8.2 Teaching Letter Sounds to Students with Dyslexia

Linda Farrell: What's that letter?

Reese: 'Y'

Linda Farrell: This is 'y', that's a 'v'.

Reese: /v/

Linda Farrell: (She points to the different letters that are typed on a piece of paper). Can you say 'v'? Okay. Look down at the letter and say 'v', point to it and say 'v'.

Reese: 'V'

Linda Farrell: What's that letter?

Reese: 'V'

Linda Farrell: Point to it and say 'v'.

Reese: 'V'

Linda Farrell: And that's that letter?

Reese: 'Z'

Linda Farrell: Okay.

Reese: They kind of ... so when you put it this way, it kind of looks like an 'n.'

Linda Farrell: It does kind of look like an 'n'. Yeah. It was very interesting working with Reese because he pointed out to me, very articulately, how 'v' and 'z' looks like an 'n' and 'v' and 'y' and they all ... it was exactly the letters that he was getting confused about and he could even tell us as a kindergartner why they were confusing. Okay, here we go. [Ms. Farrell shows Reese a card with a 'v' on it.]

Reese: 'Y'

Linda Farrell: You're telling me that's a 'y', and I'm going to tell you that's a 'v'.

Reese: 'V'

Linda Farrell: So can you say 'v'?

Reese: 'V'

Linda Farrell: What's at the bottom of the 'v'? A point? What's at the bottom of the 'v'?

Reese: Point ...

Linda Farrell: Okay ...

Reese: It's kind of, if you turn it this way and there's a line, it kind of looks like it would look like an 'a'.

Linda Farrell: It would!

Reese: It looks like a triangle and you put it this way in the hands.

Linda Farrell: Okay, but what letter is that? Is it ... ?

Reese: 'Y'

Linda Farrell: Okay, this ... is this 'a' or 'v'?

Reese: 'Y'

Linda Farrell: 'Y'? Oh, my gosh! I have to show you something. 'Y' looks like this. Okay. When I first started working with Reese, I was just trying to get him to know 'v' because my assessment had told me 'v' was confusing. I don't work on all of the confusing letters. I work on one or two confusing letters at a time. I work on one letter if he just can't remember the name, and when I first started working with Reese, I thought that he could not remember the name of 'v'. So, I get a stack of index cards. Maybe I get 12, maybe I get 14, maybe I get eight. Half of those will be the letter that we're working on. One letter. The other half will be letters that he's very confident with, so he doesn't have to think about those, so that I go, what's the name of this letter? What's the name of this letter? As I did that, it was real easy for him to say, 'v', 'v', 'v'. Let's do 'v'.

Reese: 'V'

Linda Farrell: What's the name of that letter?

Reese: 'V'

Linda Farrell: What's at the bottom of the 'v'?

Reese: Point ...

Linda Farrell: You got it. Say 'v'.

Reese: 'V'

Linda Farrell: Okay, what's that letter? [She points to several letters.]

Reese: 'S', 'v', 'e', 'v', 'c', 'b', 't', 'b', 'x'

Linda Farrell: Let's try these one more time. You think you can go through 'em again?

Reese: There's a lot of 'v's. [Linda laughs.]

Narrator: Once Ms. Ferrell saw that Reese knew the name of the letter 'v', then she worked on helping Reese discriminate between the letters 'v' and 'y'.

Linda Farrell: My job is to figure out a way to make them not confusing. For him, they all looked like they were the same shape, so I have to think, okay ... As I was working with him, I saw that he confused 'v' and 'y'. He'd already told me, oh, they both have these and they look, this has a point here and a point here. So my job is to get him to look at the letter and give him a way to verbalize the difference between the shapes of the letters. And I had never done this before with 'v' and 'y', but I looked and I said, well, 'v' has a point at the bottom and 'y' doesn't have a point at the bottom. This goes through my mind. 'Y' doesn't have a point at the bottom ... what's at the bottom is a line. Okay, so I'll make that difference. This is a 'v' ...

Reese: And 'y'

Linda Farrell: You got it. Now, there's a line at the bottom of 'y'. What's at the bottom of 'y'?

Reese: Line ...

Linda Farrell: A line. What's at the bottom of 'v'?

Reese: Point ...

Linda Farrell: Okay, say 'v' has a point.

Reese: 'V' has a point.

Linda Farrell: 'V'

Reese: 'V'

Linda Farrell: Say 'y' has a line.

Reese: 'Y' has a line.

Linda Farrell: 'Y'

Reese: 'Y'

Linda Farrell: Okay. Now point to the point and say 'v' has a point. 'V'.

Reese: 'V' has a point. 'V'.

Linda Farrell: Say, 'y' has a line.

Reese: 'Y' has a line. Line.

