Mixing up the sounds and syllables in multisyllabic words (aminal for animal, bisghetti for spaghetti)
Late establishing a dominant hand
Trouble remembering letter names and sounds
Trouble learning to count
Trouble with rhyming words
A history of reading problems in parents or siblings
Reading errors that show no connection to the sounds of the letters on the page—will say “puppy” instead of the written word “dog” on an illustrated page with a picture of a dog
Elementary school:
Slow, choppy, inaccurate reading
Skips or misreads prepositions (at, to, of)
Ignores suffixes (word endings)
Trouble memorizing a sequence of steps
Trouble reading unfamiliar words, often making wild guesses because they cannot sound out the word
Avoids reading out loud
Poor spelling
Young adult/adult:
Limited vocabulary
Very poor written expression
Large difference between verbal skills and written work
Poor grades in classes
Slow reader
May have to read a page two or three times to understand it
Dreads writing memos, letters, emails, etc.
A childhood history of reading and spelling difficulties
While reading skills have developed over time, reading still requires great effort and is done at a slow pace
Difficulty remembering names of people and places; confuses names that sound alike
Spoken vocabulary is smaller than listening vocabulary