Tutoring

Four days a week, for almost two years, Frazer and Marmi Houff have been meeting for an hour a day.  She is well-trained in the Orton-Gillingham http://www.orton-gillingham.com/ method which helps dyslexics make sense of languages patterns and nuances in order to read, spell, and write.  A large part of what Marmi adds to the experience is root words in Latin and Greek (we recommend Rummy Roots and More Rummy Roots as as card games) and a comprehensive study of afixxes (either prefixes or suffixes).  Marmi presents much of what Frazer learns through games.  He has responded so well and is so diligent and persistent where I am not sure the other boys would be.  Frankly, I never knew what -ion meant (result of an action) or -en (to make) or many of the suffixes beyond number and tense.  And then to tie the affixes into the the part of speech such as -ion will make a verb a noun (which is more confusing to me than participles and gerunds).  Every day he meets with Marmi, Frazer ends the session with a drill deck of words that are broken in to syllable patterns.  It took him two years to go through the first deck (automacity is deemed at 100 words in 3 minutes).  He has almost finished the second deck (95 words as of today) in 6 months.  The progress is nothing short of astonishing if only judging him against himself.  And what else is there?  That's the best part of swimming.  I have really learned that there is so much value in even being able to inch towards inmprovement even if measured in hundreds of a second.  The road to Rome...

Frazer and I have been so lucky to have such a dynamic partner in his education.  I think this poor woman is in it for the long haul with Frazer.    We get along so well.  We are lucky!