“Just sound it out.” “Say what?” Reading 101 for teens and young adults with ADHD

Decoding is the letter-sound relation used to pronounce written words. It’s also what some might call reading. By improving skills, readers develop the ability to recognize words quickly and identify words they haven’t seen before. There is an ongoing contention regarding decoding interventions. Some focus on translating print into speech by rapidly matching letters. Others find the key in the combination of letters (graphemes) to their sounds (phonemes).

Reading skills for teens and young adults have requirements beyond those developed for children.

• Develop both reading accuracy and automaticity.
• Focus on both narrative and expository materials (fiction and non-fiction).
• Write notes, emails, and texts, sounding out letters and words.
• Talk about irregular words seen online, in comic books, magazines, and class notes.
• Use spell check as a starting point. Remember…it’s good, but not perfect.