Has your school told you they can’t test for dyslexia until third grade? You’re not alone. Here’s the part nobody tells you. That advice is wrong. In fact, according to a dyslexia therapist, waiting until 3rd grade is the most expensive advice you’ll ever get.
I recently sat down with Faye Casell, a certified dyslexia therapist with over 20 years of experience, and we unpacked several myths that keep parents stuck in a waiting game. Faye is an ALTA Certified Academic Language Therapist (CALT), a licensed dyslexia therapist in Texas, and, like me, she’s also a mom who has sat on the parent side of the IEP table. She’s been in those trenches too.
Let’s face it. The alphabet soup of credentials is confusing. OG tutor, CALT, CALP, reading specialist. What do they all mean?
A certified dyslexia therapist is someone who has completed roughly two and a half years of coursework, 700 supervised tutoring hours, submitted multiple recorded lessons, written 10 book reports, and passed a national exam. Faye jokes that submitting all of that work simply earns you the honor of sitting for the test. You still have to pass it. I would know, as I just received permission to sit for the Dyslexia Therapist exam. Now I have to review all my material.
Here’s why this matters to you. Being a dyslexia therapist isn’t homework help. It’s a rewiring of the brain. Scientists have taken brain images before and after therapy, and the intervention literally lays down new neural pathways. That’s intensive work, and you want someone trained for it. You want a dyslexia therapist.
But credentials are only half the equation. The relationship between the dyslexia therapist and your child is essential. There isn’t one right fit for every child, and a good dyslexia therapist will tell you that upfront.
Now for the myth that makes both of us a little crazy.
“We don’t test until third grade.” “She’s too smart to have dyslexia.” “He passed the beginning-of-year assessment.”
Sound familiar? Here’s what’s actually true. Under IDEA, the federal special education law that governs public education, you can request an evaluation at any age. Put it in writing, copy the principal and the special education director, and the school must respond. They either begin the evaluation process or they issue prior written notice explaining, in black and white, why they’re declining. You walk in with it in writing, and you walk out with it in writing.
And those assessments your child “passed”? Faye shared a story about a bright first grader who aced her spelling test on the diphthong oi sound. Impressive, right? Not quite. The little girl had figured out that every answer was either: oi or oy. She had a 50/50 shot. When Faye asked her to spell cow, she wrote c-o and then asked, “Is it a U or a W?” She was guessing. Brilliantly, but guessing.
A classroom test isn’t a dyslexia screening. Bright kids can hide struggling for years, and the tests they pass often aren’t measuring what you think they’re measuring.
My favorite moment from our conversation was Faye’s advice for IEP and 504 meetings.
Picture the school as a server at a very nice cocktail party, walking around with a plate of hors d’oeuvres. They don’t get to tell you that you must eat this or you can’t have that. You get to see the offerings. You get to think it over. You get to pass.
You can always table an IEP or 504 conversation and say, “I’m not ready to make a decision. I need time.” That pause is your right. It’s powerful. So don’t be afraid to tap the brakes.
Faye also shared a story about keeping your eye on the goal. Several years ago, she worked with a mother who fought her school for services from first grade to third grade. The mother did everything right. She requested testing. She got an independent evaluation that confirmed dyslexia. The school still pushed back. When it was finally over, Faye asked her how many hours the fight had taken.
Her answer? Upwards of 200 hours.
That’s heartbreaking! Two hundred hours is roughly the same number of hours a dyslexia therapist spends remediating a child’s reading. Two years of a malleable young brain, spent on paperwork instead of pathways.
This was not the mother’s fault. She was doing exactly what a loving parent does. But it’s why both Faye and I believe parents shouldn’t have to choose between fighting the school and helping their child. You can do both. Advocate on one track, and start intervention at home on the other.
Where do you go from here? Here are three small steps that you can take:
One more thing. If your child is in third or fourth grade and you trusted the school, don’t kick yourself. Everybody does it. You didn’t fail your child because it’s never too late. I trusted the school and my daughter wasn’t diagnosed until high school. So if you’re wondering whether your child needs testing, tutoring, or a dyslexia therapist, head over to The Literacy Keys and schedule a free consultation.
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