How To Help Your Struggling Reader: Why Is My Child Having Trouble Reading?

We all know that it’s pretty straightforward to spot when our kid is struggling. But if you don’t have a literacy degree, or even if you do, sometimes identifying exactly what they struggle with and why they are struggling to begin with can be trickier.  Here are two of the main categories that cause children to struggle with reading. Based on these foundational concepts, you can begin to get to the root of what might be causing your struggling reader to have trouble reading.

Struggling Readers & Decoding

Decoding just means actually using the sounds in a word, plus other word attack strategies to sound out a word.  If your child doesn’t know their letter sounds with automaticity, or hasn’t learned all of the rules for decoding yet, such as that "vowel-consonant-e" makes the vowel sound long, or that a "y" at the end of a word typically says /ee/ or /long i/, then decoding is likely going to cause a struggle.  This may mean they need help with phonemic awareness, which is the knowledge of sounds, rhymes, and other reading exercises that can be done with your eyes closed, like listening for the beginning or ending sounds.  Or, it might mean they need some targeted phonics instruction, which would focus on sounds, letters, alphabetic symbols, and how those letters, symbols, and sounds work together to build words.

Comprehension Difficulties for Struggling Readers

If your struggling reader's decoding is solid, but they can’t answer questions about what they read or is having trouble understanding what they read, then we would look at comprehension. Comprehension is the ability to understand and analyze a text.  Perhaps your child didn't know all of the vocabulary words within the text, even though they can read (decode) them. This would mean they aren’t actually catching the full meaning of what they are reading, similar to if as adults we read a complex textbook on a subject we had never heard of before.  We can call out the words on the page, but they don't hold a lot of meaning if we don't know the definitions of most of the words on the page.

Maybe they are reading in a slower or choppier manner that is interrupting their flow, or fluency, to a degree that hinders their comprehension. Or maybe they need to work on their critical thinking skills, which means they need help piecing clues together to come to a logical conclusion. 

Remember, no matter what the cause of your child’s struggle is, you can get to the bottom of it, and your child can meet with success when the right interventions are in place! Your child is lucky to have you working toward solutions for their struggles, and with intention and dedication, they will get back on the right track before you know it!

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