Dyslexia Awareness Month: Understanding Dyslexia and Supporting Early Readers

Every October, Dyslexia Awareness Month shines a spotlight on one of the most common, yet often misunderstood, learning differences. Dyslexia affects up to 1 in 5 people (10–20%), yet myths and misconceptions still shape how many view reading difficulties. For decades, many reading programs were based on the belief that children naturally learn to read simply by being surrounded by books and stories. While a small number of children do acquire literacy this way, the vast majority — including those with dyslexia — do not. Most learners benefit from explicit, systematic instruction to develop the foundational skills required for fluent reading. For children with dyslexia, it’s crucial.

One common myth is that dyslexic children see words or letters “backwards.” Dyslexia is not a visual problem. At its core, dyslexia a language-processing difference that makes it harder to connect sounds to letters, blend them, and store words efficiently in memory.

Another myth is that if a child struggles, they just need to “read more.” Unfortunately, this approach can often lead to frustration and a loss of confidence. The issue isn’t effort, it’s access. Children first need to learn how the code of English works before they can read successfully and enjoyably.
Structured Literacy gives them that access.

Some well-intentioned but misinformed educators advise parents to read more to their children to help develop the child’s reading ability. Unfortunately, this advice is somewhat misguided. While reading to children is important for fostering a love of books and strengthening oral language skills, it does not teach the foundational skills, or mechanics, required to read (decode) and spell (encode) words independently.

The Importance of Early Identification and Support

Early identification of pre-literacy and literacy difficulties is crucial for helping children with dyslexia succeed. Even without a formal diagnosis, recognising struggles early—around ages 4 to 7—allows teachers and parents to provide the right support before reading difficulties become entrenched.

Many parents and educators may not know the early signs of dyslexia, but they often sense when a child is having trouble hearing, identifying, and working with sounds and words. Trust your instincts.

If you’re worried about a child’s reading difficulties, try our free dyslexia pre-screener for ages 5–7 at dyslexiatest.me.
• Quick and easy on any device
• No personal information required
• Provides a list of concerns and next steps
• Helps you decide if further assessment is needed

Why More Reading Isn’t Always the Answer

When a child with dyslexia struggles, it’s tempting to give them extra reading practice. But without the right foundation, more reading can increase frustration and exhaustion. Instead, children need targeted support to build the essential skills that form the foundation for reading and spelling.

Key Skills to Build Reading Success

Build Phonological Awareness

Help students develop an understanding of the sound structure of language—including sounds, syllables, and rhymes.

Within this skill set, phonemic awareness—the ability to hear and manipulate individual sounds (phonemes) in spoken words—is especially important. It is a key foundation for learning to read and spell.

Phonemic Awareness Examples:
• Phoneme Blending: “What word do these sounds make: /c/ /a/ /t/?” → cat
• Phoneme Segmentation: “Say all the sounds in the word man.” → /m/ /a/ /n/
• Phoneme Deletion: Initial: “Say stop. Now say it without the /s/.” → top
• Phoneme Substitution: “Say hat. Now change the /h/ to /b/.” → bat
• Phoneme Reversal: “Switch the first and last sounds in top.” → pot
• Phoneme Addition: “Add /s/ to the beginning of mile.” → smile

Develop Phonics Knowledge

Phonics teaches how sounds (phonemes) map to letters and letter combinations (graphemes). English has approximately 44 sounds but only 26 letters, and many sounds have multiple spellings.

For example, the long “a” sound in lake can be spelt in at least 8 different ways:
• a–e (cake)
• ai (rain)
• ay (play)
• a (apron)
• ea (break)
• ei (vein)
• ey (they)
• eigh (eight)

Because of this, learning which letter patterns to use for spelling takes longer than learning to read the word. That’s why it’s important to provide many opportunities to practice both decoding (reading) and encoding (spelling) together. Learning rules can help too!

Explicitly Teach Morphology

Children with dyslexia sometimes struggle to change words into different tenses (like run → ran or play → played). They may not automatically notice prefixes (re-, un-) or suffixes (-ed, -ing), but many show a strength in understanding word roots and meanings, especially when these are taught explicitly. Children with dyslexia can become fantastic word meaning explorers because morphology is connected to meaning, unlike those squiggly lines we call letters!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OAHUenKcNN0

This is called morphology—learning how words are made of smaller, meaningful parts. For example, understanding that act is the root in react, action, and actor helps children build vocabulary, improve comprehension, and feel more confident with new or challenging words.

Phonemic Awareness, phonics and morphology skills make a winning team!

When we explicitly teach phonemic awareness, phonics and morphology (providing explicit instruction in morpheme meanings and regular practice spelling words in different forms and tenses), we help the brain store these words permanently (also known as orthographic mapping). This means your child doesn’t have to sound out the same word repeatedly, which makes reading smoother, more enjoyable and easier to comprehend. 

Tip: Foster a Growth Mindset

It’s important to encourage a growth mindset by celebrating small victories along the learning journey. For example, when a student uses the wrong spelling pattern but produces the correct sound, acknowledge their progress:
“Great job! You used a pattern that makes the long a sound in the word rain — you wrote ‘ay’. That shows you understand that ‘ay’ can make the long a sound. In this word, it’s spelt with ai instead. You might not know that yet, but you’re really starting to understand how vowel patterns work!”

Then you can extend with a quick teaching prompt:
“Did you know that ai is a common spelling for the long a sound in the middle of a word, while ay usually comes at the end? For example, rain and day.”
Learn more spelling tips in Improve Your Spelling by Mike Jones or get the Nessy Reading and Spelling trial (FREE) to play engaging online games that make learning these skills fun!

Learn More and Get Support

Explore ways to improve your child’s reading and spelling and discover what support they may need. For free tools, resources, and expert advice, visit Nessy’s Dyslexia Resources.

Early intervention is Key

"Once children fall behind in the growth of critical word reading skills, it may require very intensive interventions to bring them back up to adequate levels of reading accuracy, and reading fluency may be even more difficult to restore because of the large amount of reading practice that is lost by children each month and year that they remain poor readers."— Joseph Torgesen, renowned educational psychologist and one of the leading experts in the field of
reading development and dyslexia.

Early screening and intervention can change that story. By identifying children who are struggling as early as ages 5–6, teachers can provide the right support before reading failure takes hold.

Top Tips for Parents and Teachers

Here’s how you can support struggling readers using Structured Literacy principles:

For Parents
● Choose decodable readers - books that only include words your child has learned to decode.
● Avoid guesswork; help your child “sound out” unknown words.
● Use audiobooks and read-alouds to build vocabulary and comprehension without adding stress.
● Celebrate small wins - confidence grows with each success.

For Teachers
● Use evidence-based instruction in Tier 1 (whole class) teaching.
● Provide explicit, systematic phonics lessons.
● Screen early and often to identify at-risk students.
● Target specific areas of weakness, rather than using one-size-fits-all methods.

Structured Literacy in Action: The Nessy Way

Nessy’s programs are built upon the Science of Reading and the Structured Literacy framework.

Through fun, interactive lessons, children learn:
● To hear and manipulate sounds
● To connect sounds with letters and patterns
● To build fluency through practice and repetition
● To develop vocabulary and comprehension through play