Dyslexia tutoring

Getting started with dyslexia tutoring

Looking to hire a private tutor for one on one reading instruction? Good idea. It's among the best ways to help your child improve their reading, BUT before you hire one, here are three important things to consider:

1.   Be sure to have completed a psycho-educational assessment or dyslexia test before you seek a tutor. Don't put the cart ahead of the horse. If your child is not properly assessed how will you know if you have a suitably trained tutor using the proper materials?

2.   Give some thought as to whether you might be the tutor. This can save a lot of money and be very rewarding in itself as you see your child progress, but be honest with yourself: do you have the time, energy and expertise to do dyslexia tutoring right? You may have to spend several weeks just preparing/training to deliver the first tutoring lesson.

3.   Do some research before selecting a tutor, including an interview of any candidates. You could literally be working with this person for years so be sure to carefully pick someone you enjoy working with. See below for questions to ask the prospective tutor.

Note: If there is a Scottish Rite center in your area, contact them to see if they have any open space at the moment. Their centers are usually free of charge and cater to dyslexic students.

Quick links to tutoring center lists

U.K. Tutoring Centres

U.S. Tutoring Centers

Canadian Tutoring Centres

Online Tutoring Centers

Finding a tutor—the hard part

Finding a good tutor through word of mouth is difficult. Finding one online can be even more difficult given the number of sites and lack of qualified tutors—very few know how to teach reading and spelling to a dyslexic student.

Regardless of where you live, here is our recommended path for finding a tutor:

Step by step

1. Ask for referrals from people you trust
   If you know someone who has had good luck with a tutor in your school or neighborhood, consider meeting with them to see if they might be able to help you as well.
   
   
2. Ask your school for a recommendation
   Teachers often know very good tutors.
   
   
3. Ask the person who conducted your psycho-educational assessment or equivalent for a recommendation
   
   
4. Search for local dyslexia tutoring centres in your area
   Some exceptional ones, like the Scottish Rite Foundation (Canada) and Children's Dyslexia Centers (U.S.), offer free tutoring for students with dyslexia—in some areas only.
   
   
5. Try an online service for finding in person tutors in your area.
   Be sure to scour the qualifications of any candidate for experience with the kinds of reading programs that work for dyslexic students

Remember, a dyslexic student needs intensive in-person tutoring, not someone on a phone or in a chat box. Wherever you search for dyslexia tutoring services, be sure to filter for in-person tutors with experience teaching dyslexic students with proven methods. 

What's a Good, Qualified, Effective Tutor Look Like?

Someone with suitable education and knowledge and experience of both the content and instruction methods required for dyslexic students This includes multi-sensory, systematic methods, usually based on the Orton-Gillingham approach and content that includes teaching phonemes, comprehension, fluency and spelling. For more details see our Dyslexia Treatment page.

Dyslexia tutoring centres

In some larger cities there are organizations that offer tutoring services for dyslexic students at a central location. In some cases they are even offered free of charge. Below are the U.S. U.K and Canadian lists as of Fall 2016.

Dyslexia tutoring centers United States

In addition to the centers below, U.S. residents can visit the Academic Language Therapy Association website and search for certified therapists in your area. This directory is comprised of educators who have met rigourous standards for just the kind of teaching that dyslexic students require. Note that not all persons in this directory will be tutors and that some states have greater representation than others. 

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Dyslexia tuition centres United Kingdom Despite far greater awareness of dyslexia in the UK compared to Canada and the US, there are surprisingly few dyslexia oriented tuition centres - at least ones that we could locate.  Most of the centres below do not specialize in dyslexia and some may not have dyslexia specialists on staff, but many do. Be sure to inquire with your specific centre. Know of other centres that should be here? Let us know!

Dyslexia tutoring centres Canada

Online tutoring centers

Improvements in bandwidth, cameras, microphones, monitors and the ubiquity of mobile devices mean that today anyone can be tutored from anywhere. While traditional educators will insist on in-person tutoring, the lure of being able to reach the entire globe will prove irresistible for educators. When it comes to this emerging kind of tutoring, the future is now.  

The location in which the service provider resides is provided below, but the services offered are technically available anywhere. Some restrictions may apply. Expect this list to grow in the near future.

Online Tutoring Centers

Interviewing a tutor

You should always interview a prospective tutor to make sure they will meet your needs. Here are some questions we suggest you ask:

1. Do you have experience working with dyslexic children/students?
   
   It's better if they do but more important is their training and their teaching method.
   
   
2. What approach or techniques do you use for teaching reading?
   
   This is the most important question. They really must be trained in methods proven to help dyslexic students.
   
   
3. Are you committed to working with my child/student over a long period?
   
   Dyslexia tutoring is not a quick fix and you should expect to be using a tutor for a long time. You don't want to switch tutors every three months. It can take a while for rapport between student and tutor to develop; once you have it, you want to keep it!
   
   
4. How will you involve us (parents) in the process?
   
   Don't just turn the keys over to the tutor, expect them to work with you, even if you're simply reading to your child each night or providing encouragement for the ongoing work.
   
   
5. How will you assess progress?
   
   Closing the gap between your child's reading ability and that of their peers is crucial. Be sure that your tutor is monitoring progress. But don't expect too much. Tutors are not trained assessors. Periodically you will need a professional re-assessment, ideally from your school.
   
   
6. How much do you charge and how do you wish to be paid?
   
   Be up front about costs and payment so everything is clear and understood.  Remember you're an employer now and your tutor has to buy groceries and pay rent. We suggest paying by cheque not cash, as this ensures a paper trail and  opportunity for tax breaks, depending where you live. 

The big picture

Be very clear on the objective of your dyslexia tutoring: closing the gap between your child's current reading ability and the average ability of their age equivalent peers, while hopefully learning to like or love reading along the way.

If your child is able to successfully close the gap and read at or close to grade level in terms of speed, fluency and comprehension, and enjoys some reading, then you will have reached your goal.

At that point, you can  reduce the number of weekly or monthly lessons or phase them out entirely.

The older the student, the longer tutoring will be required. This is why it's so important to catch reading problems early! 

Our story

After training to be parent tutors, we taught the first Level of the Barton Reading and Spelling System (Orton-Gillingham based) to my stepson but our busy schedules (ok, and some procrastination guilt from not consistently making the time for tutoring) lead us to hire a tutor in the fall of 2012. We were very lucky to find a wonderful teacher with a recent degree in education and a passion for helping kids read. She had been volunteering at our school—which is probably a good place to inquire once you start your search. More recently we changed tutors, but again have found a suitably trained teacher, actively working at a private school here in Ottawa.

Lessons we have learned so far:

• Remember that life will regularly get in the way of dyslexia tutoring - the tutor can't make it, it's soccer night, Grandma's birthday, someone is sick etc. So, be sure to schedule more lessons rather than less, at least two per week, but three would be better. Figure on at least 1-3 cancellations/postponements per month.
  
  
• My stepson hated it when the tutoring started right after school. Kids, just like any adult, appreciate a bit bit of downtime before more work. Schedule your lessons no earlier than one hour after school ends, if possible.
  
  
• Keep a log/record of dates and times tutored, and ask your tutor to keep one too because it's surprisingly easy to lose track of how many sessions you owe your tutor for. Even they might not know!
  

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