Need help in Comprehension area | ADHD Information

it's sort of like you read read the words to yoursef but not what they mean!!

Hi! After searching the net this evening for improving my sons comprehension skills (he is 8 1/2 yrs old), I ran across this message board. I am not only looking for others ideas on how to help my sons comprehension skills, but just to have a place and chat about his ADHD and the learning disabilities he is facing... it would mean so much.

I'm not sure how much information to lay out on the table just yet. My main goal right now is to find out if anyone has any ideas or techniques to help those who struggle with comprehending. Not only in reading, but just every day things, every day life. My son has a wonderful group of resource teachers at school (he is going into the 3rd grade this fall) who have done so much for him over the years. I would like to find a few things I can do here at home that would benefit him, help him comprehend the little things.

If anyone has any ideas or have found techniques that worked for your children, I'd love your feedback. Thanks!!

well i would try setting things up like games so you can keep his atention for
a while.

Hi. We play games, he reads on his own, enjoys pretend play whether it's football, cooking or wrestling. Take reading as an example... although he has an awesome memory, he struggles very hard in re-telling in words a story he just read. He reads over sentences even with errors, not knowing he is reading nonsense sentences. He is reading at grade level but is four grades behind in comprehension.

i'm kinda like hat too. i ge tdistracted when im reading so i have to re-read
the same sentence at least 3 times. Maybe thats what happens to him.

The colored book mark thing is a GREAT idea!!! I wish someone would have thought of that for me! This is why I love this message board...........lots of great ideas!

I have also heard of kids using bookmarks that have colored film in them to help kids follow along better. They highlight the sentence being read by the child. Different colors work for different kids. My son's friend uses red ones. It helps him not skip around and focus just on the sentence he is reading-blocking everything else out. Good luck!

I don't know if this will help or not, but it worked for awhile with us.

#1. The teacher was very willing to work around my sons ADHD. She went way beyond anything I expected. One of the things she did, was to let him choose his own reading materials, anything and everything he wanted to read, she didnt' care. It didn't have to be school material or class choices. As long as he read it counted as reading time. He is very interested in dinosaurs, and monsters. We read so many monster books and read some of them over and over again. Even much higher level dinosaur encylopedias, he would go over them for the longest time. I got tired of them but he didn't.

#2. One time while reading, he was doing his normal gymnastics and squirming and flipping around. We were sitting on the bed, with him beside me. He ended up on the other side of the book. Actually reading the book upside down. And where normally he struggled with each and every tiny word, and skipping sentences and words and not understanding anything he read. UPSIDE DOWN, he read straight thru, the entire book, in just a matter of minutes. I thought he might have dyslexia, but everyone (doctors, teachers) said no, what was going on was to read upside down, he had to seriously concentrate, and absorbed more of what he was seeing and actually focusing on the words....... We have tried this since then and sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. He is really proud of himself when it does. Maybe you can try it, and see. If it works its a much more enjoyable way to get thru reading than constantly reminding him to read for every word.

[QUOTE=lvwp]

I don't know if this will help or not, but it worked for awhile with us.

[/QUOTE]

Wow! What a task for the little guy!! That is soo cool!! Thank you for sharing!

Thank you for the link. As far as the late talking/no talking, that came about because of the fluid built up in his ears that his Pediatrician overlooked the first two years of his life. He was 2 1/2 yrs old when we took him into the ENT because of no speech, the ENT Dr immediately took him in to insert double tubes and removed his tonsils/adenoids (due to other problems he was having).

My son has been in speech class every year since he was 3 yrs old as well as PT and OT. Your right in that they have helped him out a lot : ). He has made huge strides over the years! We have his speech class already set up for this fall with the school.

Thanks again!

