing this one small thing can improve reading skills dramatically over the course of one year, and it encourages the student to read other materials as well.

Tips & Warnings

• Figure out what kind of genre the student likes and frequently point out books and magazines of that sort. You can remind the student of famous people with learning disabilities. Walt Disney, Tom Cruise, and Cher are all dyslexics.

• Follow the IEP to the letter. If you are a teacher, you can get into trouble if you do not.

References

• Learning Disabilities Association of America
• Helpguide
• IEP Information

Resources

• IDEA information