For Parents

Welcome Parents!

This web page is designed to assist our Parent Liaisons and parents of students involved in our Dyslexia Pilot sites. You will find valuable information about dyslexia, and additional links to resources.

Act 69 of 2014, the Dyslexia and Early Literacy Intervention Pilot Program became effective on June 26, 2014. As a result of the Act, the Pennsylvania Department of Education (PDE) has established a three-year dyslexia screening and early literacy intervention pilot program that is being executed from 2015-2018. The purpose of the pilot is to provide evidence-based early screening and multi-tier support systems, using evidence-based intervention services for students with potential risk factors for early reading deficiencies and dyslexia, such as low phonemic awareness, low letter and symbol naming and inability to remember sequences.

As part of this program, each participating school has selected at least one parent to serve as a Parent Liaison. The role of the Parent Liaison is to promote effective communication between the school district and the parents, to understand communication between the school district and the Pennsylvania Department of Education, and to participate in any activities throughout this 3-year project to aid in maintaining a clear focus and purpose of the pilot program. Parent Liaisons across all the pilot districts will collaborate with each other in order to provide quality assistance to their own districts and schools.

• Tips for Supporting Reading Skills at Home
• Learning to Read: A Fact Sheet for Parents
• Talking to Students and Parents About Dyslexia
• Starfall Educational FoundationTop 10 Links for Parents of Students with Dyslexia
• Dyslexia and Early Literacy Intervention – Parent Fact Sheet
• References for Dyslexia Parent Fact Sheet
• Early Literacy Grant
• Effective Early Literacy Practices: What We’ve Learned and How to Replicate in Your District
• Pennsylvania Dyslexia Literacy Coalition

Web Resources 

• Dialogic Reading: An Effective Way to Read to Preschoolers
• Bio and Interview with Dialogic Reading Technique creator Dr. Grover (Russ) Whitehurst
• The Best Literacy Apps for Preschool and Kindergarten Children
• THE RAI READING CORPS: An AmeriCorps Partner Program
• Decodable Literature Library from Flyleaf Publishing
• Decodable Books and Phonics Lessons
• Tools 4 Reading
• Literacyhow
• Read, Write, Think
• 2015: A Banner Year for Dyslexia
• Pennsylvania’s Branch of the IDA
• The National Center for Learning Disabilities
• Literacy Education for All, Results for the Nation (LEARN) Act
• Power UP What Works
• Center for Dyslexia, Middle Tennessee State University
• Teaching Meta-Cognition Skills /Dyslexia Help at the University of Michigan
• Readworks – provides research-based units, lessons, and authentic, leveled non-fiction and literary passages directly to educators online, for free, to be shared broadly
• Free Reading
• Free Reading – Decodable Passages
• Newsela – an innovative way to support students in their development of reading comprehension skills of non-fiction text by accessing current expository text articles at five different lexile levels.
• To Wait in Tier 1 or Intervene Immediately
• Dyslexia Help – University of Michigan
• The Yale Center for Dyslexia & Creativity - http://dyslexia.yale.edu/resources/tools-technology/
• Understood: For Learning and Attention Issues – For the first time ever, 15 nonprofit organizations have joined forces to support parents of the one in five children with learning and attention issues throughout their journey.
• Neuhaus Classes for Teachers
• Bookshare: An Accessible Online Library for people with print disabilities
• What is dyslexia? – Kelli Sandman-Hurley
• Apps and educational games for students by grade level
• Digital Promise: Accelerating Innovation in Education
• Help for all students, using auditory, visual and tactile techniques designed to teach students with dyslexia
• Supporting Early Vocabulary Development within an RTI Framework
• Fixing the Failure Model: Harvard Graduate School of Education
• Project CRISS: CReating Independence through Student-owned Strategies
• ireadwith: ebooks that make children talk!
• Mrs. Perkins’ Dolch Words:Helping Your Children Read
• Learning Ally: dedicated to empowering blind, visually impaired, or dyslexic students achieve their goals
• Focus: The newsletter of the PA and DE Branch of the IDA
• International Dyslexia Association
• IDA Fact Sheets on Dyslexia and Related Language-Based Learning Disabilities
• Frequently Asked Questions about Dyslexia - https://dyslexiaida.org/frequently-asked-questions-2/
• IDA Dyslexia Handbook: What Every Family Should Know

 

Video Resources

• Dyslexia – Interdisciplinary Assessment and Instruction in Reading – Part 1
• Dyslexia – Interdisciplinary Assessment and Instruction in Reading – Part 2
• Update on the Dyslexia Pilot Project
• Students Referred for Suspected SLD in the Dyslexia Pilot Program: Where Do We Go From Here?
• The Other 3-Tier Model for Reading, Writing, Oral Language, and Math
• Evidence-Based vs Research Based Programs for Dyslexics
• Fundations: First Grade Lesson
• Fundations: Tapping Out Sounds
• Fundations: Sentence Frames in the Classroom
• Dr. Grover (Russ) Whitehurst talks about his Dialogic Reading technique on ReadingRockets.org –
• A Dyslexic Student’s Perspective: Which Tablet Works Best for Dyslexics?
• Reading Rockets: Reading and the Brain
• Neuhaus Reading Routines K-5
• Decoding Dyslexia Oregon
• Understanding Dyslexia: The Intersection of Scientific Research & Education

Resources from other states

• Connecticut: Pilot Initiative in Reading Instruction Shows Dramatic Results in Closing the Achievement Gap
• California: The Dialogue Surrounding Dyslexia: Five Important Takeaways
• Florida: Florida Center for Reading Research
• Minnesota: Navigating the School System When a Child is Struggling with Reading or Dyslexia
• Oklahoma Phonological Awareness
• Oregon: Decoding Dyslexia
• Tennessee: Center at MTSU helps with dyslexia treatment