Dyslexia Intervention FAQs

A young girl with dyslexia learning new skills to improve her reading.

1. What resources are available to help families and caregivers understand dyslexia?

Local libraries, schools, and booksellers offer lots of resource books to help parents understand dyslexia and learn more about how to help children with reading difficulties. Many states also have dyslexia handbooks that explain how the state defines dyslexia and how eligibility for services is determined.

Organizations such as parent-led Decoding Dyslexia (www.decodingdyslexia.net) and Children of the Code (https://childrenofthecode.org) provide resources including interviews with experts and videos explaining dyslexia. The International Dyslexia Association also has resources for parents.

2. What resources can families and caregivers use to support students with dyslexia at home?

Providing an encouraging and judgment-free environment at home is crucial for supporting a child with dyslexia. This can sometimes be challenging, especially if parents have limited knowledge about the nature of dyslexia. Personal beliefs and cultural perspectives can also shape parents’ approach to supporting a child with dyslexia.

One simple but powerful thing parents can do is read aloud to the child consistently. It is best to start reading aloud when the child is young and to make it a habit. Parents can engage the child with the book by asking questions about the story or content. Choosing books on topics that interest older children can also encourage reading.

Audiobooks are another great resource. Parents can ask questions about the book or ask the child to make predictions to keep the child engaged in the story. Maintaining a regular routine and using checklists can help keep the child organized.

Parents should work closely with the school to make sure the child is getting the support and accommodations needed to succeed. Technology can make a huge difference for children with dyslexia. Look for features such as these:

spellcheck
speech recognition or text-to-speech
visual support for learning
instructional games and programs

When parents praise children for what they do right or for what they achieve, it can boost self-esteem. It is also important to provide opportunities for children to participate in a balance of activities—including those unrelated to reading.

3. Is there a severity scale on the TOD, or another means of distinguishing between students who should be in special education and those whose needs can be met in a general education classroom?

This is a two-part question. First, yes, there are “severity” scales on each of the three Tests of Dyslexia (TOD™)(now available) batteries. The TOD authors use the terms “risk” or “probability” (of dyslexia) rather than severity. In the TOD-S, TOD-E, and TOD-C, those terms appear in the table to reflect risk. The most predictive score from the TOD-S is the Dyslexia Risk Index (DRI), the most predictive score from the TOD-E is the Early Dyslexia Diagnostic Index (EDDI), and the most predictive score from the TOD-C is the Dyslexia Diagnostic Index (DDI). The risk or probability of dyslexia operationalized by the DRI, EDDI, and the DDI can be determined by referring to the relevant tables from the TOD Examiner’s Manual.

The second part of the question addresses how TOD scores can be used to determine special education eligibility. Increasingly, those with a higher risk are likely to be considered eligible for special education under the category of specific learning disability (SLD). Even so, determining eligibility is more complicated than calculating a risk score.

Ultimately, eligibility is determined within the school environment by a team of professionals. These teams usually rely on one of three identification models: ability–achievement discrepancy, pattern of strengths/weaknesses, and Response to Intervention (RtI).

Exactly how each team evaluates dyslexia varies. Suffice it to say that the TOD batteries contain the tests necessary for making a determination using any of the three SLD models, as long as data reflecting academic performance is also available (e.g., progress-monitoring scores).

Each state has its own eligibility determination guidelines. They can be found on the state department of education website.

4. What interventions can help older students with decoding difficulties?

There are several interventions that have been designed specifically for older students with decoding difficulties. Here are a few examples:

Wilson Reading System
Just Words
Language!
Great Leaps Reading
REWARDS

As with younger students, older students will need intensive, systematic, one-to-one or small-group instruction to improve their skills. There are also several online reading programs such as

Mindplay,
Lexia,
Great Leaps Tutoring,
Read Naturally, and
Language Live!

The most important thing to keep in mind with any of these interventions is that they should be used with fidelity, typically 30 to 60 minutes per session, 5 days of the week.

5. How can classroom teachers help students with dyslexia improve their spelling?

One of the most important ways teachers can help students with dyslexia is to build their own professional knowledge of the ways dyslexia can impact spelling. Spelling and reading are reciprocal tasks that require connecting letters and sounds—and these tasks usually require much more work for students with dyslexia.

