Michelle Slater

Have you ever caught your child re-reading the exact same sentence three times during homework? Or maybe you’ve found yourself at 3:00 PM staring at a laptop screen, rubbing your temples as the words start to blur together? When reading or screen work feels like an uphill climb, our immediate reaction is often to blame a lack of effort, poor time management, or basic tiredness. But frequently, the real culprit is something quieter: hidden visual fatigue. To understand why reading can feel so...

Understanding the Role of Vision, Sensory Processing, and Access to Print A Question Parents and Educators Are Asking My child has dyslexia. Why do they still struggle to read even after receiving support? Or: If dyslexia is a language-based disorder, why does reading look so physically difficult for some children? These are important questions. They reveal something we sometimes overlook: Reading is not just about knowing sounds and words. Reading is an incredibly complex process that...

Reading is complex. While phonics and structured literacy are essential components of learning to read, successful reading requires much more than decoding words on a page. It requires the coordinated work of language, vision, attention, memory, sensory processing, and the ability to access information efficiently. Beyond Phonics is a research-based article series exploring the many systems involved in reading development and literacy success. This series is not about replacing evidence-based...