Teaching non and pre-verbal kids to read?

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Hi everyone. I hope all is well. I was wondering if anyone had any experience teaching non and pre-verbal kids to read? I have a 3 year old ASD son who is very bright and loves letters. However, he is pre-verbal, and his verbal communication is probably at a 15 mo old level. I know that reading at 3 is extraordinary for even nt and non-hyperlexic children, but I want to begin the process because his speech delays are likely to persist for a while, but his cognition continues to grow. This has begun to lead to frustration. We use picture-based pecs and AAC, but honestly, his cognitive abilities have grown beyond what those can help him to communicate.

Any recommendations on how to teach him to read?

Thanks so much in advance!

Does pre-verbal mean he doesn't talk but you think he will start to soon? If so, why do you think he'll start soon? (Not suggesting he won't, but wondering what his skills are). Most 15 month olds have started speaking though, haven't they?

Anyway, one of my kids learned to read when he was non-verbal. He taught himself (hyperlexic), but what I think really helped him was spelling on the fridge with magnetic letters. I would read whatever jibberish he wrote with the letters and I think he figured out which sounds were created by which letters. We also did read to him a lot (and it never seemed like he was paying attention, but apparently he was, because he first started labelling objects featured in the "my first words" book). The PECS also have the word written on them, which I think helped too, because he did "stop", "go", "wait" as some of his first spelling words, and that was while looking at the PECS.

Thanks, WTH. I think he's pre-verbal because he jargons and makes word approximations, although no one but me would understand them. I think he's probably going to be labeled as having childhood apraxia of speech at some point, but none of the experts I've consulted thus far are willing to give the diagnosis before she 5. Sigh... I'll try your recommendations. Thanks so much!

Btw - how did you know that he had learned to read? By his manipulation of the magnetic letters?

I could read before I could talk. I think I learned when I was around 2 years old. My parents and grandparents read to me a lot so I guess I just picked it up. We knew because as soon as I started talking, I was able to read aloud.

I learned reading when I was two, before speaking.
My mother gave me picture books with pictures of things and words for them, then more and more advanced until I was reading at junior high level when I started school, still before speaking.
Reading didn't cause me to communicate more, but early learning of reading set the foundation for later speaking and verbal fluency.

Thanks, guys. But if you were so young and didn't talk, how did your parents know whether or not you could read? Normally, children would read aloud to demonstrate what they've learned. How can I know if doesn't speak?

My family didn't know until I started talking. Prior to that, when they read to me, I guess they assumed I was just looking at the pictures rather than learning to identify words and breaking them down to the sounds the letters made. I don't remember but from what I know about early childhood brain development, I think I saw each word as a picture/shape (and probably "read" by memorization of the word-pictures at first) before figuring out that each letter made a sound and when you put them together they made the words.

I think something similar to the My Baby Can Read program would work. It sort of creates a print-rich environment. Everything is labeled with its name so he would associate the word with the concrete object. After a while, you could test him by holding up an object and a couple flash cards and having him point to the name of the object.

For individual letters, if he has the coordination, you could teach him a simplified sign alphabet and teach him to associate the signs with the shape of letters. Like have a flashcard with the letter A on it and form his hand into the sign for A while saying the sounds A can make. I'd start with one sound for each vowel then you can build up to the different sounds (long A, short A. etc...). Trying to teach all the sounds a vowel can make at once can get confusing.

My son is hyperlexic, and though he was verbal, he was not exactly a fount of communication in the early years, if you know what I mean. Sometimes he would do it out loud, but mostly he was silent. He would scan text, and you could tell he was paying more attention to it than the pictures. He had no patience for analyzing the pictures for detail, but needs them for visual appeal.

If you were to watch a little kid read, they will go methodically through each page at a reading pace. If they aren't really reading they tend to flip willy nilly through the book, not necessarily sequentially, and will turn pages fast. Pay attention to what the child seems to be focusing on.

