Yesterday, my first Barton student, who is my eldest son turned 21. It's pretty amazing how 13 years flew by and the adorable little boy, is now a muscular young man who towers over me.
I still have his beginning of the school year goal that his teacher had displayed on a bulletin board from second grade. It said, "Right now, I want to become a bater reder." I'm not sure if that first vowel in better was supposed to be an a or a u, but I've saved the paper thought bubble all these years as a poignant reminder of why I do this work.
After I had a session with Ryan, a rising ninth grader, on Thursday night, on a whim, I asked Garrett to read a list of words from early in Barton Level 8, which he completed in 2016. Some of the words, such as egregious and repetitious are challenging, but he read all 21 with ease and speed. Ryan was accurate, but not highly fluent. He only started his remediation as an eighth grader and that difference is significant.
Dyslexia and its associated reading difficulties come in many varieties, but one generalization we can make is that intervening before third often makes a profound difference. In thinking about all of the students I've tutored since Garrett, less than half were in that age range. I can already see the improvements in my newest student who is a rising second grader. Even though my other newest student is also eight-years-old and a rising third grader, it's already apparent that he will be more challenging to remediate. His parents agreed to three weekly sessions this month and I'm going to request that frequency continues next month. I'm concerned that third grade is going to be rough for this smart boy who is not even close to grade-level reading.
As tutors, we never know exactly how a child's story will unfold. We simply meet students where they are and do our best to change the trajectory. Thirteen years ago, that journey began with my own son. Today, it begins again with every new student who walks through my office door.
