My 5 yr old daughter started Kindergarten this year. Up until now we have seen her as a very bright girl....she's
very socially mature for her age. In pre-school this past year we noticed she was having some issues recognizing letters. She got to where she could write her name easily enough and she knows those letters when she sees them. But it seems like if it's anything but that and AB&C she is at a complete loss. I have sat down with her and worked with her till I was about ready to crack.
It goes something like this:
Me: "What Letter is this <I draw a 'D'>?"
Her: "Ummmmmm.....I don't know. <
>"
Me: "OK....It's a 'D'."
Her: "Oh! It's a 'D'! <
>"
....Then I have her write the letter about 10 times and say the letter she's writing while she's writing it...
Me: "OK...Can you think of any words that may start with a 'D'? It makes a 'Da Da Da' sound."
Her: "Uhhhh....uhhh........no. <
>"
Me: "How about Dog? Dad? Dip? Darn (as in 'darned I wish you were better at this')?"
Her: "Oh! Ok! Dog! Dad! <
>"
Me: "Yeah That's it! <
> Now draw a dog and some D's on the same page and say 'D' while you write it."
....so now that we've focused on the 'D' for a while and we've done excersizes and examples etc etc etc....I decide to move on to a couple more letters....with about the same amount of success (being not much at all). THEN i come right back to "D" ....the letter we must have spent 20 minute on in total......AND SHE DOESN'T RECOGNIZE IT, FOLKS!!!
It's not like this is a fluke thing that she doesn't recognize the letter. We work with her all the time and every time it goes just like the above. We've even tried mixing things up and trying something different to see if it helps...like maybe she just learns in a different syle. She doesn't recognize the letters 10 minutes after we just went over it. I'm concerned that she may have a learning disability of some kind....i just don't know what it would be though. With regard to nearly everything else she's just a super kid.
Any suggestions? I'm all ears....or eyes....