I forgot to mention that about three weeks ago, Jon moved out of the three pre-primers and into a 150 page reading primer. The type size is slightly smaller again, but it’s the leading (the spacing between the lines) that is causing some stress. If Jon isn’t totally focused, he tends to lose his spot and jump from the line he is on. I know this is common for beginner readers, but it’s exacerbated by the cortical visual impairment: it’s is easier to see something if the visual field around it is empty. So we’ll have to proceed and see where we get.
One of the many “not-quite, but kind-of-like” metaphors for CVI is that it’s like looking at the world through a moving, rotating piece of Swiss cheese. It’s fascinating to watch Jon read, as he is constantly changing distance from the page, cocking his head and changing angles. Sometimes you’d swear he was looking at the other page! Anything to keep the words in view.
Lately the at home readings have been quite stressful for Jon, probably since he’s exhausted from school. Thursday’s late afternoon session took 40 minutes, including whining and attempted evasion, whereas at school, fresh and no-nonsense, Jon did the same text in 12 minutes on Friday morning.
Laura, his teacher and I had a chat about that and we’ve decide that for the time being, Jon won’t have to do reading homework from the textbook, but only from supplementals he’s being assigned. If he volunteers for more, fine, but the whole idea is to reduce the stress and anxiety of reading.
Here’s the a page from his current assignment, that he won’t necessarily be reading with us anymore. How will I find out what becomes of Joey?
His teacher thinks that this frustration, and certain evasions she’s seen, shows that we are approaching his current skill level in vision, in vocabulary and in reading skills. Which is great. The great strides of late have taken him to where he needs to be. Now the books will be introducing up to 10 new words a story. I personally think that the vision is slightly hampering things in an absolute sense, but given how far he’s come in the 60 days since he was reading 48 point type, I can’t argue with how we’ve done so far.
In the meantime, we’ll ease off on the gas a little for now. We want him to like to read. Especially if it’s always going to require effort.
Joey grew up, became a firefighter, was “discovered” in a firefighter’s charity calendar and now makes a pile of money as a stunt double in Van Damme action films.
I guess I should have marked that “Spoilers”.
-aiabx
In the light of aiabx’s comment, it would be prudent to let Jon know that reading can be a two edged sword. More specifically, “See the kind of things you can end up reading about!”
The trouble is (as it is with all early readers, of course) that a lot of the time they expend all that effort to read some — let’s face it — horribly boring stuff. I mean, I can just imagine Jon’s eyes glazing over with that fireman story.
And a few weeks back his primer featured a rather wacked-out story about a happy pan (!!) that was beyond bizarre. Jon read the thing but kept looking puzzledly at Peter for confirmation of “yep, that’s what’s written there”.