I realize you may not have time to read this, but I've always appreciated your comments and knowledge about reading so I thought I'd get some input.In case you have time to respond, I'm sending this request. Based on the information provided by my student as well as his mom, I feel like I need to be right on target w/my goals b/c he may not hang in w/me. He seems discouraged about all things academic. Since I value your expertise, I'd appreciate any guidance you can provide. If you feel further testing is necessary, let me know about that, too.
I just tested a young man who is 16 yrs old and is having reading difficulties. His mother stated that they live in a very small town where everyone knows each other, and over the years she has requested
testing for her son. The "professionals" (who have been either family friends or relatives) always told her that he didn't need to be tested - "there's nothing wrong w/him; he's just lazy".
During the 2009-10 school year, the young man went to a private school where they provided some Linda Mood Bell programs, and his reading improved somewhat.
(I don't know about his testing b/c the parents are divorced, dad sent him to the school and has the LMB records). He currently attends public school, and will be in the 10th grade
this year. His mother reported that he starts off fine in a class but soon does nothing and just gets further behind.
He stated "I start working, loose intrest and just quit. Then I cant pass the class". This young man's desire is to be a fire fighter - "I feel like good give me a talent for it so that what I want to do".
(Note: his father is dyslexic). During the assessment, the student made several comments that led me to think he may have ADD w/o hyperactivity (inattentive type).
Here are his test results:
z-screener: At least 90% correct at all levels, except for level 13 (67%) He told me that the z's were very confusing so he had to think of other rhyming words to figure them out (did it rather quickly).
TOWRE: Sight Word Efficiency s.s. 80
Phonemic Decoding Ef. s.s. .
Total Word Reading Efficiency s.s. <46
Total Word Reading Efficiency %-ile <1
CELF-4
Receptive vocab s.s. 6
Expressive vocab s.s. 7
Recalling Sentences s.s. 9
Understanding Spoken Paragraphs s.s. 9
CTOPP
Phonological Awareness s.s. 82
Phonological Memory s.s. 79
Rapid Naming s.s. 82
GORT-4 s.s. 91 (Rate and Accuracy were both scaled scores of 7; Fluency was 8 and Comprehension was 9)
On the G-E Test of Coding Skills, he achieved at least 80% mastery on all basic syllable types, but scored around 70% on words with more than 2 syllables.
I didn't administer a formal writing test or a test of spelling. He exhibited 7 spelling errors on the paragraph I asked him to write about one of his firefighting adventures.
Examples:atmarich for automatically; mad for made; shure for sure; deparmen for department)
Thanks a million and God's blessings to you!
Melanie
1 comment
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Sandie Barrie-Blackley Melanie~ Sorry for the delay but I am snowed under.
I'm not sure exactly what your question is about this young man. He certainly has a very significant reading disorder ( Total Word Reading Efficiency: %-ile <1...yikes! )..... related to phonological awareness. phonological memory and rapid naming deficits as shown by the CTOPP scores..
This is not a pattern of a "lazy" person but a bright person with a neurolinguistic impairment (i.e., dyslexia). His comment about the Z-Screener speaks to how bright he must be.... and how he is anything but lazy:
<....the z's were very confusing so he had to think of other rhyming words to figure them out (did it rather quickly). >
He need O-G treatment with a provision for intensive (daily) practice and text-to-speech and speech-to-text assistive technologies. See the sample report on the Lexercise Forums for some ideas for how to present that.
Good luck.
Sandie