4 Types of Struggling Readers

4 Portraits of Dyslexia
How do these connect to the Cluster Analysis?

Think about the areas of SMV – plus P.

Pragmatic (knowing about purposes or functions of reading)
S - Syntactic: (knowing about language)
M - Semantic: (knowing about words and the world)

V - Grapho-phonemic: (knowing about print)

Structure, Meaning and Visual and also the type of disability a learner has
struggled with in their schooling.
V- Phonics, Concepts about print, Structural Analysis
and Alphabetic Principle, Phonemic Awareness and Phonological
Awareness, Cipher, Decoding and visual mediums.

S- Also the Linguistic Knowledge, Language and

English language, fluency, syntax, oral language.
M – Is the use of Comprehension, Prior Knowledge, Background
Knowledge, Illustrations, Vocabulary and Semantics.
P – Pragmatics is the use of knowing about purposes or functions of reading) – Using context
of the story and the cues within the text. Purposes and functions of language and the socialization
aspects and or motivational aspects of the reader and how they feel in the reading setting.
Scientists at Yale University have identified two reading disabilities that account for why
some children compensate for impaired ability but others struggle to read throughout
their lives.
It's a finding that demonstrates the need for early intervention reading programs for
children, says one of the study's authors, G. Reid Lyon, PhD, a psychologist and chief
of the Child Development and Behavior Branch of the National Institute of Child Health
and Human Development at the National Institutes of Health. Also these two areas
 affect the readers’ auditory, visual and attentional habits and due to the two types can
be aided but one may take more time than the other.

The study indicates the two reading disabilities/dyslexias are:

 A primarily inherent disability in which poor readers form alternate neural pathways to
decode words leading to accurate word recognition. While these compensated dyslexics
continue to read slowly, their cognitive capabilities allow them to comprehend text.

 A more environmentally influenced disability in which poor readers rely on memory

for whole words rather than decoding strategies, leading to persistent difficulties in
reading accuracy, reading fluency and comprehension. This type of reading difficulty is
more common in disadvantaged schools and communities, says Lyon.

From these two areas we get 4 basic areas within SMV

1. Portrait of a Struggling Reader: Aaron

Aaron is a serious and quiet little boy. He sits at the kitchen table with a book from school
looking like he's ready to go into battle. He hunches down over the page, pointing to each word
so with such force that his index finger is white at the tip. It's painful for his mom, Rona, to listen
to him as he labors over each sound:

"Iiiii aaaa aaaa, aaaa, aaaannnn ssss ssssuuu – I mean, ssss ssss uuuu ttttt. Tttt. Tttt."

As he incorrectly reads the first sentence, "I am so tired," his voice trails off in frustration, and
he sounds indeed, like he is tired — tired of working so hard.

Rona says gently, "Just five more minutes, O.K.?"

Aaron's shoulders slump as he turns the page and tackles the next set of words with the same
intensity, and unfortunately, the same trouble. Rona comes over to try to help on the word bed.

"Sound it out, Aaron."

"Bbbbbb, bbbb, bbbb, aaaa, aaaa. Bbbb, bbbb, aaaa, bbbb. Bant. Ban. Bbbb, aaaa…."

Rona doesn't know how to help him, because it seems like he works so hard. She's always
believed that effort was what made the difference — and Aaron's two older sisters could achieve
anything they put their minds to — but reading just wasn't coming for Aaron. In fact, Rona was
pretty sure this was the same book he brought home yesterday. Why did it seem like every word
was a new battle all over again? And what could she do to help him?
What is Aaron struggling with?

Aaron's primary struggle is with alphabetics

Alphabetics includes phonemic awareness, knowledge of letter/sound relationships, and the
ability to apply knowledge of sounds to decode unfamiliar words.

Aaron doesn't know his letter/sound relationships, which means that he struggles when he tries
to sound out words. For example, he makes the /n/ sound when he sees the letter m in am, and
the /a/ sound when he sees the letter e in bed. Struggling with alphabetics is the most common
reason for reading difficulties, and can cause problems in other areas. For example, you can
already see from Aaron's case that although he works hard, he doesn't enjoy reading. More
frustrating experiences will add up to a problem with motivation for Aaron.

