Turbo Start: A Dyslexia Curriculum for Newly Identified Students with Dyslexia

Turbo Start: A Dyslexia Curriculum for Newly Identified Students with Dyslexia is a nine-week, evidence-based dyslexia intervention that can be used as part of a standard protocol dyslexia instruction program. The Turbo Start program provides a jump start for newly identified students with dyslexia who need comprehensive dyslexia intervention while awaiting placement in an intervention group. Turbo Start addresses five specific evidence-based components of reading intervention. Each component is taught developmentally, using a direct, systematic, cumulative, multisensory method of introduction and practice to meet the specific needs of newly identified students with dyslexia. Turbo Start is a complementary dyslexia instruction program that provides comprehensive, intensive, evidence-based instruction for students who are identified off-cycle and addresses characteristic weaknesses of students with dyslexia to support optimal growth once placed in a sequential reading intervention program.

• Newly identified individuals with dyslexia of all ages.
• One-on-one or small group instruction (no more than six students).
• Use by a Certified Academic Language Therapist.
• Four days per week for 60 minutes per day for nine weeks

             or

• Five days per week for 45 minutes per day for nine weeks

Turbo Start contains the five components of effective reading instruction identified by research from the National Reading Panel. Turbo Start addresses each component by:

• Phonemic Awareness – following established procedures for explicitly teaching the relationships between speech-sound production and spelling-sound patterns.
• Phonics – providing a systematic approach for single word decoding.
• Fluency – using research-proven, directed practice in repeated reading of words, phrases and passages to help individuals read newly encountered text more fluently.
• Vocabulary – featuring multiple word learning strategies (definitional, structural, contextual) and explicit teaching techniques with application in text.
• Reading Comprehension – teaching individuals to explicitly use and articulate multiple comprehension strategies in narrative and expository text (i.e., cooperative learning, story structure, question generation and answering, summarization and comprehension monitoring).

• The Turbo Start program was developed for use as an off-cycle, drop-in dyslexia program.
• Turbo Start's content is derived from principles of evidence-based dyslexia instruction and provides foundational training in five specific components of reading intervention.
• Turbo Start provides flexibility in the intervention timeline to prepare students to enter dyslexia services in a group setting with fidelity.