How I teach Dyslexic kids - Part 2

 

Even consonants are not spared.

Almost all the consonants too represent more than one sound.

When we correctly teach the sounds of letters — that is, without any extraneous “uh” or “huh” noises tacked on — many children still shut down if they haven’t first been taught the letter names. This is because a huge number of everyday words are actually pronounced using the sounds of the letter names themselves, not the isolated phonemes we drill in phonics lessons.

Examples: Be (B says its own name), bee, ceiling (C says “see”), deep (D says “dee”), eagle (E says “ee”), giraffe (G says “jee”), Jay, Kate, Pea, tea, beat, ape, ace, and many more.

I learned this the hard way, by watching the quizzical looks on my students’ faces whenever I read words that didn’t match the pure letter sounds I had just taught them. They knew the letter names perfectly (every child does), but without being told that those names carry real sounds used in real words, they simply couldn’t connect what I was saying to what they already knew.

This is exactly what happens in schools every day. The confusion builds up quickly. Children disengage, lose confidence, and many are swiftly labelled “dyslexic” when the real problem is incomplete — or outright incorrect — instruction. Instead of recognising that the teaching method failed them, the system blames the child’s brain. This pattern repeats across classrooms worldwide, turning bright, capable kids into “struggling readers” or “special needs” cases before they even have a chance to succeed.

From my own observations and the hundreds of stories I’ve shared on dyslexiafriend.com, this is not a rare exception — it is the standard outcome of mainstream early reading instruction. I call it Dysteachia, not dyslexia. The children are not broken — the method is.

Kids come to school already knowing letter names (from home, TV, songs, or play). When we skip or downplay those names and only drill isolated “pure” sounds (often with added “uh” noises like “cuh-ah-tuh”), they hit a wall the moment they encounter real words. The quizzical looks turn into frustration, then avoidance, then behavioural issues or withdrawal. Teachers and specialists then reach for the dyslexia label instead of fixing the foundational teaching gap.

From years of working with struggling readers, I’ve seen the same pattern repeatedly. When kids already know the letter names, correcting the sounds of the consonants becomes easy. They quickly drop the extra “uh” noises and start reading fluently. Teaching letter names first doesn’t overload them — it actually makes learning the sounds easier and faster. Research backs this up too: strong letter-name knowledge is one of the best predictors of later reading success.

The old British colonial method we grew up with in Malaysia got this right — teach the names first, then introduce the sounds (and show that the same letter can have several sounds). Children absorb it effortlessly just as Singaporean kids handle English letter names and sounds alongside hundreds of Chinese characters without any “cognitive overload.”

Bottom line: Stop blaming the child. Fix the instruction. Teach the full picture of letters — names and sounds — clearly and completely, without extraneous noise, and connect everything to real words early. The so-called “dyslexic” epidemic shrinks dramatically when we do. Bright kids can read. We just need to stop getting in their way. This isn’t theory — it’s what I’ve witnessed again and again.