When children struggle with alphabetics, they often benefit from phonological training and/or
phonics instruction.

Target - Alphabetic principle and phonological awareness, and how to help children who struggle
with alphabetics.

2. Portrait of a Struggling Reader:

Felicia

Felicia is one of those kids that her teacher, Laura, can't quite figure out. When Felicia is reading
aloud, she usually manages to get almost all of the words right — often on her first attempt.
However, she gets each word after a very long pause: Laura can see Felicia moving her lips as
she tests out each and every word before she says it aloud.

Laura had all her students read the same text aloud to her one-on-one. The record of Felicia's
oral reading showed 95% accuracy – technically in the top third of the class – but it took Felicia
three times longer than the lowest reader in the class to finish the story. "Once… upon… a…
time… there… lived… a… giant… the… giant… was… tall… a… boy…"

Felicia's reading sounded like the puttering of an old jalopy.

When Laura's other students read, they read in phrases, or sentences, or whole stories. They
read fast enough for a listener to follow the story line. But no matter what Felicia reads, she
always reads word by word, and it's always painfully slow.
Laura had never actually seen Felicia finish any book she'd started. Every day, her students read
for 10 minutes independently before lunch. Every day, Felicia picks up a new book and reads the
first few pages. When Laura calls the students to line up for lunch, Felicia immediately shuts her
book and put it back on the shelf, while the other children either bring their books with them or
leave their books open on their desks so they can pick up where they left off after lunch. The
next day, it's a different book, and just the first few pages again.

Laura's not sure exactly what the problem is, and she doesn't know what she can do to help
Felicia.

What is Felicia struggling with?

Felicia's primary struggle is with fluency.

Fluency includes the speed and accuracy with which a child reads, and the expression and
phrasing of their oral reading.

Felicia doesn't read the way she talks. She treats connected texts as lists of words to identify.
You can tell she is struggling with fluency because she reads so slowly.

Struggling with fluency is often a by product of struggling with alphabetics — when a child does
not have efficient decoding skills, her reading is necessarily more effortful and slow. Difficulties
with fluency can lead to difficulties with comprehension. For example, as Felicia listens to herself
read, she may not be able to "hear" a story because she is so focused on reading each word.

When children struggle with fluency, they often benefit from repeated readings in instructional or
easy level books, and feedback from a skilled teacher in guided oral reading situations. Felicia is
not getting this repeated exposure to books because she picks up a new book every day. For
Felicia, reading the same book three days in a row would be more valuable independent practice
than reading three different books in three different days.

Read more about this area of difficulty and how to help children who struggle with
fluency: Target the Problem: Fluency.

3. Portrait of a Struggling Reader:

Charlie
Charlie's the most talkative little kid his tutor, Jeff, has ever seen. Every week they meet he has
plenty to talk about — telling him about the baseball game he won, or his favorite video game,
or how much he wants to get a dog. But, whenever it comes time to talk about the story he just
read, Charlie clams up. Charlie's mind seems to wander while he reads, so Jeff decided to choose
books especially for him.

One day, Jeff picked out a book about dog training he thought Charlie would really like. Charlie
read the book aloud with no problems, stopping to comment on a few of the pictures — "See,
that's exactly what kind of dog I want … I want a black dog, not white … This dog is tiny!"

Pleased with the choice of book, Jeff said, "So, do you think you could train a dog?"

Charlie looked at him quizzically and said, "What do you mean? I don't have a dog, remember?"

Jeff smiled, "Oh, I know that! I meant, in the book, what did they say about training?"

Charlie turned back through the pages of the book — although every page described how to train
dogs to obey a different command, he couldn't seem to find what he was looking for. Finally, he
turned back to the first page and reread the first sentence aloud, "Trainers know you can teach
an old dog new tricks."

Jeff thought maybe his question was too vague. Instead, he asked, "What did you learn about
dog training from the book, Charlie?"

Charlie looked again at that first page, "Umm, training is for old dogs?"

