Opinion ID: 613334
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Individualized Dyslexia Tutoring

Text: Approximately one month after Hawaii DOE denied Courtney eligibility for special education, Courtney took another informal reading test. Courtney performed very poorly on fourth grade level reading comprehension and even struggled to comprehend at the third grade level. Frustrated with Courtney's lack of progress, Courtney's mother, at the family's expense, hired Dr. Kathy Ferguson (Dr. Ferguson), who is certified to teach dyslexic students, to help Courtney improve her reading skills. Dr. Ferguson began tutoring Courtney in January 2007, the middle of Courtney's fifth grade year. Based on her initial assessments, Dr. Ferguson concluded that Courtney had a quite severe reading disability and that she read three grade levels behind. Dr. Ferguson provided Courtney with weekly dyslexia reading tutoring, which resulted in significant progress. By the end of her fifth grade year, Courtney approached reading proficiency according to a standardized state test. Moreover, Courtney performed better on informal reading tests, reading a fifth-grade-level passage with 95 percent accuracy and 50 percent comprehension at the beginning of the sixth grade. Before Dr. Ferguson's tutoring, Courtney read a fourth grade passage with only 90 percent accuracy and 10 percent comprehension.