Teachers, did you know that research shows between 5% - 20% of your students will struggle with dyslexia? What does it look like in your classroom? Here is a list of resources to assist you in reaching students on the dyslexia continuum and struggling readers.  

Flowchart to identify students' most pressing needs to target instruction

  1. AIM Institute for Learning and Research's Quick Guide for Reading Assessment

Free Assessments

  1. Phonemic Awareness: PAST from Dr. David Kilkpatrick. The assessment is available online for free. For more information, you can purchase his book, Equipped For Reading Success (current cost is $55).
  2. Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills : UO DIBELS Data System (uoregon.edu)
  3. Diagnostic Decoding Surveys - Beginning and Advanced | Really Great Reading

What is dyslexia?

  1. Don't believe the myths! Dr. Nadine Gaab debunks several myths on the Gaab Lab website.
  2. MDE has a variety of valuable resources on its Dyslexia page including a "Teacher Checklist for Characteristics of Dyslexia".
  3. Dyslexia Handbook from Colorado Department of Education
  4. International Dyslexia Association (IDA) has created a guide for teachers entitled Dyslexia in the Classroom: What Every Teacher Needs to Know.
  5. Learning Ally has several helpful guides about dyslexia, its potential indicators, and accommodations.
  6. IDA has a list of fact sheets including Effective Reading Instruction for Students for Dyslexia.
  7. Dyslexia impacts more than reading. This mind map was created by a Minnesota parent.

Current Conversations around Literacy

  1. RTI vs MTSS: What's the difference?
  2. Podcasts from American Public Media and MPR.
  3. The Yale Center for Dyslexia and Creativity made a video showing successful dyslexics reflecting back on their schooling.
  4. Undiagnosed dyslexia can have devastating effects. Ameer Baraka tells his story at the US Senate Committee Hearing on Dyslexia.
  5. Phonemic Awareness is an important pre-reading skill. Books by David Kilkpatrick and Louisa Moats in the next section are great resources. Additionally, here is an article, The Elusive Phoneme.

Books

  1. Background knowledge is a critical component of becoming a skilled reader. Natalie Wexler's book The Knowledge Gap is one resource.
  2. The Writing Revolution: A Guide to Advancing Thinking Through Writing in All Subjects and Grades by Judith C. Hochman and Natalie Wexler provides helpful tips for expanding students' writing abilities.
  3. David Kilkpatrick, author of the books Equipped for Reading Success and Essentials of Assessing, Preventing, and Overcoming Reading Difficulties is a wealth of information about phonological awareness. Equipped for Reading Success has one-minute phonemic awareness activities ranging from beginning to advance. The PAST test is available online.
  4. Speech to Print by Louisa Moats is also a go-to! In addition to many degrees and titles, she is also a linguist.
  5. Language at the Speed of Sight: How We Read, Why So Many Can't, and What Can Be Done About It by Mark Seidenberg, Basic Books (2017)

Webinars/Training

  1. Reading Rockets has FREE Reading 101, a self-paced PD for K-3 teachers.
  2. Florida Center For Reading Research: free independent student center activities (pre-K - 5th grade).
  3. The Reading Center offers an online 5-hour Dyslexia 101 informational course for educators designed to provide an increased understanding of dyslexia, what it looks like in the classroom, accommodations and more.  It is a self-paced course with no start or end date. (5 CEUs clock hours)
  4. Learning Ally has free on-demand webinars with edWeb:
  5. The Dyslexia Training Institute has many resources about dyslexia on their website.  One called The Lowdown on Dyslexia specifically for teachers. Here are clips from their "Dyslexia for a Day" and "Dyslexia for a Day - Writing" simulations to help show what it feels like to be a dyslexic student in the classroom.
  6. PBS Misunderstood Minds has a simulator for you to try in order to experience a decoding difficulty.
  7. Learn about the importance of phonemic awareness in beginning readers. Resources include David Kilpatrick's Equipped for Reading Success and Heggerty's Phonemic Awareness curriculum. Kilpatrick's PAST screener is available online.
  8. International Dyslexia Association (IDA) has free webinars.
  9. David Pelc's 11 minute video, "Where Do I Start? (A suggested SOR Scope and Sequence)".

Other Literacy and Dyslexia Organizations

  1. PaTTAN (Pennsylvania Training and Technical Assistance Network) has videos on YouTube.
  2. The Reading League promotes science based approaches to teaching reading. They have a list of decodable readers. Note: It is only a decodable if the scope and sequence of the decodable has been taught.
  3. Microsoft provides Dyslexia Awareness in its partnership with Made By Dyslexia.

Facebook Social Learning Groups

  1. Science of Reading - What I Should Have Learned in College
  2. Minnesota's Science of Reading - What I should have learned in college

If you have resources that have been helpful to you, please let us know at [email protected].

Teachers can make a huge difference in the lives of their students. 

Thank you for taking the time to learn about dyslexia! 

 

Disclaimer: Please note that DD-MN does not endorse, represent or have any legal connection with any of the resources listed above. These are resources that many parents have found useful in searching for information about dyslexia.

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