Growing up in the 70s, I had a friend with dyslexia in elementary school and I understood that he perceived the letters in books differently than me and had therefore problems reading. I also realized that the teachers knew about this issue, but really did not do anything different for him, they just gave him more time when he needed to read something or just called on him less than on other kids to read aloud in class. Of course, things have changed in the last 40+ years and so this book was of particular interest to me since I wanted to find out what could be done to help kids with dyslexia to improve reading skills. I do remember my mother telling me that I under no circumstances was to think of my friend as less intelligent, just that his brain was working differently just like I was left-handed while many other people were right-handed. Unfortunately, having problems reading can affect how well a child does in school and if classroom sizes are large, teachers may not have sufficient time to accommodate a dyslexic child. This makes it more important for the parent to be involved in the education and take time to work with a child on assignments.
This book is a collection of fun activities for a parent to help their dyslexic child with reading. And yes, I said fun - because the activities in this book while geared towards improving reading ability are fun and more like games than a reading lesson. From race games to coloring activities and funding matches, these activities are geared towards ages 7 to 12 in children and will require an adult or significantly older sibling to assist. This is not a book to hand to a child to work on their own. I found the activities in this book to have a nice variety of approaches to improve reading skills in the target age group using playful approaches that make the child forget that it is learning and instead make it appear as if the adult is playing a game with the child. Having fun while doing these activities is important in my opinion because it helps the child to stick with a routine of doing these activities regularly.
I highly recommend this book to any parent who has a child with dyslexia. But I also feel that this book can be used to improve reading skills in children that may be struggling for a number of reasons because they do encourage reading in a fun and entertaining manner.
Disclaimer:
I received a free advanced copy of the book in exchange for an honest and unbiased review. The opinion expressed in this post is solely my own and has not been influenced by any third party.