Frustrated, Jeff wasn't sure what to do next. He didn't think the book was too hard for Charlie —
because he read the whole thing with no problems —and he knew that the book interested him
— Charlie even asked if he could bring it home to show his mom the pictures. Why, then, did he
always have such trouble getting Charlie to talk about the books he read?

What is Charlie struggling with?

Charlie's primary struggle is with comprehension

Comprehension combines the use of background knowledge and vocabulary with strategies for
constructing and monitoring meaning in a text.

Charlie doesn't monitor his comprehension when he reads. He doesn't recognize when he's
"getting it" and when he's not.

Although he makes connections to the text by calling up his background knowledge (for example,
he evaluates how the dog in the picture compares to the one he wants), these connections seem
to distract him from the core meaning in the book, rather than help him focus on the core
meaning. Charlie didn't even notice the book was about training because he was so focused on
dogs in general.

When asked to tell a bit about the book, Charlie had to return all the way back to the beginning,
because he hadn't been monitoring the meaning along the way.
When children struggle with comprehension, they often benefit from direct comprehension
strategy instruction, vocabulary instruction, and small group discussions of text. Often, the
strategies for comprehension can be introduced to students using texts that are read aloud. Jeff,
Charlie's tutor, could have read the training book aloud and stopped after every few pages to
discuss with Charlie what he thought was happening at each stopping point.

Read more about this area of difficulty and how to help children who struggle with
comprehension: Target the Problem: Comprehension.

4. Portrait of a Struggling Reader:

Molly

Molly's father, John, was at his wit's end. Molly's teacher had sent home a note saying that Molly
was misbehaving during reading time — and frankly, John wasn't surprised. He'd fought enough
battles with Molly at home to know that she would do anything she could to get out of having to
read.

At first, John hadn't been too concerned. After all, kids will be kids, and he understood not
wanting to do homework — after all, John didn't like bringing his work home either.

But Molly's teacher wrote a comment on her report card two weeks earlier that Molly wasn't
making enough progress in reading and she needed more practice at home. The problem was,
when Molly was supposed to be reading in her room, more often than not, she was making
towers and ramps with the books instead.

Right after the report card came home, John tried out a reward system to get her reading —
every time Molly read five books, he took her out to McDonald's, her favorite place to eat.
However, she quickly started choosing from her infant brother's board book collection (the one
about shapes only had five words in it total!) in order to read through five books quickly. This
was not exactly what John had in mind!

Then he tried withholding television until Molly read a book each afternoon after school. But
Molly put up such a fuss that this quickly became a miserable hour-long daily ritual, usually
ending in frustration when John had to give up and make the kids dinner.

And now she was giving her teacher a hard time! John thought about getting Molly a tutor, but
he didn't really know if it would help. What would help, he wondered?

What is Molly struggling with?

Molly's primary struggle is with motivation.
Motivation means maintaining a desire and interest in reading.

Molly sees reading as a chore to do — or rather, a chore to avoid doing at all costs! She used to
like reading with her father, but John doesn't read to her or with her anymore because he thinks
that she's too old now. Reading used to be a chance for Molly to spend time with her father, but
now reading means being lonely and bored in her room.

Difficulties with motivation often begin as difficulties in other areas. For example, if a child is
reading books that are always too difficult for him, reading won't be a rewarding experience.
However, in Molly's case, her lack of motivation could cause difficulties in other areas — she
didn't do as well on her report card because she hadn't gotten enough reading practice.

John is right to get involved, but rather than policing Molly's reading, he can be helping her
choose books that will pique her interests, and he can share reading with her again by reading
with Molly and talking about what they're reading.

When children struggle with motivation, they often benefit from instruction in choosing books
that are both engaging and appropriate and setting purposes for reading (for example, to get
information on a particular topic). Student choice in reading material is extremely important.
Children who struggle with motivation can benefit from social interactions about text (such as
peer book discussions) and learning experiences that relate to particular texts (such as using
"how to" books to perform a task).

Read more about this area of difficulty and how to help children who struggle with
motivation: Motivation.