Beyond Phonics
There are some pupils who still find it hard to read, despite quality-first teaching of phonics.
While teaching phonics is an effective way to teach many children to read, by itself, it doesn't reach all children.
"We should accept that some children are harder to teach, and we need to work harder to reach those children."
The Reading Framework 2023, page 125
If a child still struggles with reading after high quality phonics teaching, you need to go beyond phonics to teach them. These children can be reached by teaching them all of the other skills needed to read.
1. Phonological Awareness
Phonological Awareness is being able to hear individual sounds in words. For example, hearing that cat and bat rhyme, that bat and ball both start with the same sound.
This skill is taught in Letters and Sounds Phase 1, however not all children are developmentally ready at age four. Therefore, some children will have revisit it later.
Research has shown that children who start school with poor phonological awareness leave school as poor readers unless they do a phonological awareness intervention.
Dyslexia Gold improves phonological awareness though rhyming and other multi-sensory activities.
2. Phonemic Awareness
Phonemic Awareness is part of phonological awareness. It is the ability to manipulate phonemes in words. For example, hearing and understanding that it is the middle sound that is different between hop and hope.
Phonemic manipulation activities, like those contained in Dyslexia Gold, improve phonemic awareness.
3. Eye Control
To read easily you need to be able to focus both eyes on the same letter, and track across the page. People with convergence insufficiency struggle to do this.
Dyslexia Gold improves convergence though engaging 3D games.
4. Abstract Words
Abstract words are words that can't be visualized, like the, is, it, will and be. Some children think in pictures, not words, and so struggle to read abstract words.
For these children to read abstract words they need to be able to visualize them. Dyslexia Gold contains illustrated pictures for the most frequently used abstract words.
Phonological Awareness - The Science
Reading is done in the brain. But which parts? MRI scans show that dyslexic people use different parts of the brain to read than non-dyslexic people do.
MRI scans have found differences in the brain between people with and without dyslexia.
Numerous scientific studies have proven brain plasticity – that the brain can be changed by practising and repeating tasks.
Scientific studies have proven that if children with dyslexia repeat activities, which activate the nerual pathways that fluent readers use, they become more fluent.
Dyslexia Gold contains these activities which have been proven to activate the neural pathways needed to read fluently: phonological awareness, phoneme manipulation, segmenting, blending and auditory discrimination.
Literacy Gold
Dyslexia Gold's catch-up reading intervention limits distraction, and reaches the pupils that phonics leaves behind. Personalised, bespoke lessons proceed at a suitable pace for each pupil, closing learning gaps.
On average reading improves by 12 months after playing Literacy Gold for a term.