Linda Farrell: Say 'y' has a line. 'Y'.

Reese: 'Y' has a line. 'Y'.

Linda Farrell: Got to point to the line.

Reese: 'Y' has a line. 'Y'. 'V' has a point. 'V'.

Linda Farrell: Okay. Now we're going to ... every time I show you a letter, you have to say that and then you have to say it. Okay? You ready? Okay, here we go.

Reese: 'V' has a point. 'V'. 'V' has a point. 'V'. 'V has a point. 'V'. 'Y' has a line. 'Y'. 'Y' 'has a line. 'Y'. 'Y' has a line. 'Y' has a line. 'Y'.

Linda Farrell: Okay, now I want you to try saying them without saying 'v' has a point, 'v'. Just say the name of the letter, go slow. Okay?

Reese: Okay. I might feel quicker and quicker. 'Y'.

Linda Farrell: Okay. Now you have to look down and point and tell me.

Reese: 'Y'

Linda Farrell: What does 'y' have?

Reese: A line.

Linda Farrell: A line. What does 'v' ...

Reese: 'V'

Linda Farrell: It is! [Linda and Reese laugh.] I started in this lesson by just getting him to know 'v', but that wasn't going to work. He still wanted to call it a 'y' sometimes, so I needed to set up the contrast. And you saw that it worked as long as he said 'v' has a point, 'y' has a line, 'v' has a point, 'v' ... 'y' has a line, 'y'. I stopped the scaffolding too quickly because I went back and he looked at it and he just saw two lines and he went, 'y,' We need to get ... whenever we do a scaffold where we're comparing two letters that look similar and we are saying this one has a point at the bottom, this one has a line. He has to do that enough where it is automatic for him to say it and know that letter and he has to look at it ... because what we want him to do is, subliminally, when he stops saying it, being, looking at that and thinking it, and then eventually he doesn't have to go through the thinking 'v' has a point, it just automatically becomes 'v'. Two high fives!

Reese: I missed one ...

Linda Farrell: Let's do another one then! Once he got good at 'y' and 'v', just those two contrasting, then I would put three 'y's, three 'v's and six letters that he already knows so that he would have to think. We're making it just incrementally more difficult for him to have to remember until he just automatically looks at that litter and it's a 'v' and that one's a 'y', and it does happen. Sometimes it happens with practice 25 times. Sometimes it happens with practice 250 times, and sometimes it's 1,000 times, but it will happen. Two high fives. That was really, really good.

Linda Farrell: Do you ever get your 'b's' and 'd's' mixed up? Sometimes? Well, let's see if we can't fix that. Aiko confuses 'b's' and 'd's'. She's in the second grade and it's going to get in the way of her reading. So, we have to fix that problem. Lots of children confuse 'b's' and 'd's'. They look alike. It's a ball and a stick, so we know we have to straighten that out because that's going to hurt your reading. There are lots of words with 'b's' and 'd's'. We're going to work on fixing that. So, we're going to learn about our 'b' hand. Have you ever used your 'b' hand? They have a 'b' hand, their 'b' hand looks like a 'b'. Here's the circle, here's the line. (She holds up her left hand, index finger up and makes a fist with her other fingers so her hand looks like a 'b'.) And we teach them to not guess and to slow down and compare your hand to the letter. This is your 'b' hand.

Okay? So I'm going to put this little rubber band on you so you can remember which one's your 'b' hand. (She places a small rubber band around AIko's left wrist.) So which one's your 'b' hand?

Aiko: This one.

Linda Farrell: This one. Okay. I don't tell a kindergartner, a first grader or a second grader, it's your left hand because they don't know which one's their left hand. Sometimes I don't even know which one's my left hand. When we first teach it, we put something on their hand, we might put a sticker. I put a rubber band on Aiko's hand so that when I say, where's your 'b' hand she's got something that reminds her ... three lessons she won't need the rubber band anymore. She'll know what it is. Some kids get it right away. Would you put your 'b' hand up like this and make a fist and then put your finger up. And that is your 'b' hand.

And I'm going to show you why it's your 'b' hand. Go like this. Put this down here. And this letter is a 'b'. And your hand looks like this letter. (Miss Farrell has Aiko put her 'b' hand next to a big typed letter 'b' on a paper so she can see that they look alike.) Can you see that? We have the circle right here. Where's the circle on the letter? Point to the circle on the letter. (Aiko points to the circle of the 'b' on the paper.) And where's the circle on your hand? (Aiko points to the circle of the 'b' on her hand.) Yeah, right there. Where's the stick on the letter? Show me the stick on your finger. (Aiko points to the stick of the 'b' on the paper.) This is your 'b' hand because the stick is on the same side of the circle as your finger. (Ms. Farrell points to the stick on Aiko's 'b' hand and the stick on the image of the 'b'.) So, your finger and the stick are on the same side of the circle. Lots of kids get 'b's' and 'd's' mixed up. Kindergarten, first and second grade — does not mean that they have dyslexia. Students who have dyslexia have phonological processing issues. They do not differentiate sounds easily. Their problems are primarily related to phonological awareness. 'B/d' is about shapes. That is not about sounds. Will you put your 'b' hand by the 'b'? Yep. And is your finger on the same side of the circle as the stick or on a different side of the circle? Look at me.