Adolescents and adults with dyslexia often continue to struggle with spelling even when their reading skills have improved (Hebert et al., 2018). It is helpful for teachers to be aware of typical versus atypical spelling development so they can recognize when a student’s spelling skills are developing on a typical trajectory (even if slowly) versus atypical development.

As children begin to write, they move from writing letters they know to communicate a message, such as letters in their name, without being aware of the alphabetic principle (prephonetic stage), to writing letters that represent the sounds they hear (semiphonetic and phonetic stages), such as pa for play; cookt for cooked.

At the transitional stage, students show some awareness of English orthography (e.g., welthy for wealthy) and at the conventional stage they draw on their knowledge of phonology, orthography, and morphology to spell words.

Students with dyslexia, however, may write letters in the wrong sequence (e.g., mlik for milk), write the incorrect vowel (e.g., pen for pan), or omit vowels altogether (e.g., wgn for wagon). They often spell the same word in several different ways within the same writing sample. This indicates poor recall of visual orthographic images (words and spelling patterns).

Spelling errors can be phonological, orthographic, or morphological in nature—and the causes can overlap. Understanding the types of errors that students make can help a teacher pinpoint instruction.

Equipped with understanding, teachers must also provide direct instruction in the areas each student needs. A student who struggles to represent the correct sounds in spelling needs instruction in phonics or even in phonological awareness, a precursor to phonics skills. A student who is spelling words “like they sound” (e.g., hed for head) will benefit from instruction in orthographic mapping and learning common English spelling patterns. A student who makes errors with case and verb tense needs instruction in morphology and spelling rules.

Targeted assessment of phonological awareness, phonics knowledge, and orthographic skills using the TOD can help a teacher identify which skills to address. If students have mastered regularly spelled words (sometimes assessed with decodable pseudowords), instruction should focus more on words with common orthographic patterns and on irregular words that have a part of the word that needs to be memorized. If students struggle with regularly spelled words, they may not have mastered phonological awareness skills (e.g., blending and segmenting the sounds in words) and instruction should start there, applying these skills to both reading and spelling.

Students can benefit from considering three types of words: sound words that are spelled just as they sound (e.g., man); think words that have common letter patterns (e.g., bright); and see words that have to be memorized (e.g., said). Generally, evidence-based approaches include

explicit, systematic instruction in phonics, particularly approaches including encoding (spelling) practice;
sound-spellings and phonograms;
morpheme analysis;
orthographic analysis;
word memory; and
use of spellchecker (Hebert et al., 2018)

Poor spelling inhibits development of written expression and even handwriting (Hebert et al.). Therefore, in addition to explicit instruction in spelling, students need supports or “work-arounds” to foster development of written expression. Teach students how to use spellcheck and related features in word-processing software. Students may also benefit from

using speech-to-text software,
providing students time to correct spelling on written assignments prior to grading, and
accessing correctly spelled relevant vocabulary words on a card during tests and assignments.

These types of strategies can minimize the impact of poor spelling on writing assignments.

The Dyslexia Interventions and Recommendations: A Companion Guide to the Tests of Dyslexia (TOD) provides instructional strategies to promote development of spelling, phonological skills, and phonics.

6. What interventions can help students with co-occurring autism or ADHD, especially with fluency development?

Although all three of these disorders may be characterized as neuropsychological in nature and may be related as they can be co-morbid, typically the defining characteristics are different.

The first task is to learn the characteristics of each disorder and then determine the extent to which they present in the referred student. Students with autism and ADHD have difficulty staying on task, and those with co-occurring dyslexia are likely to avoid reading also. Initially, it will be important to consider how to motivate these students to engage in reading-related tasks.

To help students with dyslexia learn to read more efficiently/effectively, systematic reading instruction must focus on mastering phoneme–grapheme relationships. As students become more proficient, their motivation to engage in reading-related tasks will improve and reading-avoidant behavior will decrease.

The TOD includes an instructional guide entitled Dyslexia Interventions and Recommendations: A Companion Guide to the Tests of Dyslexia. Each chapter focuses on a particular type of reading-related problem, particularly those characterizing dyslexia, including one chapter describing fluency-building strategies.

