Spotlight on Dyslexia: The Orton-Gillingham Difference
What differentiates an Orton Gillingham reading specialist from others is their training and experience in the Orton-Gillingham approach. This provides them with insight and skills on how to encourage students to learn in the way that suits them best. They are trained to adapt their instruction to each student, breaking down reading into smaller, more manageable skills that build on each other. This allows the students to achieve mastery on their own timeline. By encouraging students to master reading and language skills in an individualized way, our student clients play an essential role in their own learning.
Orton-Gillingham places an important emphasis on multisensory approaches to learning. This is important because students with dyslexia lack a level of phonemic awareness, so learning reading skills through a phonics-based approach that incorporates all senses is highly effective. Our Orton-Gillingham trained specialist combines sight, hearing, touch, and movement into everyday instruction to help students understand the relationship between letters, sounds, and words.
This approach is different from their in-school experience where teachers have the challenge of trying to ensure that each student masters reading skills on a standardized timeline. Whereas the Orton-Gillingham Approach breaks down reading into smaller, more manageable skills that build on each other so students achieve mastery on their own timeline. Advancement to the next skill only begins when they have fully mastered the previous skill. This step-by-step approach to learning promotes a more complete understanding of reading skills and ensures that despite your child’s learning challenges, they are able to see success and continue to improve.
