Homeschooling Dyslexia: Lessons from 20 Years of Trial and Triumph
A Special Treat Today.
Many parents choose to homeschool because public schools aren’t meeting their children's unique needs. Among the most common learning challenges is dyslexia, affecting approximately 20% of children in the United States, impacting their reading abilities and everything that follows.
Today, I’m thrilled to share a guest post by Jessica Kulynych, the writer behind An Unexpected Difficulty. Jessica has successfully homeschooled her three children, all of whom have dyslexia. In this post, she offers invaluable advice on managing dyslexia including her favorite curriculum recommendations to help your child.
I hope her insights inspire and empower you on your homeschooling journey.
If you know a child who has dyslexia, consider sharing this post & be sure to check out Jessica’s substack HERE!
Homeschooling Dyslexia: Dos and Don’ts by Jessica Kulynych
When I left my academic job to care for my young daughter, I had no idea she was dyslexic. I certainly never imagined I would have three dyslexic children. I spent almost twenty years homeschooling. Over those years of both joy and sacrifice, I learned more than I ever wanted about dyslexia and literacy and the reading brain. Homeschooling was an enormous gift for my children, who all went on to be successful in high school and college and career. The lessons of loving and educating dyslexic children are vast (you can read more about the roller coaster world of parenting dyslexic children on my free newsletter), but here are a few of my most important take-aways.
Don’t Waste Time
We homeschoolers often like to buck the trends, give our kids a true childhood, not get caught up in the competitive academic rat race. But reading is different. It’s absolutely essential in a literate society and if your child is going to struggle it is easier to remediate if you start early. Kids who are not dyslexic will take off. They will not be harmed by a few daily lessons in pre-k and k. The kids who are dyslexic have no time to waste. Learning to read will take longer for them. If you think your child might be struggling, you are right!! Don’t waste time.
Do Get a Dyslexia Specific Program
It has become popular in the “science of reading” world to say that the method for teaching dyslexic kids to read is no different from what most children need. This is only partially true. In my years of homeschooling, I went through many, many reading programs. I only understood the difference when I started using Barton. Other structured literacy programs appropriate for typical readers may be insufficient for a dyslexic child. The components are the same, but a dyslexia remediation program will be slower paced, more direct, more explicit, more systematic, and include more spaced practice than is needed for a typical reader. A dyslexia program will integrate decoding and encoding (reading and spelling), syllabication and morphology (how to break words into both syllables and units of meaning) across the entire program. It will be sequential and multisensory, incorporating seeing, saying, sounding and writing. A good structured literacy program can be Orton-Gillingham based, but that does not make it the same as an Orton-Gillingham tutor or dyslexia-specific remediation program.
Do Focus on Vocabulary and Content
Content knowledge and vocabulary learned in other subjects are an essential part of learning to read. Make absolutely sure your dyslexic child is getting copious amounts of sophisticated literature and history and science and geography. Read aloud as much as you can. We always had an audio book going in the car. We had literature read-aloud during lunch. I read aloud from history and science texts all the way through middle school. Dyslexic children should not fall behind grade level content expectations simply because they take longer to learn to read. This is what sets homeschooling apart for dyslexic children. Few schools have the resources to provide content read aloud across the curriculum. It was exhausting for me, but it might have been the most impactful part of homeschooling for my children.
Do Accommodate and Document
You are the planning team for your child. You can give them extra time, read instructions, scribe, and allow them to type. You can alter assignments, spread them out over more days, reduce homework, give more breaks. These accommodations are important for dyslexic kids because their brains are working harder than the brains of neurotypical children. Keep a record of all the accommodations your child needs and uses. When my 17-year-old daughter was fighting for accommodations on her SAT and AP tests, I had to provide The College Board a detailed description of tutoring, curriculum and accommodations from her elementary years. If your child wants to attend high school or college you will need these records.
Don’t Forget, Writing and Spelling Can Be Very Hard
Even after your dyslexic child is reading, they may still struggle with writing. Writing can create cognitive overload in a dyslexic child, leading to messy handwriting and very brief sentences. Looking at a child’s writing is one of the best ways to diagnose dyslexia. I tried oodles of stand-alone spelling programs with my children. None of them worked. We did copywork and classical roots. It didn’t help with spelling. Be patient. One of my dyslexic children improved with time, another did not.