Students with ADHD and autism have difficulty with fluency. Autism can also affect the ability to focus and engage. For these individuals, these general guidelines might be helpful:

read aloud with the student as often as possible
use labels and icons to help associate words with objects
engage in conversation as often as possible and with intention
use positive language.

Addressing the needs of students with ADHD requires special skills. There are resources and organizations available, including Children and Adults with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (CHADD). CHADD provides education, advocacy, and support for individuals with ADHD and their families.

7. What interventions can teachers use to support students with anxiety, reading avoidance, or self-esteem problems around reading?

Students who struggle with reading often experience anxiety and self-esteem problems. As a result, they may avoid reading. To address these symptoms, the first step is to determine the best way to address the student’s reading limitations. When students gain reading proficiency, their anxiety and perceptions about their academic self-worth tend to improve.

The TOD includes an extensive instruction guide entitled Dyslexia Interventions and Recommendations: A Companion Guide to the Tests of Dyslexia (TOD), which provides targeted academic recommendations. Each chapter provides specific instructional strategies addressing a particular type of reading problem.

Of course, educational professionals within schools (e.g., reading coaches, interventionists, special educators) have been trained to help address specific problems. For those students who also need additional social/emotional supports, there are many resources available. For example, the International Dyslexia Association (IDA) and the National Association of School Psychologists offer excellent resources for supporting emotional health and well-being in students with dyslexia.

8. What are some recommended decodable book series?

Decodable texts give students opportunities to practice and reinforce phonics concepts. Because the Science of Reading is rapidly gaining acceptance, the number and variety of decodable texts is growing, too. Here are a few examples adapted from Mather and Wendling (2012):

Beanstalk Books: Beanstalk Books has over 400 titles of decodable books for students in K–2. The Letters & Sounds Decodable Readers are 100% decodable and each story has been written with a strictly controlled text. Children are only exposed to words and text based on their knowledge of letter–sound correspondences.
Bob Books: These decodable texts for beginners or advanced beginners use word families and compound words. Emergent readers begin with text that uses only the letters M, A, T, and S and then move toward long vowels. The series includes workbooks, books for sight words, and books for more advanced readers.
Developing Decoders: Developing Decoders is a series of decodable stories designed to help beginning or struggling readers acquire phonics skills. Each book contains fifteen stories that focus on a specific phonics pattern.
Dog On a Log decodable books and chapter books: These books start with fun, easy activities for phonological awareness. The first decodable book has six letters and two sight words. The first chapter book has 260 words. By Step 10, books include over 8,000 words. Free printable parent and teacher guides, board games, D’Nealian letter tracing cards, and letter/sound cards are also available.
Flyleaf Publishing: Flyleaf’s decodable books provide beginning and struggling readers with opportunities to apply their phonics knowledge in meaningful, colorful books. Their decodable books stress both foundational skills and reading comprehension.
High Noon Books: This publisher offers a large selection of decodable books for struggling readers of all ages. They also provide High Interest/Low Level books (Hi-Lo), as well as graphic novels.
Open Court Reading decodable books: This decodable text series is separated by grade level. The publishers have also created additional free practice activities available online.
Phonics Practice Readers by Modern Curriculum Press: These readers offer three different series for variety of context. Each series includes practice on short vowels, long vowels, blends, and digraphs.
PLD: PLD’s range of decodable reading books aligns with PLD’s Structured Synthetic Phonics (SSP) sequence. The type of words, word count, and number of high-frequency words gradually become more complex as more phonics concepts are introduced. Set 1 starts with VC and CVC words with no high-frequency words. As new phonics concepts are introduced, length increases. The first 11 books introduce approximately a quarter of the alphabet sounds.
Power Readers and Supercharged Readers: Power Readers has 28 related decodable stories with recurring characters and activity pages aligned with the story and the phonics concepts. The program is designed for students in K–1 or for intervention for students in grades 2–4. The stories begin with simple, one-syllable short-vowel words (sat) and gradually progress to simple, two-syllable words (rabbit, ringing). Supercharged Readers is a series of decodable chapter books for students in grades 1–2 or for intervention for students in grades 3–5.
Reading A–Z: Reading A–Z provides a variety of decodable books for students to practice their phonics skills. Teachers may select a certain skill, such as consonant blends or vowel digraphs, and then find the appropriate titles. The books may be used in combination with other materials, including Alphabet, Sound/Symbol, and Read-Aloud Books.
Reading Head Start: This subscription-based program offers a reading program for parents to use at home with children ages 2 to 14. The program includes a year-long free trial.
Simple Words Books: This series of engaging books is written for upper-elementary and older readers. There are stand-alone books, as well as series that follow the same characters. The website provides additional resources for parents and teachers, including free webinars.
SPELD: SPELD SA Phonic Books follow a structured synthetic phonics approach. The books support the learning of letter-sounds and blending in a sequential order, helping students to develop decoding skills. A few high-frequency words are taught before reading each book. Ten sets are available at no cost, with a PDF version and a PowerPoint.
S.P.I.R.E. Decodable Readers: This library contains 120 decodable readers that cover a wide range of topics in science, social studies, and literature. The texts provide practice for every concept allowing students to apply new phonics skills to connected text. The texts include a variety of genres such as biographies, poetry, Greek myths, and science and social studies articles.
Wright Skills decodable books: The complete series offers comprehensive phonemic awareness, phonics, and word study resources for reading instruction.

