How do you effectively teach sight words to students with Dyslexia?

Answer 1

I color-code the vowels, making nearly all words phonetic. This way, students can sound their way into their sight words. I have only 13 colors for 18 vowel sounds. (Long vowels are all the same color), and every key word is a color that makes sense mnemonically. High-priority words must be overlearned through writing. For the rest, games provide the necessary practice. Don't expect irregularly spelled words to be memorized easily as spelling words, but they are often easy enough to memorize as sight words because they are often visually distinctive. Phonetic words, on the other hand,usually should be learned through spelling as well as reading.

Answer 2

I have used the "Skywriting" approach taught through some multi-sensory programs.

To begin with, I chunk 10-15 sight words on notecards. We go through them two to three times together and then the student is assessed with them. If a student gets one wrong, we put it to the side and keep going. At the end, whichever sight words are in the "incorrect" pile, we skywrite them.

Skywriting:

-I write the words (one at a time) very large on the board

-We take three to four steps back from the table we're working at.

-The student uses his or her writing hand and two fingers, they stretch them as far as it can go to the point where you can feel a pull in the shoulder (the teacher also models this and shows them how it should look and feel)

-We spell and read the word ten times.

This allows the messages to travel through the arm, into the brain.

Repeated Practice is also very helpful in learning and remembering sight words. As stated above, chunk them into groups of 10-15; as the student reaches mastery, introduce more. Keep reviewing them, even after the student has shown they know the word. Practice reading them in simple sentences as well as that can help in comprehension of the words.

Answer 3

People with reading difficulties may have a hard time understanding where the letters are placed in a word. You can ask what letters they see at the beginning, middle and end of the word. One trick could be to use money. Yes I said money!! If a word has three letters such as "bat", then use three pennies. Have every letter represent a penny. Point to every penny and say the letter. After doing that for some time, ask the student what letter was used for the first penny and point to the first penny and then the other two letters. After some time, the students will understand. This way is very effective to help students know the details in a word.