📖Parent Toolkit

Decoding

Translating written letters into spoken sounds. The core skill that dyslexia disrupts.

Phonemic Awareness

Hearing and manipulating the individual sounds (phonemes) inside words. Foundation skill before decoding works.

Asking ‘what's the first sound in cat?' — answer: /k/, not ‘c'.

Phonics

The system that maps sounds to letters. Structured, systematic phonics (e.g. Orton-Gillingham, synthetic phonics) is the evidence-based approach.

Fluency

Reading smoothly, with expression, at a good pace. Builds after accurate decoding.

Sight Words

High-frequency words best learnt by recognition (the, said, was). Useful but not a substitute for phonics.

Working Memory

Holding information in mind while using it — e.g. remembering the start of a sentence while sounding out the end. Often weak in dyslexia.

Multi-Sensory Learning

Seeing, hearing, saying and moving the letters at once. Helps dyslexic brains lock in patterns.

Tracing a letter in sand while saying its sound.

Assistive Technology

Text-to-speech, audiobooks, speech-to-text, dyslexia-friendly fonts — tools that bypass the reading bottleneck so learning continues.

Reading Stamina

How long a child can read before they're exhausted. Build it in small, regular doses.

Reading Anxiety

The dread, avoidance and panic that builds around reading after years of struggle. Treat it before pushing more practice.

Strengths-First

Dyslexic brains often excel at big-picture thinking, problem solving, storytelling and visual reasoning. Lead with those.

Accommodations vs Modifications

Accommodations change HOW they access learning (audiobooks, extra time). Modifications change WHAT they learn (less content). Accommodate first.