I purchased a Harcourt Trophies book online. My son reads the stories to me. At the end of each story there are a number a exercises targeted at comprehension. He stumbled with these at first, but he's moving right along now. I suspect (I'm not a teacher) that if you work on improving comprehension of stories, this will carry over to other parts of life.Who diagnosed him? Comprehension problems can be everything from CAPD (central auditory processing disorder) to ASD (autistic spectrum disorder). My daughter has CAPD and is in special ed. She has trouble understanding reading and had trouble learning to read too. She doesn't retain verbal information well, although she has an excellent attention span (ADHD ruled out on her). She is coming along well in an LD class for half the day and we will try mainstreaming her for all classes once her reading skills/if her reading skills catch up to grade level in all areas, comprehension included. Now my son is on the high functioning autism spectrum. He could read at two, but couldn't understand what he read. As time went on, rather than being ahead of his peers in reading, he's falling a little behind, but his comprehension has improved with interventions. I think you need to know exactly what you are dealing with so you can help your child best. If you want a comprehensive evaluation to point out your son's specific strengths and weaknesses, I'd take him to a Neuropsycologist. They do hours of comprehensive testing and can pinpoint stuff other professionals can't/don't see or look for. The reason for his lack of comprehension may be the key to how to help him comprehend. If he is just spacing out (ADHD) it requires a different approach than if he really doesn't "get it" such as with ASD. If it's CAPD, he may need LD help. It really all depends on what the problem is. Kids are not "one size fits all" and nobody here knows what will work for your child. You know him best, and what he has been through and what his specific problems are. Re-enforcement NEVER hurts, but may not solve the core issues, depending on what causes them. Vision therapy (I know a lot of ASD using it) is for a specific problem where the eyes don't focus together. My son has this, and had vision therapy at one time. It didnt, however, affect his reading ability and the therapy didn't improve his comprehensive. It did help his eyes focus at the same time. Before the therapy, everyone noticed he would only seem to stare at things with his right eye--looked like he had one strong eye and one weak eye. An eye exam, however, showed 20/20 vision. I think you should see an Ophamalogist too. "Leave no stone unturned" in finding out the problems and why they exist. JMO.MomWI38935.3907291667

Hello! Welcome to the board.

My son came to live with us as a foster child, when he was almost nine, getting ready to go into third grade. He is dyslexic and was unable to read, when he first moved into our house. To help him with his reading skills, I always purchased two of the same books, so he had his book and I had mine. We took turns reading, or if he was really hating the idea of reading on that particular day, he would just follow along while I read. I stopped often and discussed important topics in the book with him and asked comprehension questions. I also would have him act out the book, while I read it aloud, pretending to be the different characters. He loved acting out the books. I think this would be a great way to help your child with comprehension, also. It makes the book visual and opens up all the channels--auditory, visual, motor--to learning. When he was tested for SPED services this year, he scored in the 90th percentile in oral comprehension.

My son has recently started vision therapy. His eyes do not work together. The therapist says it will help with comprehension also. We will see. Vision therapy. I'll look into that, it sounds really interesting.

Thank you, lillian. I love your ideas. My son loves, loves books (and loves acting out as teacher to his imaginary class). I do find he becomes frustrated when we are sharing a book, having two of the same books is an excellent idea!

Notellin, I will search for the books today. Thank you, that is the type of information I am looking for.

MomWI, My sons Neurologist (sp?) and Pediatrician diagnosised him when he was 7. He was also diagnosed with Apraxia as well. It was suspected at 3 he was ADHD, but my husband and I wanted to exhaust all other avenues before going down that road. By the time he went in 1st grade, we looked into ADHD further. I looked into ASD a little bit. The Social Interactions, Language Communication, Behavior Imagination. It was very interesting to read. Maybe a small handful of things pointed to my son, but overall, he doesn't fit the criteria for ASD. I do believe there are sensory issues with my son where CAPD makes sense.

There is more, but I have to go for now. Thanks so much for the information!

Here's a PDD Assessment test. People on the PDD board swear by it. Your son may not have ASD, but he has tons of symptoms. Good luck. Pretty much late talking/no talking, SID, ADHD, etc. all add up to ASD for most kids. No two are alike. Here's an idea. Since he has so many ASD symptoms, even without the diagnosis I'll bet the interventions would still help him. I'd push for Speech/PT/OT/social skills from your school. Bet they'd help him a lot. Good luck with your child.

www.childbrain.com/pddassess.html

MomWI38935.4600347222