How do I know if DS has hyperlexia? Is it really that important to know
if he does? He always seems really interested in looking at the words in books- but
yesterday we tested him and we think he can read. We tested him on
several words and he got them right: Book, Bath, Bike, Train, Please,
Bear, Baby, Car, Water, Airplane,Cat, Milk.
He got 2 wrong- He thought Doll was "Dog" and "Want" was "Water".
We haven't taught him his alphabet yet. He can't sing his ABC's or
anything. I think he's sight reading- he's memorized the words from a
video.
Should we encourage this? It seems silly to work on reading when he
doesn't even point yet. But then I was reading about hyperlexia and it
says it can be a real tool. I'm not really sure where to go with
this....
My son also falls into the hyperlexia catagory somewhat (but he has always read for comprehnsion thus they threw it out). He knew all letters and numbers up to 20 ranodmly by 18 months. By 24 months he was starting to spell out 3 letter words and was learning to recognize all his letters in cursive and upper/lower case. By 30 months he was reading almost all 3 letter words he could spell and some 4 letter words and has been pretty much fully reading since age 3. It was about age 3.5 that he learned to start sounding out words through the use of www.starfall.com. He can read anything you put in front of him, though he still needs help with some words, but he has read from things like Harry Potter and even Shakespeare (I did not pick that oune out he did as he wanted to see what was in the book).
His ability to read has been extremely helpful in it allows the school to use social stories to teach him what to do in some situations and he can read it by himself. Further, since he can read (and write) the school is able to help him express himself by writing down what is wrong when he has difficulty verbally expressing it. My son is also an extremely strong visual spatial learner and many of his strengths lie in both reading and math.
As for ways that schools will accept, they accept both phonetic readers and whole word readers (the difference is that a phonetic reader reads by sounds and a holw word reader reads by memorizing patterns). Children that are more audial learners probably learn phonetically easier, where children that are visual spatial learners probably learn better through whole word reading. (my son in fact learns everything in a whole concept.. first learning the overriding whole picture then breaking down each part and working down to the simplest thing, many times he understands how to do something but doesn't know how he did it). My son did know all the sounds the letters made, he just didn't correspond those sounds to helping him learn to read. Further, since the sounds aren't exactly the same in each word it only helps to some degree (gets him clsoe to what the word is, but he is very literal and has trouble figuring out what the exact sound should be). The school system he is in has no problems with him being a whole word reader and are used to having children who do both whole word reading and phonetic reading.
On the flip side, my younger DS has little interest in learning his letters or numbers and it feels wierd that he will be 3 soon and doesn't know them all, but he absolutely enjoys being read to and loves the starfall sight and the start of the stories signing the letter sounds.
[QUOTE=NelleS42]
Nelle
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My son (8 1/2) has the "Leap Frog" computer and books...he loves them, I love them because it can read to him or he can read it himself, will sound out words for him, will ask questions about the stories (not like he can answer yet...cognitive ability is low)....plus they have scooby doo and spongebob books which he likes. We also have the Leap frog alphabet computer, sounds out letters, he can create or it will ask him to spell 3-letter words ---- has a few options.
READING is fabulous...never stop reading to your kids (if they can sit still for it)...some days he's better than others....but once in a while, he takes a real interest...and he has that interest in words, so he will ask "show me ..." asking for words I had read.
~Lesley
deerhart thanks for the starfall.com site...we'll be trying that!!!
My DS (6yrs) has hyperlexia and he has been reading and comprehending since age 3. And even if you just have NT kids, it's NEVER to early to read. Reading to your children is so very important from the beginning. And if they can read back, hey that's awesome too! DS could speak in complete sentences by 18 months old. He knew his ABC's and could count to 100 by just about 14 months. So I say encourage as much as you can without driving your baby nutz! LOL
rachelle
My son Takoda also picks up words by sight. He has a fasination with letters and knows them all. But he hasn't grasped the sound them out factor yet. I worry that if he keeps getting all these words by sight he won't bother to learn their sounds.
I feel I NEED TO TRY PHONICS. I don't think we should ever discourage them from reading but I just hope to teach him the way the schools will accept.
Nelle
I think my high functioning twin may be at least somewhat hyperlexic. He has always been fascinated with letters and numbers. His favorite think to do this summer is write all the names of the Baby Einstein videos. Being able to spell Shakespeare and Einstein should come in handy in kindergarten.
I think you should definitely use any child's interests in order to teach them more effectively. It may be helpful to pair the written word and picture, with the spoken word, to increase listening comprehension for example. I am now using a book called "Teach Me Language" with my son. The book encourages you to teach your child to read, because reading is a "valuable prompt for speaking". "We believe that is IS developmentally appropriate for these children to learn to read if reading is used as a language therapy aide and the child seems ready." ("Teach Me Language", p. 6) My son has a lot of problem with syntax, the order of the words in a sentence, so I think being able to visualize word order will be very helpful for him.
How can you tell if a child has hyperlexia? I can't communicate enough w/ ds to know if he can read or understand letters. He is definitely intested in them , and loves to watch the credits at the end of movies. But I have no clue if that means anything.
Amber
With my son he was verbal enough at the time to use words. So we could show him any random letter and he could tell us what it was and it progressed to us writing down random words and him saying what it was (sort of like pointing to book and he would say book, instead we wrote the word book and he would say book then we would ask him to go get what we had written as a way to tell he knew what the word stood for).
For a child that is completely nonverbal the only thing I could think of is to write things down and see if he can then retrieve them (like shoe, book, pot). The pure definition is a obsession/fascination with words or numbers and doesn't have to include actaul reading (though many do) and some doctor's feel that the child doesn't fall into the hyperlexia catagory if they can read for comprehension
HI all , I know CHRISTIAN ISN'T HYPERLEXIA..I just wish I could fig.out what it is really he has b/c he doesn't recognize letters or numbers ..but I do luv when the school says he does..MY FOOT!!!LOL.. I have LEAPSTER For him but his attention is 30 secs. but we were over friends the other day and he was playin the xbox, which Im not real into b/c it has epilepsy warnings.but he was so interested in the snowboard game for 15min. WOW i wish he would just learn words n numbers..so if its not hyperlexia then what else could this be called.???I looked through my son's original autism clinic Dx and it does state Takoda has hyperlexia. They didn't say much about it with his Dx they spent most of the time explaining autism (HFA and the others) and how they determined Takoda was autistic.
So I don't know exactly how they determined he is hyperlexic.
Nelle PS Thanks for the links and info. Well Aiden has a fascination w/ numbers and letters but I'm not sure if it's anything unusual. I'll have to see if he'll pay attention enough and try to see if he'll understand when I say where's the letter A and where is this (point to word "head" and see if he points to his head). He has a fairly short attention span so it could be hard to get him to try this. He won't even let me read books to him most times. He just likes to flip through them. I guess it would be interesting to see if he understands the letters though. Or maybe he just thinks they look neat lol. Amber Hi, You can find most phonic programs on eBay.com auctions at a much better price than the stores. I love auctioning on eBay. Delores
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