Do Neuropsychological Testing
A full neuropsychological evaluation is worth the cost. As a homeschooler, you don’t have years of IEP or 504 plans to document your child’s struggle. When my first child was young, I didn’t test because I thought I just needed to get her reading. But dyslexia is a neurobiological difference. It is not “cured” by learning to read. Your child still has a dyslexic brain even after they learn to read. Testing is your ticket to high school and college success. If your child ever wants to attend school, you will be more likely to get the accommodations they need if you have a diagnosis. Testing also gives you a window into your child’s strengths. Because reading and writing are such an integral part of education, it can feel like everything is a struggle for the dyslexic child. But these kids have real strengths and it’s important that they and you and everyone around them know that.
Do Nourish Success
Reading and writing are hard for dyslexic kids. They will continue to be hard even after remediation. Spend a good chunk of each day or week doing things your dyslexic kid excels at. Book club, science fair, music, art, building, racing, inventing, joking, singing, daydreaming, creating, whatever they love fill their tank with the experience of success. Don’t let them be defined by their struggle. Homeschooling is perfect for this.
Don’t Forget Dyslexic Students are Different From One Another
The typical reading circuit is like a smooth path through the wilderness. Dyslexia is every other route. Through the bushes, across the creek, down the ravine, over the hill, there are lots of ways to get to your destination. Dyslexic brains do not all look alike, and dyslexic children can have a variety of different struggles. One child may struggle with sounds and another with fluency. Some have ADD and some don’t. Some are sensitive and others are not. There is a wide spectrum of dyslexic strengths and struggles and if you are lucky enough to have more than one dyslexic child they will amaze you with their variety.
Resources: A Short List
I could make many curriculum recommendations, but here are a few that top my list.
Curriculum
Barton Reading and Spelling Program – I didn’t get this program until I realized my third child was struggling. I wish I had used it with all three. Barton is designed for the individual parent to tutor their own child. You don’t need Orton-Gillingham training to use it. All the training you need is included with each level.
Cursive First – I taught cursive handwriting to all three of my children starting in second grade. This simple program not only teaches students how to form individual letters but links writing and phonics by having students practice writing and speaking twenty-six multi-letter phonograms.
Writing with Skill – This program was a lifesaver for my dyslexic-dysgraphic second child. It breaks expository writing down into its essential components and, rather than assuming a child will figure it out on their own, explicitly teaches all the micro-skills (outlining, summary, description, transition, introduction, conclusion, dialogue, literary criticism and figurative language and so much more) that are a part of academic writing. My daughter, who cried when she had to write a single paragraph, finished the course writing a beautiful seven-page essay. The online course version of the curriculum at The Well-Trained Mind Academy was fantastic. This child, who could not write at all in 7th grade, went on to excel in high school and college English.
Lively Latin – Foreign language is hard for many dyslexic kids but this Latin program was a hit with all three.
Dance Mat Typing – This silly little game-based typing program is great for young kids and mine remember it fondly even as young adults. Typing is crucial for dyslexic kids and this is a great way to get started.
Michael Clay Thompson grammar, vocabulary and poetics books. These delightful grammar and vocabulary books were a staple of our homeschool. My creative kids adored them. Combined with learning Latin, these books gave my children a solid foundation in grammar and sentence structure.
Holling C Holling books – These books are an uncategorizable mix of fiction and nonfiction, science, history, geography, art and story-telling, and perfectly fit the imaginative, wondrous minds of my dyslexic children. Like the dyslexic brain, they are genre-blending, outside the box, not-to-be-missed resources in a dyslexic homeschool.
Classic children’s literature – Wind in the Willows, Swallows and Amazons, The Five Children and It, The Secret Garden, Pippi Longstocking, The Hobbit, Anne of Green Gables… Listen to classic literature with rich vocabulary as much as you can! The sentences in these books are so much more complex and melodic than the cropped sentences of early chapter books. We listened to almost every book on this classic list, and they make up some of the most memorable moments of our homeschool years.
A dyslexic education can and should be an education rich in language and literature.
For more from Jessica, check out her substack An Unexpected Difficulty.
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