Issues Related to Reading and Writing

1. Dyslexia

Dyslexia is a lifelong condition that makes it difficult for people to read. It’s the most common learning issue, although it’s not clear what percentage of kids have it. Dyslexia is mainly a problem with reading accurately and fluently. Kids with dyslexia may have trouble answering questions about something they’ve read. But when it’s read to them, they may have no difficulty at all. Dyslexia can create difficulty with other skills, however. These include: reading comprehension, spelling, writing, math.

Teaching approaches and strategies can help overcome dyslexia challenges.

2. Issues with decoding

Also known as sounding out words, decoding is when children are able to put sounds to letters in order to sound out written language. It’s common for beginner readers to struggle when they meet new or unfamiliar terms but typically decoding becomes easier with phonics instruction and repeated practice with reading out loud. If a child continues to struggle, there may be a specific learning difficulty present or a physical impairment that is preventing them from physically seeing the letters or hearing the sounds in spoken language. (Cicerchia, 2016)

3. Poor comprehension

There’s a lot going on in reading, from letter and word recognition to understanding meaning at the phrase, sentence and paragraph level. When a beginner reader encounters vocabulary they do not know or do not recognise due to inaccurate decoding, they are likely to skip ahead. The more blanks in a line of text, the harder it is to make meaning and the more cognitively challenging and frustrating the reading task becomes. That’s why poor comprehension can result when a student struggles with decoding, has a limited vocabulary or attempts to read a text that is at too high of a level. (Cicerchia, 2016)

Reading  requires being able to pay attention to narrative. Students need to identify gist, main ideas, and specific details and even make inferences about what they are reading. If a student has problems staying focused as a result of ADD or ADHD it can impact on comprehension. (Cicerchia, 2016)

3. Speed of Reading

As students expand their vocabulary, they recognize more words by sight and reading speeds up. If speed is  an issue, there may be an underlying problem, such as slow processing. Reading is a cognitively demanding task and holding so much information in the mind while continuing to process text can exhaust children with slow processing. Strategy instruction may help but it’s important that these students be allowed extra time to complete tasks that require extensive reading.

Issues with Writing

1. Expressive Language Issues: A condition that creates trouble with expressing thoughts and ideas using spoken language. Kids with expressive language issues can struggle with formulating what to say and then saying it. Kids who have trouble expressing themselves clearly when speaking often have issues expressing themselves in writing, too.  They have:

• Limited range of vocabulary
• Frequent use of unspecific labels like “thing”
• Difficulty producing complex sentences
• Omitting words
• Confusion of tenses

• Strategies for Expressive Language Issues
• Draw pictures of what you want to write before writing.
• Use a herringbone diagram to help with sentence structure.
• Use a thesaurus to expand vocabulary.
• Use visualization techniques to expand details in writing.

2. Sequential Ordering Problem

Children who struggle with sequential ordering have difficulty putting or maintaining letters, processes, or ideas in order. A sequential ordering problem may manifest itself in a child's writing as:

• poor letter formation
• transposed letters and spelling omissions
• poor narrative sequencing
• lack of transitions

3. Attention Problem 

Children who are inattentive and impulsive experience many problems. They may:

• • 
    • find it hard to start writing 
    • are easily distracted during writing tasks
    • are mentally fatigue/tired while writing
    • inconsistent legibility in writing
    • uneven writing tempo
    • many careless errors
    • poorly planned work

•                                                     4. Higher-Order Cognition Problem

• Children who have difficulty with higher-order cognition are often unable to use writing to present a sound argument or convey sophisticated or abstract ideas. A higher-order cognition problem might manifest itself in a child's:

  • trouble generating ideas or elaborating on them

  • difficulty developing and organizing ideas

  • lack of opinion or sense of audience

  • difficulty with writing tasks that require creativity and/or critical thinking

5. Memory Problem

Because so many writing processes need to be automatic, active working memory is critical. Children may have difficulty recalling spelling, grammar, and punctuation rules, accessing prior knowledge while writing, or organizing ideas. A memory problem may manifest itself in a child's writing as:

• poor vocabulary
• many misspelled words
• frequent capitalization, punctuation, and grammar errors   (Levine, 1987)

6. Graphomotor Problem

Children with graphomotor problems struggle to coordinate the small muscles of the fingers in order to maneuver a pen or pencil, especially as assignment length increases. A child with a graphomotor problem might:

• write only very short passages

• write extremely slowly and with great effort

• use an awkward pencil grip

• lack fluidity in cursive writing

• find it hard to form letters