Aiko: The same side.

Linda Farrell: The same side, yeah. Let's go down here. Is this a 'b' or a 'd'?

Aiko: 'B'.

Linda Farrell: Okay. And when you answer, I want you to look down here and compare it. Here's what you did. You went (Ms. Farrell looks up at the ceiling) ... well you're not going to figure it out unless you look and you compare. Okay? So you have to look and say, "oh, I can tell." So is that a 'b' or a 'd'?

Narrator: Ms. Ferrell's explicit lesson about recognizing the shape of the letter 'b' will take some time to sink in for Aiko. And there's a common habit she'll need to deal with. When Aiko is working on a identifying a letter, she often looks up to think, looking away from the letter.

Linda Farrell: The answer to what is an incorrect letter or an incorrect word is in the print. And we have to teach Aiko to keep her eyes on the print ... on the words when she's reading or the letters. I've worked with many kids that have the same difficulty. And I'll say, keep your eyes on the words ... and they can't do it because their habit is so strong that they can't try to do what I'm asking them to do and remember to keep their eyes down. So, we just practice keeping your eyes down. We're going to practice looking down here. Okay? So I'm going to ask you a question and you can't look up until I go like this.(Ms. Farrell lifts then taps her fist on the table.) Okay? So you keep looking down. Don't look up, look down, look down, look down. Look down. (Thumps fist.) Now you can look up. Okay, let's try it again. Look down. Look down, look down. Look down.

Narrator: Eventually, AIko will need to have images of words stored in her brain. This is critical to the immediate word recognition necessary for fluent reading. When students say a word without looking at it, they miss opportunities to develop those images.

Linda Farrell: So, hold your hand up here. (Ms. Farrell and Aiko put their hands on their chests.) Okay, so I'm going to go 'a' because I don't need my 'b' hand, but do I need my 'b' hand for that letter? (Ms. Farrell is pointing to a piece of paper with letters of the alphabet typed on it.)

Aiko: Uhm? (She shakes her head, no.)

Linda Farrell: Yes, I do because that's a 'b' or 'd'. So I have to put my 'b' hand. And let me see, is that a 'b' or a 'd'? Which one do you think? Oh, where are you going to look down?

Aiko: Down

Linda Farrell: Yes. Okay. Is that a 'b' or a 'd'?

Aiko: 'B'

Linda Farrell: Let's try that. Put your 'b' hand next to that. (Ms. Farrell points to a 'd'.) Okay. Is your finger on the same or a different side?

Aiko: Different.

Linda Farrell: Different. So is that 'b' or a 'd'?

Aiko: 'D'

Linda Farrell: Yes. And we're going to keep looking down. Remember, you don't get to look up until I stomp (she taps the table with her fist). Okay? So, now I want you, we're going to go just right to here. Okay? So watch me, 'a', 'd,' 's', 'b'. (Miss Farrell holds her hand to her chest except when she is putt her 'b' hand or 'd' hand by the corresponding letter), You do it. Okay? Put your hand up here for the 'a'. Okay, do it.

Aiko: 'A', 'd,' 's', 'b'.

Linda Farrell: Okay, now see how far away your hand is? You got to go like this. (Ms. Farrell places Aiko's hand closer to the letter 'd'.) And you know where you looked when you read? You looked at me. But where are you supposed to be looking?

Aiko: Here?

Linda Farrell: Yep, at the letter. Okay, so we did those four. You do these four.

And this is isolated practice. I see lots of teachers who use a 'b' and 'd' hand or a 'b' hand, but they only do it when the kid misses a word. So, "Oh, you read "bog" is "dog". Use your 'b' hand. You don't have to use your 'b' hand. If it's not "bog", it's "dog"." We've got to have isolated practice to rewire the brain to stop guessing and start looking. And that's what we did with Aiko. Aiko has pretty significant 'b/d' issues. With this kind of practice. She could solve her 'b/d' issues, I believe, in three to four weeks if we did this every day.

Aiko: 'B'

Linda Farrell: You got it? Do you think you can do 10 in a row?

Aiko: No.

Linda Farrell: I think you can! Let's try it! Okay.