Developmental dyslexia is a condition that is related to a difficulty with reading. It is estimated that around 20% of children in the USA suffer from dyslexia.

Children who suffer from dyslexia can often feel embarrassed or “stupid”, but this shouldn’t be the case. Dyslexia is a common condition and with the use of tools and support, many people find their struggles with dyslexia are reduced. But before we look at tools to help, let’s first get a short explanation of what dyslexia entails.

What is Dyslexia?

Dyslexia is a brain-based learning difficulty that causes a child to experience problems with reading, spelling, understanding mathematics problems and, in some cases, handwriting. We often find that those children who suffer from dyslexia read at levels lower than expected.

This is despite having normal intelligence. The great news is that there lots of brilliant tools available that can help children overcome their struggles. Below we discuss ten of these essential tools.

1. Learning Ally

Learning Ally is a fantastic resource for audiobooks. This is an app that houses hundreds of books for both children and teenagers. It’s perfect for those who struggle with reading in general and reading speeds.

Children can use this app to follow along with their favorite stories at a pace that’s perfect for them. They can also adjust the type of font and size of text to make it easier to read.

Dyslexia can affect each child differently and this app allows you to cater for that. It’s available with a monthly subscription and it’s an excellent tool to help children with dyslexia.

2. All About Spelling

All about spelling is a comprehensive program that delivers information via a step-by-step process. It’s actually based on the Orton-Gillingham methods which are commonly used to help teach those children with dyslexia. It’s a brilliant program for all children, but it was developed with dyslexic children in mind.

There is an additional app that works brilliantly alongside this app named “All About Reading”, which helps children with their reading skills in addition to spelling.

3. Dyslexia Quest

If you want a tool that will combine fun and education help children with dyslexia then Dyslexia Quest is the app for you.

It looks and feels like a game, but it’s designed to help children work on various educational elements that dyslexic children typically struggle with. This includes phonics, memory skills, and sequencing.

4.Sound Literacy

For those younger children who suffer from dyslexia, it’s very important to work with phonics. Sound Literacy is a brilliant tool that can help with just that.

It’s an app that features game-like activities which have been designed to help children learn to recognize various letter sounds.

5. Co-Writer

In some cases of dyslexia, children can struggle with writing. This can then often intertwine with other difficulties such as phonics and reading.

However, writing can be made easier with a variety of tools. One of those is Co-Writer. This is an extremely useful tool due to its spelling assistance software.

It gives children the ability to practice their phonics as the spelling predictor works only when a few letters have been typed.

6. E-readers and tablets

Technology dominates our world, so e-readers are now an excellent choice to help children with dyslexia. They come with various built-in features that can help children with learning. From reading and spelling and even through to dictation. For example, the use of speak selection.

This lets you select any text and have it read back to you aloud. This is perfect for teaching a child to read, or allowing them to read by themselves. The accent and speed can all be adjusted.

Another great feature is the use of a Voice Over. This provides a screen reading devices that allow your child to hear what is on the screen via text to speech.

Many e-readers and tablets come with zoom capabilities, allowing for easier viewing and color inversion and text bolding options. This is a great tool to allow your child to be independent in their dyslexia learning.

7. Reading Intro by Oz Phonics

Another brilliant app for young children with dyslexia is the Reading Intro by Oz Phonics. This helps children learn to recognize letter sounds.

The app is filled with tasks that are both simple and fun so children can play with them on their own.

8. Ginger Page

This is another brilliant tool for those children who have difficulty with spelling due to dyslexia.

We often find that traditional spell check software can sometimes find it difficult to recognize a word that someone is attempting to spell.

However, Ginger Page is built with a sophisticated word processor that can help those children with dyslexia to write better.

9. Glasses and colored overlays

This is a tool for dyslexia that is quite individual to the child. The science behind the filters is that they alter the wavelengths that cause visual processing impairments in the brain.

Research has suggested that 20% of dyslexics can benefit from colored lenses or overlays. However, different children may need different colors and may require a different color for each eye.

10. Smartpens

Smartpens offer a solution to writing. A smartpen comes with a “built-in” computer that records what is heard while you are writing. This is a perfect solution for school lessons. Children can take notes and the pen will record what is being said. This means, if they are struggling with their writing, or retaining information, the pen can remember what was explained in the classroom. This is a brilliant addition to “at-home” tools for helping children with dyslexia.

You will that find that those children who suffer with dyslexia often have difficulty reading texts, typing back and spelling different words within a text. There is an all-in-one solution to all these issues and it comes in the form of the Scanmarker reading pen.

Some of the pens brilliant features that can assist your child include, it’s ability to type text thirty times faster than normal typing and it’s ability to read aloud text to help assist with spelling. This is a fantastic reading aid for children with dyslexia that allows them to enjoy activities surrounding studying and reading.

These eleven essential tools range in diversity and application meaning you can find a solution to help the main areas your child struggles with. Whether that’s spelling, reading, writing, or a combination of issues. It’s important to know that with the use of these essential tools and your support, your child can overcome the difficulties associated with their dyslexia and go on to achieve great things.