9. What’s your best advice for providing dyslexia interventions in a general education classroom?

Estimates of dyslexia vary, based on severity, from 5% of the population to 20% (Mather et al., in press). Most classrooms will have at least one or two students with dyslexia, so it is important for educators to be aware of the characteristics of dyslexia and how these characteristics impact reading and spelling development, as well as self-esteem.

Reading instruction for students with dyslexia is often provided by special education teachers or reading specialists. Students with dyslexia require explicit instruction and more practice than general reading programs provide. A classroom teacher may, however, find an appropriate series of decodable books that will help the student practice phonics. These can be used in daily reading practice. The student may also work on an online intervention program during classroom reading instruction.

Providing extensive interventions in the general education setting is usually not feasible given the number of students in the room and the grade level or content area expectations. If the school schedule allows for differentiation in the main reading or literacy block of instructional time, students with dyslexia will benefit from one-on-one or small-group explicit, systematic instruction that follows a Structured Literacy approach (Spear-Swerling, 2019).

In addition, students with dyslexia will likely need additional targeted instruction either through a response to intervention, multi-tiered system of support, or special education services. Classroom teachers can

provide extended time on tests and assignments as needed;
avoid overloading students with unfinished assignments or extensive homework, which may mean shortening some assignments;
only call on a student with dyslexia to read orally if the student volunteers or has practiced the passage ahead of time;
avoid penalizing students for spelling errors in routine writing assignments;
create opportunities for oral testing when the writing demands are too great;
give access to reading content through audiobooks or text-to-speech software;
allow students to complete written assignments using word processing;
teach students how to use spellcheck and speech-to-text dictation;
encourage pleasure reading and provide opportunities for it; and
get to know students and create opportunities for them to demonstrate their strengths.

References:

CHADD. (n.d.). Parenting a child with ADHD. https://chadd.org/for-parents/overview/

Hebert, M., Kearns, D. M., Hayes, J. B., Bazis, P., & Cooper, S. (2018). Why children with dyslexia struggle with writing and how to help them. Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools, 49, 843–863. https://doi.org/10.1044/2018_LSHSS-DYSLC-18-0024

International Dyslexia Association. (n.d.). Facts sheets. Retrieved from https://dyslexiaida.org/fact-sheets/

Mather, N., McCallum, S., Bell, S. M., & Wendling, B. J. (in press). Examiner manual for the Tests of Dyslexia. WPS.

Mather, N., & Wendling, B. J. (2012). Essentials of dyslexia assessment and intervention. Wiley.

National Association of School Psychologists. (n.d.). Mental & Behavioral health. https://www.nasponline.org/resources-and-publications/resources-and-podcasts/mental-and-behavioral-health

Spear-Swerling, L. (2019). Structured literacy and typical literacy practices: Understanding differences to create instructional opportunities. TEACHING Exceptional Children, 51(3), 201–211. https://doi.org/10.1177/0040059917750160

This is a compilation of widely known available resources that might be helpful to readers. An organization’s inclusion on this list does not constitute or imply an endorsement, recommendation, or favoring by WPS, nor does an organization’s exclusion represent a criticism, disapproval, or expression of concern.