Some kids are good at phonetics and some take better to whole language (words as pictures.) Some are evenly skilled. It is hard to tell how well they take to phonetics before they are speaking well, but if they show an interest in letters and spelling, they'll use the magnetic letters to show you. I would work on both because it is really hard to tell in the early stages and both skills are really helpful.

Books that show labeled objects are great. We had a ton of those. My son loved them more than story books. They can be used to teach both methods.

My mother and grandmother read to me while I turned the pages.

My son was diagnosed as ?pre verbal? at 3, almost 4yrs. For him that meant he could speak but very, very rarely spoke(5-10 words in an entire day most days). He didn?t speak even for his needs met, but just at random times for his own amusement. Always in context though. It might just be a word or even a full sentence, but then back to happy silence and jabber. The couldn?t get anything out of him but one ?no?. I don?t know if he really was pre verbal or just because he wouldn?t speak for them that is what they called it.

About 6 mo later(he was speaking at about a 2 ½-3yr level by then) he showed us he could read. He brought his flash cards we had bought a year or two before trying to get him to speak. They had the pictures on one side and the word on the other. I took the packet of flashcards and was about to show him the picture and he said ?orange? and I looked down to see the word side was showing. I figured it was a fluke or he remembered that was the top one from the last time we did then a week or two before since he has really good memory. So I did the next one, he got that one too. I pulled one from the middle and low and behold he read that one as well. He insisted I go through the entire stack of 100 ish cards and he probably could read 30 or so. He made us do that for days. Since he was really into it, I downloaded sight word bingo and we worked on that with him. He would read words from books but most were too much to start with so I got smaller books(5-10 words per page and 5-10 pages) that focused on sight words and word families.

That was about 3 months ago and now he is reading at best I can tell a 1st grade level. It is great that he is reading, but what I am really grateful for is that it has helped his speech. He has started to use full sentences regularly instead of mostly nouns with an occasional verb when required. Also before he knew the word from ABA, but he wasn?t using them outside session or us requesting ?T-man what is this??. He was like your son and loved letters, so maybe this will work for him. It can?t hurt as long as he is interested. There are a ton of great apps too if he is tech motivated.

Is a focus on learning to read really appropriate for a 3 yo? Most NT kids aren't ready for reading until around age 5, and many in the homeschooling community think 7 is more appropriate. If a kid is naturally hyperlexic run with it, but why push so early otherwise?

Thanks again, everyone! ASDMommy, DrHousehasAspergers, and Setai - great recommendations! I will definitely try them.

Zette - I want to teach him how to read to expand his options for communicating with his. He is very bright, and is trying desperately to communicate. He points, grunts, and tries to make words, but they come out garbled. If he could read, he would therefore be able to point to words to indicate what he wanted. He can make already make choices based on receptive language, but we have to guess correctly to present the options. PECS books are bulky and limited as well. He's currently working with a speech therapist on an AAC program, but that also depends on my correctly programming the pictures in advance, and a lot of the pictures seem really confusing when compared to the word they're trying to describe. I would love it if he could have a book of words, like a baby dictionary that he could use until his language comes in.

Reading early isn't uncommon in my family. All of my siblings and I read before 4, as have all of my nieces (I don't have any nephews). So, if he fits that pattern, he should be capable. But because he can't speak yet, I really just don't know. But, please understand, I am not trying to turn him into some sort of genius (if he isn't already!). Instead, I'm looking for more tools. As I mentioned in my original post, his cognition is outpacing his currently available communication tools. What I didn't mention is that frustration is starting to set in and we are seeing a lot more tantrums.

Does he have apraxia? Signing can help if it's difficulty making his mouth work to say the words.

Thanks WTH - I like pre-verbal better too! I kind of feel like that's the word we should always use, since new skills can always develop.

Okay, it sounds like I should get some durable letters that he can play with. Now the question is how to keep track of them! He likes to hold things in his hands all day, so I can see me spending most of my days trying to track down missing letters! Sounds like so much fun.