Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Twice Exceptional Lindamood Bell - Seeing Stars

Anyone familiar with this program?

DS6 starts his second week tomorrow. I am impressed so far. I think for him his biggest gains will be in spelling. His decoding has come a long way already but his spelling is completely phonetic. On the fly he was able to correctly spell "spoil" and "bleach". Then they'll ask him to take a look at his mental picture and read the word if he removes the "p" in spoil or the "l" in bleach.

It is definitely stretching his weak working memory but considering he started last week with little chucks (change the "i" in "is" to an "a") and ended with longer words, it seems to be progressing.

This brings up another topic but I am going to start a new thread for that.

Our dyslexic dd's tutoring service uses it - I think it's the program that dd used when she was starting out with remediation, I know for sure that it was what was recommended at her initial eval but to be honest, once she started her tutoring, I paid much more attention to what specific skills she was working on each time and can't remember whether or not any of it was part of Seeing Stars.

FWIW, remediation has helped dd quite a bit - although she's also been through tutors, and the background/depth of experience/personality of the tutor all made a *huge* difference in terms of how quickly she made progress.

polarbear

I looked into it for my DD back when she was in elementary. It wasn't what my needed for support but I've heard good things about it. When my DD was in elementary my school district had a dedicated special ed Lindamood Bell class for kids in younger elementary.

Update -

Well, he has finished his second week and it is still going well. At the end of K his teacher said his reading level was beginning second grade.

This week at Lindamood Bell, he was done with second and heading through third.

I am not sure I put a lot of stock in reading levels. It seems like one person's second grade could be another person's third. They all look about the same to me. Perhaps they are more standardized than I realize. Nonetheless, grade levels aside, I can see a lot of improvement.

Another interesting development is that his school teachers are going to visit the center and meet with his tutors to discuss his progress. Additionally, his tutors are going to visit his school in the fall for a follow-up. It is a nice step to get everyone on the same page.

DD11 has been seeing a private tutor for the past four months. She uses Lindamood Bell and Orton-Gillingham. We are seeing fantastic results already!!

Question I am afraid to ask...

How much does the Lindamood-Bell tutoring cost? What is the investment for, say, one year tutoring twice a week?

DD7 is being worked up for a reading disability. She is reading at grade level which is torturously awkward for her. The school district has been dragging their feet for a full year and we are only now on the list for testing and possible services in September.

We are hopeful the district will foot the bill, but... we are willing to invest if necessary.

I see they have a summer special for $295 for testing...

I used to work for them at one of their clinics, and then later at a special clinic set up within a school district where I was employed by that district rather than by Lindamood-Bell.

If you're enrolled at one of their clinics, they generally have a minimum of 4 hours a day, 5 days a week, for 4 weeks. Depending on the location, it's about $80 an hour. So you're looking at $6400 for 80 hours over 4 weeks, not including testing fees.

I didn't know of any students who went for only an hour or two a week, but you can always ask at your local clinic. The only student I heard of who was enrolled less than that amount was a 4-year-old with no apparent learning difficulties who did 2 hours a day for a total of 10 a week. She didn't need it but her mom wanted to pay so....

Thanks, W'sMama, I called and they cost $112/hour. They usually suggest 4 hours/day for 4 weeks for just under $9000 for a month of intensive tutoring.

Funny, if you suggest $9000 for a year of tutoring once or twice a week with the same result offered - rapid progression - it sounds more palatable.

I am going to get her evaluated for $295 and make a decision from there. We have checked into other avenues privately and through the school, so here we are at Lindamood-Bell. Seems many parents here with ADHD-dyslexia-challenged learners are realizing some reading success with their methods. I'm looking forward to hearing what they have to offer.

Holy wow! That's nuts. I'd gladly tutor your kid for $112 an hour for just a couple hours a week! Note that they're paying the actual tutors (clinicians) a tiny fraction of that amount. You might want to try putting out an ad for a tutor who's been trained in L-B, and offer $30 an hour or something. Most of the people who work there are just college kids who've had a 2-week training session.

Seablue, our dd's tutor (using Seeing Stars) costs $100/hour, but dd only sees her once per week. When she started it was recommended that she see the tutor twice per week, but we had to opt for only once per week due to dd's schedule (and the tutor's already packed client schedule :)). As I mentioned previously, dd made very little progress with her first tutor, and rapid-fire progress with her latest tutor (both through the same office). Each child's needs are going to be individual, but for a HG/+ child, depending on where he/she is at now, I suspect there might be a trade-off somewhere in the amount of bang-for-your-buck you get with 4 sessions per week vs perhaps 2. Does that make sense? I think if we'd sent dd in for 4 sessions per week she would have burned out on it to a certain extent. Instead she had time during the week for the new concepts/words/etc to sink in before the next session. Plus reading was not fun for her *at all* - this was total work and total drudge up until a certain point when things became much easier (and when she had her new tutor :)).

polarbear